SITE SPECIFIC PERFORMANCE

Today (7th May) is my site specific day and I have been in the Library since 5.30am to set up.
I have come so early mainly because I wanted to ensure that there were no problems with my piece or aspects that needed editing or changing, and that if there was, I had plenty of time to fix them and also because the third floor is a busy place to be and I wanted to be able to silently fix my pieces.
One problem I already encounted with my site was the journey to the library. I had to create all my pieces at home as it could not be done on site, this was because making my pieces on site would be impractical due to the rules of my location. Making my project would mean making extensive noise and I would need a lot of room to set it up. Sound is my main issues as the third floor is a silent floor and having space  is unachieveable on the third floor of the library during dissertation time.
I had to bring my piece ready-made to the library, this meant I would need to travel 6 art pieces across Lincoln from my house and this proved a difficult task on my own. I opted for a taxi instead, and asked originally for a minibus to take my pieces safely across to the library. The taxi company could not offer me a minibus at this time of day and instead offered me an estate car. I told the taxi company about my project and gave them the exact size of my biggest piece (48 inches by 48 inches). They assured me, after I repeatedly asked, that an estate car was big enough to fit my project and so I booked the taxi for 5.30am.
I had no problem moving my project from my house to the taxi. I did however, have a problem when getting my project into the taxi. After being assured multiple times that I did not need a minibus and that an estate car would be big enough for my pieces, I then discovered that the piece infact won’t fit in an estate car. This meant I had to break part of my project to transport it to the library.
My second problem with the site was the turnstiles. Being only 5ft 3 in height, it was extremely difficult for me to carry my projects over the turnstiles and up to the third floor. I overcame this by having a friendly 3rd year student who assisted me in carrying my projects over the turnstiles. Although without his help, I would definitely have struggled to do this.
After getting my pieces to the third floor and setting them up without a struggle, I sat down to do some work and keep a watch over my pieces until they were being assessed. Around 7.30am, the cleaners came to clean the area. I do not think the cleaners had been informed of my project as one of them tried to move my ‘Coningsby’ board. She was little and could not reach the top, so she pulled the board from middle, resulting in the material being ripped slightly and the board bending and twisting the wood frame. After spending a few hours trying to fix my piece with tape, I discovered it was unfixable and the only way to perfect this was to redo the piece. However, it took me three days to make the piece in the first place and I do not have the time or resources to re-make my board. This means that now my board will not stand in the window and will have to be placed below the window, yet another struggleI have come across with the site.

Here is my piece when it was perfect, before it was pulled down:

This is proof that my piece was perfect and did sit within the window. I had previously bought this piece to library when I was in the developing stages and it had sit in the window for over 3 hours. Proving that the frame was strong enough to support the weight and also hold the piece steady.

I  used ‘The Book Of Art’ as my inspiration for this piece that I have created.
I liked the diverse images within the book and the different things they represented. I was inspired by this and wanted to create my own representative artwork. Obviously my piece had to be site specific, and with my site being the University Library, I set about researching the Central Warehouse and it’s uses.
I discovered that the trainline used to run by the side of the library, and collect goods and grain to take to different areas around lincolnshire. These areas were Lincoln, Coningsby, Tumby Woodside, New Bolingstoke, Stickney and Midville. This gave me the idea of having six different art pieces to represent each station.
I chose the location of the third floor because often it’s striking architextual features are ignored. Students come to this floor to work silently and concentrate on their work. This means the features, such as the beamwork and brickwork are never acknowledged. I wanted to emphasis these precious features with art pieces, especially emphasising the original brickwork. I also wanted my piece to be seen and not heard, I wanted the pieces to speak for themselves and so I also chose the silent floor for this reason.
I wanted to use and explore diverse and unusual materials for my piece, this would help my work to stand out against any usual paintings or drawings that could be considered ‘uninteresting’ and fail to capture the attention of passing students. I wanted my pieces to stand out visually but also be directly related to the current library and also it’s history and how that has affected it’s uses.
My pieces are stationary and somewhat abstract, made from diverese materials such as wood, string, tin, grain, book pages and book covers. These pieces represent each individual station by carrying the name of the station upon them. Although the artwork is more of a direct link to the library and it’s history, rather than the station itself.

My piece has only been up for an hour and a half and has already attracted some social media attention.
This means my piece is drawing attention to the undiscovered areas of the library, as students are observing my piece and have been influenced by it enough to make posts on social media.
This means my piece is achieving its original aim.