Good Indeed

The other  day I found this great performance in the public setting called The Pedestrian Project by New York artist/designer Yvette Heijne. The performers are acting out every day life, but it has a great impact because of the costumes they are wearing which resemble the traffic light icons for pedestrians. Brilliant!!

It has been a busy and fruitful week!

On Monday I did a workshop with the students from the Black Nordic Theater. We worked with the problems from knotreally.tumblr.com and came up with several different approaches to use them to bring reflection upon our behavior. It is interesting to see how Design can meet Theater and Theater can meet Design. I think both fields have a way of storytelling and we will merge them together to come with a new way of expressing! We will go out and experiment with social dialogue in the public space on the 4th of February, so be aware!!

Then on Thursday I had an interim meeting with the external examiner, who gave some good criticism telling me to think about my end result and how I am going to communicate my ideas and process in a clear and exciting way. Also clarifying what the design in my project is, since it is very theoretical and about the process and method. In my view the design in my project is design thinking and experimenting with this in all kind of different settings: open-closed, direct-indirect, professional-guerrilla, in order to find creative solutions in the process. Another thing he mentioned is that I should be thinking about how I am going to present this at the End of the Year Show.  In other words: what am I going to end up with? I have several ideas about this 1) a Design Method for Change ( a manual), where I am the neutral agent bringing reflection to cause change 2) Event. If all my plans work out I would like to bring it all together in a happening, which is social, playful and reflective. For instance the SOCIAL EVENT, but also when thing don’t work out, I think I should do it anyway and call it the NONE EVENT or the Unsuccessful Event to draw out the conclusions!

Yesterday I had a meeting as well with Louder, a marketing agency. There I will do a workshop as well. This will be all about provoking creativity. Especially since they would like to include the whole office more into the creative process and now it are mainly 3 persons doing that. My challenge is to challenge the team in a playful way to put their fears aside and dare to come up with ideas without judgement.

This project is very inspirational and a nice approach to the cliche and commercial things you usually see at valentines day. A nice way to use social dialogue and think about/value their love. Maybe this could be something for me to use in an installation. Curious to see what the outcome will be check I love you more

They keep an eye on things. They observe. They witness. They gather evidence. They place sites of political importance and key landmarks under surveillance. They watch the Watchers. Each mission is a unique response to the architecture and the people of the city. When they arrive in a city they transform it, appearing on rooftops and in doorways. In places of political or architectural interest, commandeering their own limousines, their own brass band, once even their own helicopter.  From www.clodensemble.com

I really like this and I think as inspiration this could be valuable for project in a way that they are dressed the same which gives recognition (good for the viral part). They are acting out a certain behavior and that I can connect to the problems I have received and the selfish behavior I would like to change. Furthermore the Clod Ensemble transform the setting by their presence. I would like to try this in the parks,  public transport, city centre, Karl Johan, Opera, etc.

I am preparing for the 1-afternoon workshop for theater students. To engage them in my project and experiment with theater as a social intervention. It will be challenging since I have no experience with teaching nor theater. But isn’t that the thing? We all don’t have the experience of a social conscience. And that is what I want to explore.
With these students I need to be specific, a director, strict and playful at the same time. Let them be the theater in the public space acting out their role. The one I am writing for them. I will need costumes of accessories of some sort. They have to make these simple attributes come to live.

The criticism the theater teachers gave me was- next to me having no experience and what the pedagogical value could be- that it is too much I want to do with these actors. It needs more background and introduction, they say. Time is ticking (away) in my project, but also in the world. If the whole world needs to be educated elaborately with loads of information, change will take forever. I think there is an easier way. It just needs to be found. Now I am wondering, cause I am of the opinion that it should be easier for creative people to relate to these global problems, but sometimes it seems to me that in this setting the ego gets even more ahead of us than in the non-creative scene. Maybe I am wrong. I hope I am.

Important for me when working with theater is to be aware of who is reading and what has been read (which is part of the evaluation afterwards) . Step outside what is known. Define for myself what the design is in this social theater situation.

if you want to see what people wrote on the papers in the bus stops click here a link to my flickr account

I found this wonderful project of Lauren Currie via Kate Andrews. What a great idea of positive interaction and social dialogue!! Click on the link to see the movie

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