Practical Art Making Component of Study

The Practical Art Making process at present consists of two projects: The first is entitled ‘Quiet Dialogues’ which is heavily based on the constantly accumulating corpus of text samples, which I would like to refer to as ‘SAmpleTXT’ .  The method [via CMC] of collecting data for the Text Samples will be incorporated into the final work as well as aspects of the content which will serve to inform and direct my own social dialogue presented. Due to this conceptual hinging, SAmpleTXT will accumulate organically prompting me to change and adapt my approach along the way, the more I infer from the data.  

The second project entitled ‘Visual Poems’ begins with a very limited digital palette, the QWERTY   keypad and the format would be a mobile device screen size and capacity to display a single message without having to scroll down. A key concept that I am working with is the idea of a “limitation”, when using a mobile keypad and its fixed range of graphic characters or symbols. It is my belief that it’s this very restrictive medium when utilised for texting, prompts users to find unorthodox and often creative ways to communicate sometimes complex thoughts. After reading the work of Andrew Wilson (Wilson 2003: 7-96) who writes poems that consists only of a 160 characters (7bit scheme for a single SMS) . I was inspired to create a range of visual poems which incorporate both textisms and visual symbols to convey thoughts and ideas.


 Traditionally the genre of literature and poetry resides in printed publications and books, the idea of these short intimate writings existing as code and being transmitted via radio signals into the ether, then finding their way to recipients is intriguing. The digital poem transcends in value and becomes transient, as the artist removes the fickle, disposal nature of instant text and SMS and attempts to embed meaning and personal sentiment, code becomes symbols for human emotion and memory. If the first key concept for this project was “limitation” then the second would be “contradiction”, of the purpose or original intention of what many consider a lower order method of communication. In order to speak in this digital language to a computer mediated audience, I intend using mediums like mobile phones, computer software, apps, projections, the internet and a digital camera but will also include traditional drawing material when conceptually applicable. Final work will take the form of short animations, slide projections and prints. Formats would be LCD screens, print on paper and photographs.