Week 8: Pitch

Below is my written pitch that explains the ideas explored in my design.

The World Above Our Minds

Social behaviour and societal perceptions influence the way in which a space is experienced. My design intervention aims to investigate, challenge, influence, alter and create a connection between the subconscious and conscious mind and an awareness of the influence societal expectations has on the way we move, act and think in terms of space. 

My design intends to bring to the foreground the behavioural expectation within the city to watch where you are going and looking, avoid eye contact with strangers and keep to yourself. As a person who travels from a small community to the city each day and walk up Queen Street from the Ferry Building to university, I have noticed this odd unspoken rule and expectation of physical existence without social interaction. On what would be called New Zealand’s busiest street in terms of foot traffic and people, there is this communal perception to act as if you are walking down the street alone, as if the strangers you pass by and walk along side are a tree, a rock, a moving obstacle in which to manoeuvre around. With this said, sometimes there is a smile returned, often by those stationary on the banks of the flowing stream of people. It’s often those with an instrument, a microphone, a sign asking for spare change that I can depend on for a sense of humanity in the moving rush of obstacles.  

People are afraid to look at someone they don’t know. There is a sense of social fear. This is why, especially in a cityscape, we tend to always look down, avert eyes and blend in with the crowd. But often we see beauty when we take the chance to look up. Studying in the city and experiencing both the interior and exterior of the St James Theatre space, I have come to notice the impact of looking up and experiencing the landscape, environment and world that exists just above our heads, above our line of sight and the beauty of angle, view and perception that many city goers exist within, but do not experience. 

My design is aiming to change social behaviour in the city by encouraging people to look upwards with lighting, shadow and reflection through fluidity, form and depth within the St James Theatre foyer space. The space will be designed as an installation public walk way between Queen Street and Lorne Street as a way to make the general public aware and consider the way they act, move and think not only within the space of the walkway, but in term of the city. The design is a way to highlight, challenge and alter peoples’ social interactions. We don’t exist in a world by ourselves. My design is based around people being a part of the space and altering it with their existence, creating a sense of temporality, chance and interaction, rather than people viewing the space as if it was a framed painting placed in a gallery. 

As I am working on this project from home and have limited resources, I plan on making the most of the resources I have access to as well as taking this opportunity to broaden and expand my skills, especially in terms of digital design skills. I plan to use a combination of model making and photography to capture effective and realistic lighting affects as it is a main factor in my intervention. Along with this, I will also iterate ideas through drawings in pencil, pen, acrylic paints and water colours as I find this a more effective way of portraying my ideas than digital drawings. With this said, I am going to make the most of my access to digital tools and use programs such as Photoshop to further edit my hand drawings and photographs. I plan to use Rhino only as a canvas in which I can test ideas in terms of how they will be viewed in the space by an occupant as I don’t have the resources to build my own site model. This tool will give me a sense of scale in my work. I am going to mainly focus on my strong points in terms of making and presenting and use other skills to support my work in its digital presentation.