Author: Ruth Scott

Within my past blog post of discovering the library, I explored into the idea of the books themselves- through the thought of non-fiction and fiction books. As a university student I, myself, use the library purely for research methods within my course. This then came to mind –how many people use the university library for finding and reading a fiction book, purely for pleasure? Not only does the library have factual books, but various genres of books for an enjoyable read purely get lost into. Being able to find the time to allow one to sit down and read isn’t very often. This then led into the idea of childhood and having the time to read, also often being read to as a child, in particular fairy tale books.

In order to relate back to the site and the users of the library, I researched into the idea of Grimm’s fairy tales, which would be highly fascinating to the likes of 18 year olds and upwards. The Grimm fairy tales show a strong sense of violence and sometimes brutal tales, not suitable for children. Using these forms of fairy tales, this could relate to the idea of the university library potentially being scary place. University being a place to grow up and develop oneself can all together be quite daunting! Using these two factors could be successful to create in performance art as it still relates back to the site itself.

Ruth Scott

The library is full of vast assortments of books with various book covers, sizes and genres – But could a book be considered a piece of art?

Our task was to create a book as art, but not in the conventional way of how a book is usually formed. I decided to take one of my own made up book titles that we had to develop in a previous task. One of my book titles was called – Natural World. I took the title quite literally, and decided to form a flower out of paper and write the title all on the inside and outside. I also added the lilac ribbon to add to the idea that the flower is a naturally pretty and striking form created from the Natural World.  I was drawn to creating this inventive piece by the artist Jodie Harvey-Brown, who creates remarkable book sculptures within the books themselves, while relating the sculpture to the content within the book itself.

If I was to take this idea of sculpture further, this could be a potential section to form in some kind of installation, while still relating to the idea of books.

Harvey-Brown,J. (2015) Your Story, Coming to Life. [online] http://www.jodieharvey-brown.com/[Accessed 30 January 2015].

Ruth Scott

We were given the task to Sit and Listen, Write down everything you hear. I decided to find an enclosed space near the entrance to the first floor and the stairwell.

-Humming is coming for the electrical lights

-Shoes/trainers are squeaking on the floor

-Wind coming through the far window

-Hard footsteps of people walking on the floors and getting louder when ascending or descending the stairs.

-Cars in the distance can be heard from the main road

-Laughing

-Buckles of shoes

-Talking -“£12.30”

– Talking – “And if I go out on a work night…” fades

-Trousers/clothes rustling

-The clattering of money in pockets

I found this task to be highly interesting, it enabled me to really listen and take in to account the thought that you could consider the sounds to be an approach to performance art.

Ruth Scott

“The play-as-event belongs to the space, and makes the space perform as much as it makes actors perform” (Pearson, 2010, p1)

The University Library is a space I consider to be a habitation for work and concentration, from lively group meetings on the ground floor to studying in silence on the third floor. When reflecting on the quote from Pearson’s Introduction to Site Specific Performance I was quite sceptical on the thought of the library being a place for live performance. However, I decided to keep an open mind to the idea of performance art. I explored into the depths of the library, into places which I may have not seen or considered to be a thought of performance.  From exploring, I found various spots of the library that I had never took a second glance at, especially the third floor as I had never really discovered it.  I decided to take into consideration the use of space, site usage, objects, actions and sounds that are always there and created within the library. From these points of action I considered that almost every act that takes place within the library could be considered a performance, to simply taking a book out or using the computers.

Initial ideas that came to mind when exploring the library was the history of the building itself and its past uses. You can clearly see the differences between the old and the new, with the structure of the wooden beams on the third floor and the vast array of old style windows scattered around the building. The use of history and this location “can work as a potent mnemonic trigger, helping to evoke specific past times related to the place and time.” (Pearson, 2010, p9)  Another idea that I gathered was the thought of the books themselves which is the main and pure reason for a point of a library, the huge collection of books with various genres could develop an innovative piece relating from fiction to non-fiction.

Overall, I can now see the huge potential for numerous innovative performance pieces, and exploring the library really clarified this.

Pearson, M. (2010) Site Specific Performance. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan

Ruth Scott