TERM FOUR | WEEK SEVEN

Monday

I continued to work on the poster designs. These were the skeleton of the posters, theyre not in order. Id decided to use a typography layout as it looks more visually appealing but also incorperates the idea of alot of text. It took me quite a while to do each poster. I would say about 2-3 hours per poster. It was still too simple though. It needed more. A different background? I would ask myself. So I added a different background. I wanted to take out a camera and hire out the moving image room to get some shots of somebodys hand or face to make the poster just that little bit more interesting. Unfortunately, majority of the DSLR cameras were booked out and the only cameras left were the snapshot ones so I had to make do with what I had. I even changed the background to grey. It was still too simple. 

I added a background to these designs. It made them that little bit more interesting. I like these designs much better than the design above. I dont really like the first poster because of the ways its been laid out and the fonts I have used. The skeleton of the design could have been better, more interesting but we were running out of time and I still had to keep on top of my other two classes. Jonah did not want these designs. He wanted to go with the plain black because that was the feel he was going for with his poems. Like, I said I didnt mind and I dont like confrontation so I went with it, I trusted his decision.

Jonah said that purple and teal were the colours of suicide awareness ribbon. I personally did not like those colours but didnt tell him that, we had to compromise on something. We decided to go with black and white. I told Jonah that we could split the payment for printing the posters A1 size at the Warehouse stationery and I could print them out but he was confident that he could get them printed for free at school in A1 size. I asked him if he was sure that he'd be able to get them done by Wednesday, because I had filming all day for our advertisement outside of school. He was persistant. I trusted his word.So I emailed Jonah my designs (the black and white ones) and he told me we would be presenting on Thursday morning at 11am.

Class responses:

Grace/Sam/Monicas group: I really loved their creative use of light and how they used different ways to make different pictures using shadows. I also like how they incorperated spoken word and performance without actually showing themselves. I also got to know each person a little better after their story. Overall, I really enjoyed their performance.

Ali/Deana/Safaiyras group: Deana spoke really well and quite confident. I think their posters/photographs were about how society abuses women or it could be nature, Im not too sure. I didnt quite understand how their first installation relates to their second installation though.

Deborahs group: Their take on a real life video game was interesting. Id never seen anything done like that before. It did drag on though and I feel it could have been improved by use of different music or by cutting some unnecessary scenes out.

Thursday

Today was the day of our presentation and it could not have gone any worse. My mum starts work early these next couple of weeks so I have to drop my little sister off at primary school. We wake up at 730 and leave the house at 815. Except when I went to go start the car this morning, my battery was flat. Ive been meaning to buy a new one for some time but right now, thats not what was going through my mind. I started panicing because 1) my little sister was going to be late, 2) I thought I would be late for my presentation and 3) we were the only ones at home. Its just me, my mum and little sister who lives at home. So I called my sister who lives in West Auckland to come jump start my car. She wasnt too happy to be woken up at 8 in the morning but I was desperate. She got to my house at around about 9. I rushed my little sis to school then came to MIT. By the time I got there, it was 930-10ish. I saw Jonah, apologised for being late and asked him if he'd printed out the posters. He said no, he didnt print them out in A1. I tried to keep my cool. He said hed printed them out in A3 size instead and installed them. Not what I was hoping for but at least it was something. I went to go check on the installation and it seems that he had changed my design. He changed it to purple and teal and cellotaped them to the wall. I was grateful that he had done that but wished I had been there earlier to install them myself because I have pins in my locker. I also did not like how it had been presented with cellotape.... and how he had changed my design without talking to me about it. He asked for me to maybe quickly redesign the chorus posters and put the sunset background onto them while he was working on printing some other stuff. I told him he didnt need to, that the posters will be algood but he was persistant. I didnt think anything of it, so I went to the computer room across from him to redesign them and by the time I had logged in, Deborah walks in and says I had to be in class presenting. I said I thought we were presenting at 11 and she said no, now - in a sort of passive aggressive way asking where our posters were. I asked where Jonah was, trying to explain myself but she wouldnt hear it. So I had to direct the class to our posters by myself. I was so embarrassed to be presenting such, lets be honest, shit work on my own. Everyones reactions were kind of like making fun of it, laughing or not taking any notice. Its the worst work ive ever presented. So I stayed with the class for the rest of the presentations. After Ali/Deanas group, we walked to the next presentation room. We'd noticed half the class was missing after 7-10mins a girl comes and tells us that everyone was looking at "Jonahs Groups" work again, not realising I was in it. I said "wait, thats my group, why is everyone looking at it again?" We all walked back down and by the time we got there, everyone was already leaving. I didnt know what was going on and one of the lecturers say "Well if you were with us then you would know what was going on". I reply with "I have been with the class, we were waiting at the other presentation". People give me the sarcastic clap. I take no notice. It would seem that he had installed other things - Im not too sure what because i didnt have the chance to see it.

Point being, because I was the visual artist, I took the fall for what was visually unappealing which was the posters and how it was presented etc. It was very difficult when Jonah would do things without speaking to me first, we were a team but he was doing things on his own and I didnt appreciate how he'd changed my design and especially didnt print out the posters. We ended up having a borderline pass so we have to resubmit by next week Thursday. I am definitely going to have to take charge and redesign the whole series again.

Class responses:

Ali/Deana/Safaiyras Group: I thought their installation was very creative with the use of a ritual, it was very different. I liked how they used plastic bottles to create a sort of totem pole. I believe that Safaiyra who was dressed in white, represented mother nature or more so, her spirit because she looked pure.

Patis Group: I really loved their performance. Their use of acting alongside written word and performance art was vry creative. I believe their piece was about rape culture. I didnt quite understand why they were in white sheets though.

Tylers Group: I loved their video. I liked their cultural references and the video editing skills were on point.