Final Piece

For my final piece I decided to develop on my first experiment and continue building a coral reef. I decided to not use lots of different aspects but just focus on using a couple of main elements and create more clusters of them. So I used different coloured micro-fiber mitts and created a whole area of anemones/ coral polyps. I then bought more gel crystals in red, blue and purple and created more fish egg clusters. To make my concept mean more, I used black ink and spilled it onto my piece to show how oil spillages are damaging living creatures that are a beautiful and natural part to the earth. I also poured bleach over the mitts, however because it is a cleaning product that is supposed to work well with bleach and sprays, it didn't take the colour out very well and hasn't given it such a good effect. The part of the body that it is designed to cover is the top half, more like a neck piece, as coral reefs are built up higher than the seabed, and this piece will develop to cover the face. Most of our vital organs are on the face and we have hair that protects these organs as they are delicate, and with the coral reef piece built up over the face, all the chemicals that damage it show us what could happen if we used harsh chemicals on our face and how we are told on the back of cleaning products to not come in contact with the eyes and mouth. I thought this related well so this is why my piece has been arranged in that area.

Final Piece Experiment

Pictures above are my first final piece idea. I started to experiment with cleaning products and creating shapes to represent the coral reef. As a base to the piece I used a blue rubber/plastic/jelly shower mat that consisted of circular holes. I then used an orange micro-fibre dusting mitt and poked it through the holes to create sea bed plants, which is a part of the coral reef make up. Whilst shopping for cleaning supplies, I picked up some air freshener gel crystals, I poured both red and blue ones onto some cling film and wrapped them up to form a ball. This is to replicate fish eggs that would be found around the reef when the fish lay their eggs. To make it look like its being damaged/ the process of the coral reef being damaged I decided to use some dish cloths and metal scourers to represent fish being caught in nets and the reefs wasting away. 
This was one of my ideas for my final piece, and I have decided to use this as an experiment and develop it further. 

Jason de Caires Taylor

To help me along the way with my project I decided to look into some artists that have explored coral reefs for their work. I came across Jason de Caires Taylor, most famous for his underwater sculpture using stone statues, know as "Silent Evolution". This piece is fascinating, it is inspirational to see that a piece of art work can be created in the depths of the ocean which involves a lot of challenges and major risks. The piece has also been looked at over time, where it started off as just statues under the sea and now life has begun to form among the statues.

Sources of Inspiration

Whilst conducting my research into my concept, I came across a few sites which looked in to the science of the coral reef and how the different plants work. 

I learnt about Coral Polyps and found some diagrams about their anatomy. 

Taken from - http://www.coralscience.org/main/coral-reefs

I then continued to research into what actually damages a coral reef. I found out that divers who swim to reefs looking for fish which are either sold to fancy restaurants or for private use, stun the fish with cyanide and this poisons the reefs. Another way of damaging the reefs is the oil spills from cargo ships that export and import oil to countries all over the world, this then  sinks into the waters and poisons the reefs. Over time all these chemicals start affecting the coral and it starts to bleach the coral and it dies. 

The most damaging is the pollution of the sea. Littering and sewage that is let into the sea full of chemicals that we use from cleaning products and food waste poisons the waters and stops the reefs from being able to breath. 

Websites used:

• http://inchinapinch.com/hab_pgs/marine/coral_%20reef/plants.htm
• http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/students/coral/coral5.htm
• http://www.coralscience.org/main/coral-reefs
• http://www.coral-reef-info.com/coral-reef-biome.html

My Concept

After completing my reconstruction/deconstruction piece, I decided to develop on my coral reef idea. Instead of just looking at the wonders and beauty of the coral reef, I wanted to investigate into more serious issues and the less beautiful aspect. My reconstruction piece was about creating something that was delicate and pretty using the chiffon blouses. My new piece is about how the chemicals in everyday living is affecting and damaging the reefs, killing millions of fish and marine plants. We don't realise how much we as people are damaging the earth and the oceans and killing millions of living creatures that are part of our daily life. What I would like my piece to show is how ugly something beautiful can become the more badly it is treated. As they say, 'Treat people how you wish to be treated', same goes for everything else in this world. 

Damaged Coral Reef

Healthy Coral Reef

Deconstruction/Reconstruction

The first part of this project was to deconstruct two garments of our choice. I chose two sheer chiffon blouses that had a lot of detail such as ribbon, lace, ruffles and buttons.  
For the project we were looking at semiotics - a study of signs. After deconstructing my garments, a word that came to mind was delicate. 
I had delicate in my head for a while and was thinking of objects/living things that were delicate. It came to me, coral reef!
Since then, I decided to look into coral reefs and chose to reconstruct my garments into my own coral reef. 

This is how it turned out. I used parts of the pink blouse and rolled them into tube like shapes, this was to replicate the anemone. I then used a polystyrene cone and wrapped a ruffle from one of the blouses around it to create an underwater plant called Lettuce Coral. Along the bottom (which isn't as visible because of the darkness) I gathered parts of the black blouse ruffles together to create flower like objects and sewed a pale pink button, into the middle to give it that flower look. I used the lining of the black blouse as the deep sea base.