Concentration

What is the central idea of your concentration?           Chance Chen

3D:I was inspired by ordinary expensive jewelry, which I have always have thought accessories comes in as an important part to complete your whole look. Then later on thought about how hard could it be to make all those pieces, you must have full knowledge, whole set of tools and source of material, that would be hard to get in your hands without being a professional or an accessories design or jewelry design student. Besides, although high street jewels can be cheap and look good, but personally I often feel like they are hard to maintain comparing to their price. There are times that I bought a piece into my collection but I only get to wear it once or twice, because that the detail pieces come off, or the color has faded due to the reason that it is not real metals. On another hand, for metals and crystals that are real, it’s kind of hard to find extraordinary designs using those expensive material, because often they are counted as rare pieces and extremely expensive. The trend in fashion lately, obtain over-sizing designs or over the top designs, but often they look good but weighting up to their price and how long a high street piece can maintain without ruin pieces here and there within a couple of times wearing, it is not balanced. Therefore, I came up with the idea of making jewelry out of paper, molding plastic paper. It’s very cheap, although it won’t be something you can keep a long time, but it definitely can race with the fast changing trend, balance out the worth of the art work pieces and it’s pricing. Of course that this wouldn’t be the most realistic thing to do marketing wise, but I thought it would definitely be something that’s interesting to make, and maybe also at the same time reminding people the idea that I’m trying to bring out, it’s never about the price of a piece of artwork, but it’s the design that worth the most; as my own view on the designer brands, although it’s material are worth the price, but it’s never about the name and fame that comes with it, it’s always about the designs that attracts me.

How does the work in your concentration demonstrate the exploration of your idea?

3D:In the concentration part, we have to make 6 to 12 pieces of work, which I’m thinking of making 6 pieces, due to that in my concentration collection, there are a lot of details and craftsmanship in within. In each piece of my work, it’s an idea on a design, so that explains why I have usually two to three works in each piece. For example: In piece number 1, I have taken gold cardboard paper, black cardboard paper and shredded gold wrapping paper, turning them into a chain necklace, a oversized gold watch and a chain bracelet. I would consider this piece of artwork as the piece that brings out the most of the main idea. Gold jewelries are expensive, Apart from the design, that’s the first thing that we notice, therefore, I thought I would be the most ironic piece out of all, that the fact I’m replacing something expensive to cheap pieces of paper. In piece number 2, I was inspired by the Braque style pattern and lace, so I used simply black cardboard paper and cut out pieces of designs that I drew out before hand. Then I sewed the pieces of designs into one, making it into a necklace and a bracelet, after chaining the finish pieces into one by using cheap thin chain, giving the work a more wearable aspect. In piece number three, I cut out red cardboard paper and made hollow design around the design, then later cut out the molding plastic gold paper into the shapes that fits into the hollow part of the red paper, turning them into dramatic necklace, bracelet and earrings. I had some criticism along the way, being told that I should consider making pieces that look 3D without even wearing them, so in piece number 4, I took more molding plastic paper in gold, cut them out into shredded like, then cut out a small bit of gold cardboard paper, cover it with industrial use quick dry glue, and stick on the shredded paper making them stand, creating this spiky and bling piece as necklace, ring and earrings. In piece number 5, I continued working on the gold molding plastic paper and cut them out into half butterfly wing into different size that I have drawn out earlier. Then I took one shred of gold cardboard and cover it with the quick dry glue, then stick on the half pieces of butterfly wings, creating this effect that not only it looks sculpturally interesting, the plastic wings also reflects the lights while moving them, which it really stands out and I would say it’s my favorite so far out of the collection. In piece number 6, I’ve taken silver molding plastic paper…

Astrid Anderson

Astrid Anderson

Astrid Anderson is a street wear in the luxury end Danish designer, who I thought is the most talented up rising designer that I look up to, I like almost every of her designs, which it can been worn unisex. Colors she uses are simple, even similar materials, but the texture and the color correspond to each other, even though it’s street wear, it doesn’t give you a feeling of not classy or inappropriate for any occasions. It’s the details and overall feel to her quality of design that attracts me; with out being common or extremely odd, those are practical pieces with a design edge. She graduated in Royal College of Art MA course in London, being the best of her class, she soon being spotted on her graduation show and received a huge acclaim from the industry and starting her own label. In 2010 she was a finalist in ITS Nine as well as being nominated as Talent 2010 by Italian Vogue; it is rare that street wear can be at the high fashion luxurious end, which I though it’s pretty amazing. She also won the Brioni Creativity and Innovation Award and the River Island MA student Bursary Award designing 3 looks for the high street retailer. Now she works in both London and Copenhagen, which both cities gives her different inspirations, which I think it’s also amazing to work in the cities you like and inspired to, doing the job you adore, be with the people you love; that’s like the best thing a person can have I thought. Initially I found her brand by looking at her work being worn on Rocky ASAP, which I thought the presentation, was edgy and not cliché like the ordinary street wear we seeing everyday. Entering her website, the basketball net made from chain looked amazing and I knew straight after that I would love her works, not making clothes, but also making artworks in the industry bring in fresh ideas.

Zomb X Classical art T-shirt

Zomb X Classical Art T-shirt

While I was browsing the street wear design websites, there was one article that caught my eye, a designer who put Classical Art prints on T-shirt, which I thought it was genius. Classical arts have been relevant for centuries, but who would ever thought of wearing them instead of hanging them on the wall?  

Not only the Classical arts, they have took many other patterns like the Thailand four face Buddha, India’s religious elephant, roses etc. as their inspiration. They also repeated the patterns at the right places, which the T-shirt looks more interesting and unique.

Then later on I thought about the color fading collage that I have been working on, if I take the pattern as the print of the fabric, I could actually do a collection from that, which I thought it would be worth trying after my AP project.

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Vadis Turner

Vadis Turner

A New York artist who attended Boston University, she was fascinated by the possibilities presented by traditional handicraft materials to define and contradict gender roles by creating desirable objects and becoming objects of beauty has long been the work of women. Her craft is like her image, is “a measure of a woman's worth and tangible evidence of her time” she said.

What caught my eye initially was her ribbon collection; she tied different colors and width of ribbons on the canvas, creating the look of ribbons coming out from the canvas in a beautiful way. Some times she uses colors of the same palate, but some times she choose couple of colors that would stand out from the rest, representing something. Later on I went on to her website and saw her other works, she gather those jewels of gold or silver color and put them together making a art work out of it, which I thought her works are not only nice to look at but also meaningful. She is also good at setting up scenes, using her aspect of beauty, messy of it’s own way, the colors and materials works with each other really well, creating the atmosphere.

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Leah McSweeney

Leah McSweeney - Married to the mob
Leah is the CEO and founder of Married To The Mob clothingline. I was reading a megazine another day and i came across the name of this brand which i had to look up where did the idea came from. Then later on found out that this brand was founded by this female, who actually had money to set up this line because of a funny story. She received $75000 settlement from the police in an accident for breaking her two teeth, she used this money and set up the line. She was feature in different magazines such as vogue, for her bold and straight forward ideas. She was strongly influenced by her friends and surroundings, thought that there are so many street brands around for men, but there arn't many for women, so she went crazy and started the line, which she has done a lot of different collaboration with big brands such as Lacoste, Reebok, Nike, Baby G, Karmaloop, Supreme etc. It had it's first collection in 2004 and til now, she started by making her own samples of clothing then later on established the one of a kind style.
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Ai Wei Wei

Ai Wei Wei

Ai Wei Wei is a Chinese artist who went to Beijing film school and Parsons New York, and was also the art director for Beijing’s bird nest Olympic arena.

Ai Wei Wei doesn’t only make artwork, but also involved in a lot of social argument and issues, pointing out corrupting government works; which the Chinese government weren’t so happy about, and decided to lock him up in 2011.

This is one of his artwork below, which it has a lot more meaning to it in this image. Ai Wei Wei is in the center of the image, hands on the knee, showing the center power of the government. The women on the far left who is wearing a air of glasses and playing with her hair meant to represent the people with knowledge, professors, scholars, who has a lot of power to show off, but still, facing the central government, showing government has the total control of them. The women with jewels on the far right is curvy, representing working class and leaning to the right, different to the government, leaning different directions and sitting a little bit further. The little lady sitting on the side of central government is the media and the lady behind represents the peasants and lower class that has no power at all. This work has been attached by many government supporters, but also being supported by a lot of artists all over the world.