Lets back track to 9th of March

Posted on April 18, 2015 by Lily Bingham-Davis

Weeks starting 9^th of March

After scrapping the idea of a Ghost Walk we came up with a new idea based around CCTV cameras specifically the one on the corner of the Magna Carter. We thought that it would be interesting to look at people and how they crossed the space, thinking about why they were there, where they were going or coming from and how they actually crossed the space.

We decided to base and call the piece after something a group member heard on one of our Site Specific lessons as we were walking in a large group. The passer-by said “Nothing happens here apart from us”. We wanted to capture ‘us’ so we decided that an interesting way to do that would be to use time lapse photography and turn them into videos, by doing this we could show our subject (everyday people) happen slowly, yet when put into a time lapse video creates a smooth impression of motion. A subject that changes quickly is transformed into rush of activity.

Taking time lapses from these 4 directions will hopefully allow us to capture different angles of activity in the square. We are also thinking about having a live feed for the actual performance and having a laptop stationed in one of the Magna Carter pubs windows, so audience members can come and see a time lapse video that is happening at that moment or we are also thinking about having one of us wear a GoPro that could follow different people around the square. Alongside this we will have 2 people in the square holding iPads that will be showing the time lapses we have taken and the other 3 people will be moving around the square following people as they cross or will be wearing a GoPro doing the same thing.

We also had an idea of recording voices to layer over the time lapse videos which would give the videos more of a purpose and depth, we would do this by having headphones connected to the iPads so the audience could come to watch and listen.

Developing Ideas

Posted on April 6, 2015 by Charlie Watts

Following Conan’s feedback we had a creative period of 3 weeks that spawned a lot of creative ideas. For example during this period we had the idea of using the CCTV Camera, this stayed until the final piece as Tania and Lily were turning with the CCTV camera whilst holding the iPad and Go Pro to present a metaphor to the audience regarding CCTV cameras always following you.

We also thought of the mapping idea during this period, this was vital to our performance as we could now not only follow the members of the public but also mark their exact whereabouts and give results to the audience and intrigued people at the end who could’ve ended up in our performance.

Conan Specific Performance

Posted on March 18, 2015 by Charlie Watts

On Wednesday 18th March, our group had to give a presentation to Conan, who is the second marker for our site specific performance. We had to give a presentation, clearly stating our idea to Conan, to make sure we are on the right tracks when it comes to our idea. After the last rehearsal we had on Monday 16th March, we were confident that we had a well thought out and well organised plan and mini performance to show Conan. As we decided who was holding the 4 iPads and what time lapse footage we were going to use, as we spent most of Monday recording more footage. With a successful rehearsal behind us, we were confident at the start of our presentation, as we knew who was doing exactly what and also we were confident on explaining why we were going to do these ideas in our performance.

Lucy and Brittany started explaining our idea of using time lapsed footage on 4 iPads to the general public, to show them how they use Castle Square as a place throughout a certain time period of 4 months, to show the evolution of people’s daily journeys and habits in a communal place in the city such as Castle Square. After that clear introduction, Me, Tania and Lily explained our parts in the process and performance, for example Lily and Tania explained how they were going stand and interact with the audience whilst holding the iPads which were showing the footage. Finally I explained my part in our idea, I would be documenting the piece by taking photographs of the audience interaction between them and the 4 participants holding the iPads, to show how the public would react by witnessing footage with them potentially be included as accidental audience.

When our presentation was over, it was time for Conan’s feedback. There were certain bits of positive criticism, Conan liked the idea of using footage to mirror what the general public do in an unsuspecting and natural way. However he did find problems and gave us constructive criticism, such as our movement, he said we should be moving more or it will just look like 4 people holding iPads for half an hour. Also the main ideas he wanted us to include in our piece is using the CCTV camera in our piece, as we are interested in looking at how the general public act everyday, and CCTV cameras do that all the time, with the public being unsuspectingly filmed.

Conan wanted us to include more of the space of Castle Square, including the idea of directions, as Castle Square has 4 directions to go in and every member of the public is different and going a specific way for different uses. To conclude Conan gave us a lot of constructive criticism to work on in the upcoming weeks, if we experiment with most of his ideas, I believe our piece can be a well rounded performance disguised as a social experiment showing exactly how the public use Castle Square.

Documenting the Space

Posted on March 15, 2015 by Tania Smart

After watching Tehching Hsieh create a documentation of his art, my group and i felt inspired and took inspiration from this and decided to create our own documentation of our space. We have started to film time lapses of each of our four main angles on Castle Square; almost as though we are taking on the role of the CCTV camera. We are interested in documenting as much as we can so that we can discover different behaviours and attitudes from people at different times of the day, we will eventually pick out a diverse range of time lapses and present them back to an audience.

Hsieh mentions “Life is passing time, life is free thinking” (Das Platforms, 2014) I believe this quote relates to our piece nicely, as we are filming our videos over a period of time and when we present them back to an audience it could also create awareness of how fast time is moving and how most of the people captured in the time lapses are unaware they are on camera and are in a natural state of “free thinking”.

Documenting our space on a regular basis will give us a deeper knowledge and understanding of the activity that regulates it. We have decided to include some of the documentation into our final performance. This will allow us to present the space back to the audience. Making them question what the space would be without them.

We will achieve this by placing four of our group members in our four significant spaces within Castle Square. Each of the four members will be holding an iPad which will be playing back specific time lapse videos from our documentations, creating another layer to the performance. It will be similar to us presenting CCTV footage back to the public. For this performance we will require an accidental audience.

Das Platforms (2014) Tehching Hsieh: One Year Performance 1980-1981. [online video] Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tvebnkjwTeU [Accessed 7 April 2015].

Castle Where? Castle Square!

Posted on March 10, 2015 by Tania Smart

To get familiar with our new space we decided to do a number of tasks and subtlemobs in it. In particular we put into practice Mike Pearson’s Some Exercises Towards Relating Space, following these instructions allowed us to discover interesting and unique pinpoints of the area. We found ourselves particularly attracted to the CCTV camera that hangs over The Magna Carta pub. We spent a whole rehearsal analysing it and following its every move. We started to think deeper regarding the CCTV camera. We became intrigued with the way the camera moved and the angles it would record. From this we acknowledged four main points of Castle Square that the camera kept returning too. These were: the road going down steep hill, the area that covers the ground before the cathedral, the area that covers the ground before the entrance of the castle and upper steep hill. As the camera mainly tackled these areas, we believed that they must be significant to the space, therefore we made the decision to include these crucial placements into our performance.

The top of the hill

Documentation from a Site Specific Performance Project in Lincoln, UK (2015)

Category Archives: Nothing happens here apart from us