The Exhibition for this Artefact was Thursday 1st to Friday 2nd June 2006,
Reading Campus, TVU

 

Introduction

This module was split into two sections: Proposal Presentation (completed) and Development of an Artefact. This essay seeks to explain the development of concept and give a post-analytical summary of the exhibition for the artefact ‘Miniature Index’. Most of this will be done within this essay but an accompanying short film on DVD will support this work and can be found inside the submission pack. If you are reading this without the pack email: paul.glennon@tvu.ac.uk

The logic behind splitting this module into a project proposal and final artefact is simple and effective – present an emerging idea halfway through the module, then develop that idea into an actual working artefact. As the artefact for this work culminated in an exhibition, it is recommended that the DVD is watched either before or after reading this essay.

Beginnings

The initial proposal started as a film in a box. The film explained intentions through the use of a small screen implanted inside a hand-made box isolating the screen. A documentary-style short, filmed on a mobile, entitled ‘Paul’s Wee World in a Box’ was the actual mobile phone screen itself, embedded inside the structure. View this link. The point of the box was to give people an insight into the mind of Paul Glennon.

The box was influenced by Marcel Duchamp’s ‘Valise’ (Suitcase) series that house miniature re-creations of his artworks. In ‘Paul’s Wee World in a Box’, the structure became a miniature ‘one person film theatre’. (The word ‘Miniature’ came from feedback from Mike Barker, the tutor for this module, in reference to the small screen world we are living in.)

The proposal went well, but further development of the box was too difficult. The box seemed to have served its purpose and the concept needed to be pushed. The best option was to move the contents, keeping the general idea but exploring greater possibilities. Literary devices were used for inspiration especially the complex thought processes in James Joyce’s ‘Ulysses’.

Jeri Johnson, a Fellow in English at Exeter College, Oxford, wrote in her introduction to James Joyce’s ‘Ulysses’ about the use of ‘interior monologue’:

‘a literary technique capable of presenting directly without aid of an intrusive omniscient narrator the most intimate, often half-formed, only half-verbalized, thoughts of a character…’
(Johnson, 1998, p. 20)

Johnson warns the reader not to confuse this with a ‘stream of consciousness’ (a term first coined by the American philosopher, William James) which describes the mechanistic workings of consciousness in an individual as opposed to thoughts spilling onto a page. For the development of the ‘Miniature Index’ a decision was made to work somewhere in between the two, jotting down random thought process when working on a creative problem, then bringing order to the thoughts by indexing them into alphabetical order.

 

Extending and Exploring the Concept

To help with this it was deemed relevant to follow the ‘art history trail’, after studying Duchamp’s ‘Valise’ artworks (see Project Proposal) – this led to one artist in particular. Joseph Kosuth (b. 1945) was part of the ‘Siegelaub’ Conceptual Art movement in the 60’s. He was concerned with Linguistic Philosophy, in particular dictionary definitions and the basic use and understanding of ‘words’. ‘One and Three Chairs’ (1965/6 – below) is an excellent example – in this work we find an actual chair, a picture of a chair and a dictionary definition printed on the gallery wall.

Kosuth seems to question art in a basic way but at the same time seeks to bring clarity to meaning.

‘The task of art consists in constantly questioning its own essence and, in extended analysis, to contribute to the clarification of the question of what art is.’
(Marzona, 2005, p. 72)

As the end of this module began to loom the non-movement of ‘Paul’s Wee World in a Box’ became a greater problem – the exact question of ‘What is Art’ became problematic. However, in observing the above comment about Kosuth it was noted that instead of a question being asked, a statement might well be being made: not ‘What is Art?’ but a suggestion of ‘What Art is’.

This led the study into the difficult and confusing world of ‘Tautology’ (a statement that is necessarily true, The Concise Oxford Dictionary). Kosuth explains this with the following: ‘art idea (or work) and art are the same and can be appreciated as art without going outside the context of art for verification.’ (Marzona, 2005, p. 72). There are many ways in which one can interpret this statement, one perhaps being the seeking of clarification from a given reference point when creating something (such as art).

So, in ordering ‘thought processes’ to be turned into an art piece, it seemed advantageous to find a reference point related to the basic principles of ‘the creative process’. In the sketchbook for this module, words were jotted down describing Paul Glennon’s creative process. The following words emerged:

Words, Drawing, Sketchbook, Film, Exhibition, Discussion, etc.

These words came quite easily and immediately the recollection of Bruce Nauman’s work came into mind:

‘Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work, Work,…’
(Nauman, 2004, p. 31)

Last year Bruce Nauman filled the Turbine Hall in the Tate Modern with his sounds in an exhibition called ‘Raw Materials’. The hall was simply filled with large speakers playing sounds from his collected artworks. An excellent Web site accompanied this exhibition which allowed you to hear the sounds and see the artworks in their original state: click here. One piece in particular comes to mind. From the Clown Torture Series:

‘Double No’, 1998

The use of actual people in ‘Double No’ makes the piece real. What better way to witness the creative process of Paul Glennon than by direct observation of his face speaking the words into a video camera? This made up the first frame in the final artefact film.

By now a clear interest in words had emerged and as this MA is one of Computer Arts, what better way to create the words, while they are being said, than by typing them? Not just typing them, but recording the very keyboard being tapped and a video of the letters appearing on a monitor. The third picture was simply a physical representation of ‘words’ videoed from a book. Thus a triptych film with movement and sound was born.

From the observed creative process of Paul Glennon eleven key words emerged in the sketchbook, and from the template of the first triptych the entire piece was completed quickly. (See attached CD with FLASH file. Note, this is only a part of the overall artwork and should be viewed in the installation piece ‘Miniature Index’.)

 

The Actual Artefact

The final decision to be made was how to display this video loop. The original box had served its purpose so a new device had to be constructed. Or did it? Within the sketchbook for this module, many token ideas are drawn with the intention of solving this issue, most of them unsuccessful. They generally tended to look like ‘Punch and Judy’ stages that were designed for the viewer to stick their head into – too elaborate! It was not until the original starting point was reinvestigated again that the idea took hold.

Within the Project Proposal the hiding or isolating of the screen came from a childhood obsession with a 3-D View Master. Children could peer into the binocular-style headset whilst flicking the disks to see the various images, giving them the opportunity to shut themselves off from the surrounding world (for me West Belfast, in the 70s and 80s). When you look inside the View Master, peripheral vision is blocked due to the design of the head set, thus making you look harder at the image. The idea of making people look hard at moving image seemed important – we see so much television and film but are we really looking any more? It seemed important to make the observers of this piece of work look harder and in turn reveal the working processes in a more focused way.

The 3-D View Master was not an option as an actual thing to look through, so, personal objects from the past were hauled out of storage. An old filing cabinet that had been lying around with no handle (it had been ripped off by me in a fit of rage over three years ago) offered obvious connotations but also harked back to the classic ‘ready-made’ artwork. With a laptop fitting neatly into the top drawer, ‘Miniature Index’ was born. (The title of the piece had to be bashed out in a tutorial with Mike Barker!) The best thing about the filing cabinet was the height – it was a half size office piece, and even on a plinth it required the viewer to bend down to look in.

 

Exhibition & Evaluation

The exhibition of this work offered an opportunity to see the work in situ. Colleagues and students entered the room; some were puzzled at first, and then, hearing the sound were drawn to peek inside. Most people bent down but some knelt in front of it.

A comment box on the side proved beneficial in collecting written feedback (see DVD) and the actual sketchbook was popular with visitors (pages can be seen on the Module 3 section at this link.)

As part of the Private View a Performance piece was worked into the evening. The work was projected onto the wall and people were videoed with Paul Glennon’s face on theirs (see DVD). This was good interaction and encouraged more debate during the evening.

The most memorable thing about the evening was the fact that people had to work hard to see the film, thus were more focused.

 

Final Note
This is the beginning not the end of this work. Recently the filmmaker Peter Greenaway was quoted as saying that the potential of film has not yet been explored to its maximum. The ways in which we actually view moving image must be explored more if we are to break free from what Greenaway calls a ‘steam-driven 19th century template of theatre and literary adaptation’. Only then might we be able to engage with ‘the great art of painting in motion’ (quoting Rudolf Arnheim in his 1957 book ‘Film as Art’).

References

Arnheim, R, (1957) Film as Art
University of California Press

Bradshaw, P (2006) Call that a Movie?
The Guardian / G2 / 16th May 2006 / p. 22 - 23

Joyce, J (1998) Ulysses
Oxford World’s Classics / Edited with an Introduction and Notes by Jeri Johnson

Morzona, D (2005) Conceptual Art
Taschen

Nauman, B (2004) Bruce Nauman – Raw Materials
Tate

 

SLIDES FROM THE EXHIBITION

Thank you to all who helped and came to the Exhibition!