ISEA talk

The ISEA talk was fine! But even better was meeting so nice and interesting people there!

Soon, I'll post more info about the talk here.

Place, identity and Culture

At the moment I am studying for making a PhD proposal. The area in which I am researching is place, identity and culture. My interest started while doing this project, so it is kind of a continuity of this project.

I'll keep posting here some quotes I come across that I find interesting and relevant to the subject of this blog.

“(…) migrants are not ‘exceptional’ people – ‘others’. On the contrary (…). Nowadays, in the western world, only a minority of people are born, live their entire lives and die in the same rural community or urban neighbourhood.” (Massey and Jess, A place in the world, 1995, p.7)

“the migrant’s sense of place and of personal identity often involves a duality – ‘here’ and ‘there’ – which is an important aspect of their lives. When they are abroad they tend to identify with home, when they are home they identify with abroad.” (Massey and Jess, A place in the world, 1995, p.29)
-- This quote I could relate myself. I just came back from Brazil, where I come from. I went there after almost 2 years I'm leaving in the UK. Although I try to keep my mind the most open as possible to see and accept the differences between the two places, and I'm always questioning national culture, when I was there I could relate myself to my life here, the culture I am leaving here. And when I am here, I relate myself to the culture there. I guess it is just a matter of I'm related to the two (and of course more than two) cultures.


More quotes to come.

You are welcome to leave your comment.

What have you left behind? on Twitter!

Now What have you left behind? is on Twitter!
Everytime we are leaving something behind from making small decisions to big decisions. So, if you come across something you left behind, twitter to @whatileftbehind

Contribute sending what you left behind to @whatileftbehind

Click to follow: http://twitter.com/whatIleftbehind

(*note the name to send the twitter is "What I left behind" for number of characters reason.)

Next event: ISEA Conference

The next event I'll be participating with this project is the ISEA Conference, in Belfast.

I'll have a talk there on the 28th August at 12pm about the process, development and outcomes of this project.


To see the full program or other info about the conference: [click here] (I'm in page 20 of the full program)

Are you coming to the Conference? Let me know and we can meet there.

Degree Show - photos

Next event: Degree Show!

Come and visit me in the degree show this week.

20 to 25 June
(Saturday to Thursday)

Place: 'TV Studio' - D block - UWE Bower Ashton Campus.

I'll be there with the notebooks, the website, a projection showing a funny making of video, the big notebook to take part.

For more info about the event at:
http://www.uwe.ac.uk/sca/view/

Bristol Design Festival - check

Bristol Design Festival finished today.

Report:

• 95 people took part in the big notebook (more than expected);
• 3 pens are gone (it's part of it);
• all the notebooks safely back;
• lots of postcards / business cards given away;
• 5 post-its with the title of my project in the wall "what you most liked in the BDF?" (as soon as I could see);
• lot of enthusiasm earned from watching people interacting with my project;
• good direct feedback;
• my desk is back to my room;

;)

Overall: Positive!

Sound!

The website has sound now! Me and Ben Mitchell (who comes from animation/sound) stayed here the whole day yesterday recording, editing and mixing sounds made out of paper, pen, books.

I'm very pleased with the work we've done! It's amazing how sounds from tapping on paper, closing a pen, ripping paper, leave a book fall on the floor,... can become such a good resource for rhythm just by isolating and mixing together.

Thank you very much, Ben!

The record was all made with normal microphone (a Guitar-hero microphone, to be very honest) and it worked quite well for the quality I needed.

Check it out!
www.whathaveyouleftbehind.com

Get a Postcard!

I'm sending a few postcards abroad to distribute the website address and invite people for the next events.

Would you like o recieve a (free) postcard?
Give me a shout: marianamota@marianamota.com

If you're somehow involved in the project, you're already going to receive one soon.

Or get a digital post-card [clicking here]!
And help me distributing the project.

(open the jpg, click with right button and save in you computer. Ready to send image by email)

Website online - a preview

Take a first look at the website!

www.whathaveyouleftbehind.com

It's a preview as there are a few changes still to be made.

But you can enjoy the preview. ;)

Bristol Design Festival

Please, come and visit me at the Bristol Design Festival.

06 - 11 JUNE 2009
10:00 - 19:00

The Old Fire Station
Bridewell Island
Silver Street
BS1 2PY
Bristol




















You'll see: The website, the notebooks, and a big notebook where you can contribute with your story during the event.

It's been great to hear direct feedbacks and see that people are interested in the project. :)

Should this project be in a Design festival?

Something that makes me wonder from the time I submitted this project to a design festival is if this project should be exhibited in a design festival. And this fact is something I am still anxious about. What makes me a bit more relaxed is that the feedbacks I got from people so far was good, and could see people interested in the project. But I wonder how people perceives this project in this exhibition.

I wonder if when general public go to a design festival, if they expect to find beautiful, digital, shiny and sometimes "eye-candy" design. Am I underestimating the public? Do I have a wrong idea of what the public expects? Sometimes I wonder if people have in mind that design is about the process, the concept. As applied art, design have the tools to make people question, see from another perspective, get something from that. I am not speaking about commercial design which has specific commercial goals to achieve and works together with marketing. I'm speaking about design that is exhibited as "this is the design we have at the moment", "this is what designers have been doing".

Particularly, I've been quite disappointed in a few design exhibitions I've been in the last months (not in the BDF though, let me make it clear), especially because I keep seeing special effects, projects that are more concentrated in the aesthetics and keeps in a superficial level. This repeats over and over again. This project is not about the aesthetics at all, apart from the fact that I do want to question that and say "yes, this was hand-made", "Yes, it's made by human to human in the most basic level."

So, I wonder... should this project be in an art exhibition instead, or does it make any sense being in a design exhibition? What do you expect when you go to a design exhibition?

Please, help me out, let me know your opinion.

A short look on the website set up

Take a short look on the website set-up (animation pixalation). Please, disconsider the breaks between the videos and a few more details, which I'm still working on.

http://www.whathaveyouleftbehind.com/test/index_test.html

At the moment, I'm working on:

- How these videos work better in the Internet (video extension x quality x file size);
- The sound for this set up (I'm trying to get sounds made out of paper);
- The black background will be a photo of a black paper.
- I'm working on the sentences that will appear on the notebook area, and the videos of the drawing map.

Screenshots

A few screenshots of the website:

Notebooks exhibition

Photos of the exhibition of the notebooks in the International Day of Sharing Life Stories that happened in the university (UWE, Bristol).

(22 notebooks that I collected back from sending abroad to people in different parts of the world.)


(the two sketch books with the whole development the project)

The next exhibitions will be in the Bristol Design Festival and the Degree Show, Faculty of Creative Arts, UWE. I really hope I'll see you there!

International Day For Sharing Life Stories

This project is taking part in the International Day for Sharing Life Stories (http://www.ausculti.org) this year, registered under Bristol, UK through the University of the West of England.

To celebrate the International Day of Sharing Life stories, we will be screening a series of digital stories from around the world, which will take place in our seminar on the afternoon of 19th May at the Bower Ashton campus, University of the West of England Bristol (Directions to get there: click here, or ask me).

I'll be there with this project (website + notebooks) from 2pm on, so please come along!

I hope to see you there!

Creative Arts Degree Show 2009

Annual showcase of work by final year undergraduate and postgraduate students from the School of Creative Arts, University of the West of England, Bristol.

I'll exhibit this project on the Degree show from the 20th - 25th June. I'll be there with the website, the 22 notebooks, two sketch books, a notebook available for anyone who wants to take part and a special screening with the making of.

So, please, come and visit me! I'll be there just waiting for you. :) Drop me an email if you're coming so I make sure I don't leave the room on that time.

Directions to get there: click here, or ask me.

For more information about the event:
http://www.uwe.ac.uk/sca/view/

ISEA Conference

Great news! I'll be giving a talk about this project in the ISEA - International Symposium on Eletronic Art - in Belfast on the 28th August at 11am.

I'll be talking about this project, the outcomes and discuss the authorial decisions made along the way, in order to consider ways of representing ideas about identity and belonging in a globalised and digital world.


More information about the conference, please access: www.isea2009.org

Let me know if you're planning to go to the conference and I'll meet you there!

Bristol Design Festival

I'm very happy to say that my application was successful and therefore I'll be exhibiting this project (the notebooks + website) at the Bristol Design Festival

6 - 11 June
10:00 - 19:00

Address:
The Old Fire Station
Bridewell Island
Silver Street
Bristol
BS1 2PY
[see map]

For more information about the festival, please visit: www.bristoldesignfestival.com

I hope to see you there! :D

Short preview

Just a short preview of what I am working at the moment. Editing the website build-up.


Just a small preview in a very low-resolution.

Website release: Coming soon!

Release of the website - delayed

I am very sorry for the late notice, but because I had a problem with my external Hard Drive (it has just stopped working), where I kept all the original video files, the release of the website will be delayed. The release then will be soon. Many apologies for the ones who contributed and are waiting to see the outcome of this project. The website will be online soon.

Creative way to answer it

Photo by Sophie Klevenow

Just received this picture from my friend Sophie. Funny way to answer the question! :D Thanks, dear! Very nice! Hahahah.

The Nomads Map

Click here to see the original size and download, print, etc.

This is the map I created by taking lines from the national borders of the world map and made what I'm calling as "The Nomads Map".

Using a transparent paper, I put it on the world map and drew pieces of lines from the country's borders. Then, I changed the position of the paper (turned upside-down, went to another place in the world map) and drew another piece of line, and so on.

The concept was to break national borders to create a new map. In this map, I'm showing that this project shows part of the nomads map and that the map goes beyond the frame.

News

Hm... what shall I say about it... Well, I don't think it is funny.

European art causes controversy
An art installation at the European Union Council building in Brussels, which is meant to poke fun at European stereotypes, is proving to be highly controversial.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7827762.stm

Handed in! Phew!

I've been absent from this blog in the last week. Basically I was finishing my piece to hand it in on Wednesday (21/01), so it was a crazy marathon finishing that for the hand in and I was absent from anything apart from the Adobe Flash, Adobe AfterEffects, my camera and my Critical Evaluation essay. Basically I had one week for the post-production of the video, which is a really short time, especially because I've never worked with video editing before. So I was making it until the Tuesday night (which I had no sleep at all) to be able to fit the schedule and not miss the assessment. Those who knows me knows that this is atypical for me. I usually take the last two days just to make the finishing adjustments. This project was quite unusual in many ways.

Nevertheless, I'm back to life again. And if I say that I finished the project, I said wrong. It is done for the assessment but there are still things I'm going to change and get better to put available online. The deadline for it to be completely and beautifully done should be on the 11th of February, as previews planned.

I'll try to put a first sight available here, so you can take a look at what I handed in and what I need to change and get better.

About the project

This project is my final project of the Master in Interactive Media, at University of the West of England, Bristol.

It is about stories of nomads, people that are constantly moving and leaving things behind. It is a collection of stories by people from and in different parts of the world who wrote about what they have ever left behind.

I’m trying to show and communicate in this project that not only people who move from place to place should be seen as nomads, but we all should see ourselves as nomads, as foreigners, as we do not have roots and we are not attached to any land, and we are in constant movement, no matter if it is by moving from place to place or just because time goes by. Therefore we are all moving forward and leaving things behind.

“(…) The foreigner lives within us: he is the hidden face of our identity, the space that wrecks our abode, the time in which understanding and affinity founder. (…) The foreigner comes in when the consciousness of my difference arise, and he disappears when we all acknowledge ourselves as foreigners, unnameable to bonds and communities.” (Kristeva, Stranger to Ourselves, 1941, p 1)

My aim in this project is to focus on individuals rather than their nationalities and to break national borders. To see people not by where they come from, but as another human being.

To achieve that, I sent notebooks abroad to people in different parts of the world with the question “What have you left behind?” and asked them to fill in a page and pass the notebook to another person. After one month, I collected about 130 testimonies from people from different countries, from different social, cultural and educational backgrounds.

After collecting the data, I developed a website to present this content I’ve received, and also to try to communicate my point of view.

What have you left behind? - story of nomads by nomads
www.whathaveyouleftbehind.com

Test/Simulation + First layout

This is part of the test I did yesterday (with no proper tripod, bad light and bad crop) but just to see how the animation will work and to help me planning for the proper shooting tomorrow.

This is the loading part.


This is after loading (building up the website, but there will be a "skip intro" for the returning users).


The idea is to have something like this:

The map will be the video and all the other element will be above it.
I'll explain the things about this test (like sizes of button, interaction between the elements, etc) soon.

I'm now preparing the things to film tomorrow. But at least you can get a sense of the website.

The project is getting a shape now. I'm very pleased and positive with the final layout. Using the proper lighting, tripod, etc, I believe it's going to be very interesting and beautiful really.

Shooting... Test

I did a test of shooting/record today to prepare to shoot on Wednesday. This means that I need to buy some material tomorrow and spare material in case the pen ends, the map is ripped, or whatever.

By the way, I've never imagine that rip a paper for the layout would be so difficult. No because the paper is hard or anything, but the piece I'm ripping can't be completely difform. It has to be just a bit, and this "just a bit" sometimes makes me waste more paper than I should. But I got the way now. It is basically draw a line in pencil of the size (more or less) that I want and rip it very slowly. Worked quite well.

Oh, another thing that is ridiculous to think of is that I have to prepare my nails to film, otherwise it will be more on focus than it should. It's ridiculous, isn't it? To think that when there is so much to do. The price of being a hand's model. Hahah. :P

Anyway, some things I've noticed that I have to do:
- Put blue tack at the back of each small paper even if it's for just one picture.
- Cut the paper in it's fiber, for the larger areas of the piece
- Mark the pages of the notebooks for me to open it, otherwise the blank pages will appear much more than the interesting ones.

I'll post here the simulation soon. I'm preparing what I recorded now.

Storyboard

I'm planning the storyboard to record the film and take the pictures on Wednesday in a studio. My friend, generously is going to help me in this and open her studio to me.

It's the first time I work with video, especially being the big part of the website, so there are some things that I really don't know what to expect and how to make it work effectively. So, at this moment I need to work collaboratively and get some help.

I need to plan everything not to waste time. So, this is how I'm planning (click to see it bigger).

Although the part of constructing the website seems to be very long, everything will be fast-forward. I'll try to make as much reduced as possible and even cut some parts if necessary.

Here is the the layout when I stop making the page, and actually start the website.








I'll post a simulation of the final layout here soon.