Impossible Things - Market

“It compels us to look and invites us to see, to notice, to wonder and to think.”

Impossible Things Market - Time Warp

28/9/16

Impossible Things produced a ‘Time Warp’ market which challenged the senses in a transition through childhood to future. The concept of the impossible was demonstrated through use of ‘time travel’ rather than individual stalls producing an impossible experience. Some however did and we found this somewhat inconsistent. 

The stalls who we believe achieved the ‘impossible things’ goal were Dr Fix, Sense and The Who as each offered an impossible experience but followed the theme of time warp. We found it exciting that most stalls offered a prize or gift after completion and that the market had given a lot of effort into decorations, dress ups and even had their own snapchat. However, as the market worked in a linear structure, for the duration it was super congested and the flow wasn't practical for the volume of people expected. 

Although it followed a timeline, for it to be successful and to prevent excessive waiting times and lines for entry, this needed to be reconsidered. We found the least successful stalls for the brief were the children’s artwork gallery, play dough centre and detention, as while all these stalls were fun and interactive, they weren’t so impossible.

Sarah Tansey

Impossible things - time warp market

- Time warp - past present and future, the ideas of things that aren't there yet - sort of tangible and illusive and invisible
about myths, legends, and tribal pasts
things that are little bit of stories and whats to come and whats been and gone

- Elusive (Playing with perception)
- A trick
- Trying to make things that are intangible tangible - they are trying to conceptualise and materialize the impossible
- Touch and feel stuff
- The play a game in 1 minute/ played naughts and crosses found it didn't really relate
- Able to paint your own dream
- write what we need to do more on some of the stalls because there were a lot of people and not enough people to explain what to do to the amount of people waiting
- The element of surprise worked well for the stalls - Make a deal with the devil
- Had to wait 20 mins to get in and had a continuing long wait throughout the whole market for majority of the stalls
- The doctors of office stall was very cool, interesting take on the concept but also a lot of fun
- taking you back to kindergarten - finger painting - your own birthday party - playing with play dough - tight and congested - cute little party bags were given out - make believe
- Although the children's drawings ranging from 2-13 were very cute they didn't work that well in the concept of time warp
- use of finger painting on the wall
- Proper high school detention was very funny and certainly took me back to high school apart from what we had to write about
- Quite cool how we were given out maps and flyers for the overall market
- Detention slips given out
The markets line up was well ordered but very congested and didn't allow for much freedom and room to move
- Unexplained emojis
- Upbeat music
- Bright and colourful
- noisy almost like and old school childhood party
- arrows on floor for direction
- lost hype by the time i got in there
- Organisers dressed up in costume
- Retro

Second Class Prototype

Today in class we started putting together the final touches for our market in week 10. Next week we are either critiquing/participating so this will be our final class time before everything is due.

Today we covered:

Bringing in resources e.g. Cushla brought in her sewing machine

Sewing together our Bunting Banner - placing together all our individually made triangles.

Creating our Instagram business cards to hand out around the market - these are all hand made and show our Instagram name where participants will find their patches along with everyone elses and eventually the final product.

Georgia designed an awesome poster for the day!

We talked about extension cords and logistics, how we are going to set up on the day - displaying and drying the patches and how we are going to create an atmosphere. We've already decided on cushions and fabric wall hangings, tea and coffee and a quilt over the table as a covering - however music, vibes and noise disruption were all things we considered.

Poster

I had started looking at poster ideas and thinking about who we were donating it to and what it should look like so i decided to keep it very simple using a small portion of our patches and photos that i had gotten from the hospitals donating foundation to use.

Video Visualisation of our Market Offering

(Video may work on Chrome, but not on Safari)

We shared our video on the marketplace Facebook page to gather feedback and suggestions. We also want to keep in good contact with the organisational teams and other people in our market so that they are aware of what we are doing.

The idea for our stall is to allow participants to decorate a patch that will be a part of a quilt that will then go on to Wellington Children's Hospital. We want to create an environment where they can be involved, use their creativity to make something, and feel a sense of achievement and self-value that comes with gift giving. We intend to create a relaxed and social atmosphere with hot drinks, stools, cushions and fabric. We want to engage all of the senses, with nice feeling fabrics, the smell and taste of hot drinks, a nice and creative looking stall and hopefully the noise of the sewing machines can be cancelled out by maybe music and talking.

This relates to the idea of immaterial labour because, rather than being an exchange of something tangible, the participants get a sense of being a part of something useful in exchange for their participation. We also get this sense of achievement in exchange for our facilitating of the stall. Our idea revolves around gift-giving and koha.

Group Meeting

Today everyone was present at our meeting.

We brought our patches that we had previously, made out of class and Sarah Sewed them together. We also talked about the next prototype market, and what everyone was going to bring.

Sheldon: Paints, Including White and Brown, Needle and thread, The banner, Paint brushes, String to hang the wet patches. Scissors, some little pegs, paint brushes and Blue Tack.

Sarah: Paint Brushes, Sewing Kit, Ribbon, Fabric, Cushions, Tea Pot, Sewing Machine.

Georgia: Coffee Cups and Tea, Jug, Paint Brushes, Ice Cream Containers, Poster, Cloth's, Blue Tack and Fabric Pens.

Cushla: Coth's, Fabric Pens, Sewing Machine, Ribbon, needle, thread and Tea Pot.

Things that We have to Purchase before the next prototype market: Pegs, White Paint, Brown paint, maybe some tea.

Class Wednesday the 14th

Today's lesson we decided on what we needed for the next final prototype market, this included cutting out squares for the patches, which we decided on a size 15x15 with a seam allowance of 1cm each side for sewing. We also Stared the process of cutting out letters for the Bunting banner at the back of our stall we were all given different letters, as we wanted them to be all different the banner is going to say "Quilt for a Cause." Georgia also started our Instagram where we post different patches up, this is another way of promoting our stall, as it's another social platform and the photos look like a massive quilt so we can see it together.

Final Banner Design

Our Selected Banner Design 

Each Person will get a few letters each to contribute to the banner as we want them to be all different styles. Each letter being a different style helps to communicate our idea of collaboration.

Some Banner Ideas

Proposal and production snapshot

We have completed our proposal and production snapshot so that we and the organisational teams know where we are at, what we're doing and what we're going to need. 

Everything we need for our market stall to work

All of the things that we are going to need for our stall and quilt making to work.

Fabric squares - all cut
String and pegs
x2 Sewing machines
needle and thread
paint brushes
Fabric paint, glue and pens
Ribbon
cushions/ bean bags
cups, jug, plunger, tea, coffee, tea towel. cloths
Banner
Fabric to drape around to create an atmosphere
instagram cards to do
posters
photos printed for the stall
table
chairs
fabric scissors

need to look into getting some fleece to sew the finished patches to finish of the quilt

Instagram account

We have decided to create and Instagram account to add pictures of each quilt patch to. This creates what appears to be a digital quilt for everyone to look at and see everyone else's quilt patches, they also are given the ability to see what the final product looks like and so they can see what happens to the quilt and where it goes after the market.

An Instagram account gives us a technological platform with which to connect with our audience and maintain a communication that is relevant to them. It may also help to make the participants of our market feel like they are a part of something that is bigger than themselves, feel like their creative labour is valued and appreciated, and feel an ability to appreciate the final product and the work of others. It also gives us another means of facilitating the market experience and something that we can appreciate and we can feel a sense of achievement about.

https://www.instagram.com/creative_industries_1920/?hl=en

Trying out Different Materials

Georgia, Sarah and I met up at Spotlight and had a look at some different materials we could use and things that we could use to decorate patches with. We bought some fabric pens, fabric paint and fabric glue. 

We have each been starting to decorate patches in our own time to see how the materials work and how well they go through the wash. When decorating my patches I tried to think about my quilt I had when I was young, which I liked to play I Spy with, so I have started painting animals such as fish which I think the children will like. 

~Cushla

Research

I went to Spotlight and had a quick look at a few different products we could potentially have on Market Day for people to decorate with; there was a massive selection and a lot of cool exciting things, but some were impractical for the quilt and others wouldn't last the Chem Wash that the quilt has to go through before they can hang it at the Childrens Ward.

Here are a few base products I found;

Prototype Market

Week 6 Prototype Market

Cushla and I were the only ones who were able to make the Prototype Market which made things a little bit harder but we got there!

At first we were just going to use pieces of memo paper and pens and get everyone to make up a design but felt that wasn't enough of an experience for the audience so we sourced some scrap fabric from the Fashion Dept. instead and had markers so everyone could draw.

There were a few draw backs and points that we picked up on during our trial;

- It is easier to draw and see on lighter coloured fabrics.

- Patterns are OK but sometimes hard to work with unless you are layering instead of just drawing.

- We will need lots of different forms of media for people to decorate with, but fabric pens will definitely be a necessity.

- People were drawn to the table but didn't really know what to do - we need to make that clearer on the day.

- We need to establish an atmosphere and vibe - we settled on some throw pillows, a speaker, pots of tea and perhaps some fabric draped in the back ground.

A few points came up after the market in discussion;

- How will we run the machines in the background, one person on each and another two up front helping people? Will we swap roles? How will the noise of the machine be cancelled out?

- How will we finish the quilt? When will we need it finished by?

- How will we let everyone see the finished quilt and let them know it actually went to the children ward? We decided on doing an Instagram with a picture of everyones square, a hashtag and a picture of the final outcome so people could follow its journey.

- What will entice people to come and participate in our stall? Should we walk around the market and talk to visitors? Wait for them to walk past? Hand out flyers?

- Will we have advertising on the day around our stall? Banners/Posters/Flyers.

Overall the Prototype Market was a success and we got some excellent feedback as well as ideas and constructive criticism for things we need to work on.