Summary
This project emphasizes the use of 3 dimensional form to communicate a duality. Dualism considers two states or elements in opposition. It has this reflective quality in that one principle exists as the other does not. Through a narrative, the dualism will be presented as a mask or augmentation. Two models are built by partners each representing one side of the duality. The duality is explained through a story on how and why the masks/augmentations exist. A secondary sense, aside from visual, is addressed within the form.
Narrative
Daily routine is created by the same two components for all people, one’s self and environment. One wakes up and must reflect on how the day will go. In any situation the decision will be to prioritize one’s self- evaluating only minimal, single points of their surroundings. Another option is to remove personal focus from oneself and emphasize the atmosphere around their being. One option encourages focus and the other eliminates focus. Focus has a sense of direction. The focused being wants the world to be blocked, restricted to a narrow hole that has a singular, forward outlook. They are about sharp consistency plagued with continuous determination and persistency on one point. The unfocused person believes in drawing attention away from one point, away from their features and insecurities. Creating movement and change around their face demonstrates how unfocused aimes to hide from observation, concealing their vision and distracting the audience from their features. By the end of the day the focused person has witnessed only a small portion of the world, confined to one perspective and their own thoughts. It is a day of intense evaluation on a small amount of exposure. The person who asks for the world to not focus on them had a day of commotion. The people encountered looked at their surrounding environments as the light shimmering captivated attention. The perpetual shift of objects around them took priority and caused perpetual shift in thoughts throughout the day. At night both subjects’ subconsciousness resume and no longer gives the mind a choice in the matter, as no one wears the masks to sleep. Their true selves become revealed once again.
Reflection
This project required the collaboration between partners to create two mask about polar ideas. I enjoyed working with a classmate because it helped me question aspects of my project I would not consider. We chose the concepts of focus, encouraging it and eliminating it. When breaking down the meaning of focus, we discovered that it means different things to different perspectives. I thought of focus as a first-hand act, where I do the focusing, but my partner thought of how an audience views focus. Collaboration expanded our idea to differing the masks in terms of perception. My mask is about promoting focus. the one who wears the mask is required to use a singular view of the world through the restrictive vision hole. In addition, the observer first looks at the bright orange viewing hole because it is the focal point. The black hoods are nested in one another, decreasing in size in order to guide the audience to that focal point. Additionally, geometric forms are used to represent the sharp, rigid sensation of focusing. Visual focus is the main component of this mask, complementary of the head location; however, there are ear components to the design as sound can be distracting. Overall, my project is designed to create one point of focus for both the person wearing and observing.
This video includes my partner’s project on removing focus.
The left represent a basic layout of my design process: ideate, sketch basic form, create a digital version, prototype and create.
For more on the process and see the prototypes visit the following link:
https://u.osu.edu/kimball.103/tag/face-off/