The idea behind these designs was to add context to the self-portraits I had taken by situating them as part of a poster/book cover design. As the photography was supposed to communicate the idea of the ‘robot woman’, docile and compliant, I took the idea of this commodified human being and ran with it. I incorporated my photography and 70s inspired graphics into an instruction manual for a robotic wife. There were plenty of examples of manuals from this era to take design references from.

Following this theme of women being seen as a commodity I remembered the book ‘Vagina’ by author Naomi Wolf that was a big part of my research for my dissertation. A poignant part of the book for me was when Wolf writes about how a Sex Educator of the 70s ‘reglamorised’ the clitoris increasing women’s sexual satisfaction at the time. It jumped out to me as almost funny that there can be such a ‘hype’ or ‘must-have’ attitude around a part of a woman’s body. It struck me that this commodification does not limit its self to a woman as a whole but to specific parts of her, even her clitoris. It is a ridiculous idea that such an integral part of women’s sexual anatomy can be a ‘trend’ coming in and out of ‘fashion’!

The robotic women of The Stepford Wives film highlight the dark side of the narrow life allowed to women across the world. With women still being held to similarly strict standards of beauty and expectations of behavior in 2021, there are parallels between the characters I know in real life and the ones that were portrayed in this 1975 film. Inspired by Nadia Lee Cohen’s characters I was motivated to see if I could emanate her style by working with makeup and wigs to capture my own robotic characters.

Across two separate days, I attempted two shoots with the majority of time spent putting on wigs and makeup. I also managed to print a 70s wallpaper print on A1 paper as a background for one of the shoots. It was my main aim to be able to distinguish as much as possible between the two shoots whilst the constants being the format of head and shoulders and myself as the subject. Not being particularly experienced with MUA, this was a challenge for me. Another challenge was trying to ‘play’ my characters as unfeeling and mechanical, certain images show more successful dead-behind-the-eyes expressions than others.

Upon reviewing the shoots this character expression is the most successful in a short clip of footage. On top of the moving image providing more space for the characterful expressions to unfold, the use of a low-quality point-and-shoot camera has made the footage visually more authentic and low-fi.

As this module is a continuation of the journey begun in AD394 there are certain avenues of my research I am particularly keen to bring forward. From exploring the male gaze in the context of female nudes and pornography in the last module I am keen to build my understanding of this broad topic. In order to gain further insight into the subject of the gaze, I have taken ‘The Female Gaze: Women as Viewers of Popular Culture’ from the library. The female authors of the book highlight particular ways in which men benefit from patriarchy by means of women being objectified and exploited. My next research point is to watch and analyse the 1975 film ‘The Stepford Wives’ in which women are robot servants to their husbands and children. I am interested to look further into how these gender dynamics have manifested themselves in today’s society.

In my Statement of Intent I described my ambitions for this project to be creating a physical outcome that would offer audiences a fashion/cultural experience through a marriage of physical objects and augmented reality (AR). It is my idea that this would be presented through a box that could be sent through to the recipient and would act as the key to the digital and physical elements of the experience.

I am keen to begin exploring the methods by which I can experiment to create the experiential box and accompanying app that I have envisioned. I am apprehensive about gaining an understanding on how to produce AR as this is currently integral to my idea. I am going to look further into how I can learn this skill through online courses eg Domestika.org

https://indd.adobe.com/view/8ae7221e-f53e-4510-a41c-f38e0bcdf4e5

The mockup below shows my ideas for a digital interface that will support my physical final piece. I hope these renderings reflect the importance of play and interactivity, central to my idea.

My hope for my final piece is that, it will become an artefact of our time, reflecting and overcoming the challenges presented by COVID-19 and most importantly creating a fashion experience that is inclusive and available across the world. One of my next steps in FMP will be to analyse my customer profile of who would be most interested in this as a concept in order to tailor my design to the people who would engage with it.

Fig 1. mockup interface, my own, Nov 2020.

Over the course of this module my research and specialist skills have developed considerably. I have come a long way in testing the validity of my ideas through experiments and mockups, than I have managed to do in previous years. I aim to continue to develop this aspect of my work in FMP by prototyping extensively.   I am  also eager to practice and improve upon my technical skills in graphic design to ensure my outcome is abstractly reflective of my research through sophisticated brand identity.

I was advised in my tutorials to get in touch with Emma as she has a lot of specialist knowledge and experience in the areas I have been exploring. Having worked with subscription boxes before she enlightened me on how they work, that each box has a theme, often seasonal, and that the call out process is similar to that of a magazine. I was reminded that however I choose to move forward with my project that the components of my final outcome must be part of a narrative, perhaps held together by a prompt word or theme. We spoke about the importance of sustainability and community building in new enterprises such as my subscription box idea. I am aware that my promotion would take place solely online and the benefit of having a physical outcome would be having followers taking photos and generating content for me, further enforcing the sense of a community. Emma reminded me that modern customers like to feel a part of the process and to always reach out and ask for their opinions. Embarking on my FMP I will be sure to start social media pages early on to build up this engagement and conduct market research, which could help me build audience profiles.

We discussed the importance of play in my concepts and this drilled home to me how how this element of fun and adventure is a constant motif in my work and how much I value the idea that my final outcome will be tactile and experiential.

Emma drew my attention to Merchant and Mills, a company pioneering making sewing stylish and current again. Their slogan, ‘clothes not fashion’ is very poignant as it targets an audience who reject the fashion industry and the exploitation and waste that comes along with it.  Whilst also capturing the attention of people want to wear clothes that will withstand the test of time, without the pressure of trends. They put a lot of effort into making their pattern packages feel luxurious and expensive further leading me to think I could learn alot from this brand.

Fig 1. merchant and mills website, Nov 2020.

Another way this brand aligns with my interests is in their deconstruction of the product and emphasis on the process. The image above shows the things available to buy on their website, a series of objects that when put together will create and experience with a rewarding final outcome.

In our small group tutorial today, I had the opportunity to share my test shoot from last week with more people and receive further constructive criticism. We spoke about how the pink silky background fabric was an effective choice as it echoes the flow of her skin and with the soft focus each becomes indistinguishable from the other. If I were to repeat the shoot I would make sure to accentuate this concept further.

I was also able to share my subscription pack idea and the working design with my mock-up boxes. I was keen to hear everyone’s feedback on this and recieve ideas for references as packaging design is something I would like to further develop as a specialist skill. Chris recommended looking into the concept of Pandora’s box  in order to think about my design ideas for this project in a more abstract way. I began thinking how this mythological artifact could make me see the box of my ideas as a vessel for the unexpected. Maybe it is the case that this box contains nothing but completely blank white 3D objects inside and its the case that a phone app would unlock the full experience. There are lots of ways this path could take me and I will explore them further in my sketchbook.

Fig 1. mockup box, my own, Nov 2020.

In my latest tutorial I had the opportunity to pick apart my test shoot with Eloise. The shoot depicts a nude model through a soft focus keyhole shape that shifts in and out of ambiguity.  I was pleased that my feedback showed the themes of voyeurism and erotica were immediately recognised. As I had thought previously, Eloise agreed that the styling element and prop of the corset and flowers added nothing to the strength of the images and urged me to concentrate on the concept of voyeurism and the questions that the shoot instigates such as ‘does she know someone is watching?’, ‘if so who?’ and ‘how does this affect her behaviour?’.

Fig 1. contact sheet, my own, Nov 2020.

Fig 2. photograph, my own, Nov 2020.

Fig 3. photograph, my own, Nov 2020.

As a very helpful pause for reflection I spoke to Mark about my project this afternoon. We spoke about the direction which I could take my project focusing on my core concept of marrying the physical experience with the digital. We discussed ways in which AR could be used to encourage people outside of their houses to explore certain spaces and how Pokemon GO is a good example of this. Off the back of this conversation I am motivated to go forward and research this idea further so that I will be able to mock up and prototype visions I have for this platform.

I expressed the importance of my digital platform being supported by a tangible and tactile experience (possibly in the experience of a posted package) and so Mark also encouraged me to look at the definition of Magazine as we believed it to be originally a collection of objects. I found that originally a ‘storehouse’ progressing to specifically refer to that of an ammunition store, the word has evolved to mean, “periodical journal containing miscellaneous writings”, which intrigues me as a definition because I feel it strips back what we commonly perceived of a magazine and deconstructs it to its bare bones. I like the idea of my final piece involving this sort of sentiment, miscellaneous objects and writings (and digital platform?) connected through a vague narrative.

As art of our informal presentations today I shared my sketchbook with Chris and my group via teams. It was beneficial to the progression of my research as this is the first time I have shared my sketchbook. I was able to talk through the experimentation that I had taken out in my self isolation. I documented this visually in my sketchbook by creating a gif from a screen recording showing the process of using the QR code I produced.

Fig 1. Gif, my own, oct 2020.

Being in self-isolation I used a large screen to display a QR code to my neighbors/housemates who documented whether or not it worked scanning at distance and through the window. I used this opportunity to investigate how I could interact with an audience despite being isolated in some way that required a physical circumstance and was not solely online.

I was encouraged to think about how I might take it a step further to curate my own exhibition and how I would utilise social media in the most creative way possible to enhance the audience experience. Going forward I am going to investigate online platforms that I am not familiar with in order to see whether they could be used as a tool to enhance the experience of an exhibition that is both physical and digital in equal measure.