Week 11 - The Recliner

This week was a crazy week of finalizing details of my chair project.

I checked out the projector on Tuesday, and I finished adjusting the numbers for transitions between videos and did the projection mapping on Wednesday. I had been trying to do 10 video loops because to maximize the amount of videos that I could put in the switch, but for the projection mapping I cut the number back to 5. I later added all of the videos that got cut into the loops that remained. Prior to that cut, I also cut all of the horizontal videos for the sake of simplicity. It was easier to just use vertical or horizontal, instead of both, for right now, and I had more vertical videos to use.

When it came to the critique day, I was so anxious about getting up on time to get to school and set up early, that I couldn't sleep the night before. Ironically, this resulted in me oversleeping and being late for class. I was really grateful for my classmates immediate willingness to help. Half the class stood up when they realized that I needed help moving the chair downstairs. I had been so stressed before walking in, and their kindness really helped relieve my stress.

When the class finally came down to see the project, I couldn't help but smile when everyone said "Woahhh" the first time the chair affected the videos. Hearing everyone's feedback about how much they liked the project and the concept made me really happy. Initially, I didn't come to art school to become an artist, so even with my change in goals, coming up with the concepts of artworks is very new to me. Even after class some of my friends and a couple of my teachers got to come and see it. Several people have told me I should submit it somewhere, which has never happened for a specific artwork for me. As of writing this post, my family hasn't seen it yet, but I'm setting it back up for them tomorrow. Some friends outside of FSU are also planning to come see it.

I am really happy with how this artwork turned out. It's still in the beginning stages but I definitely plan to continue working on it. My parents have agreed to hold onto the chair until I have a place to put it. They were considering getting rid of it after this project was done, but when I told them that I want to continue working on this piece, and explained that the chair itself is really important to the work, they were happy to hold onto it.

Throughout the whole process of working on this project, I have been really excited about it and even thought about the possibility of submitting it somewhere. However, I was struggling to come up with a name for the work. After talking with some of my friends, I eventually came to the realization of the most obvious name "The Recliner". Growing up, we always referred to the chair as the recliner. Even when I first asked my parents about using it, I referred to it as the recliner. This is a very personal work, so it only makes sense for it to have a personal name.