Experiments in Happiness

Experiments In Happiness Newcastle Upon Tyne Part II 5th Year Live Collaboration Project 2016-17

By Joseph Chandler

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Experiemtents in Happiness was a live art project sitauted within a disused building the the centre of Newcastle. The collaboration was between myself and two other collegues and Newcastle born artist Amy Lord. The 2 day live event would form a part of the annual Late shows.

Our Brief was to design the first floor level which contained 4 rooms, which were to house a performance space, interactive feedback space and an out of the ordinary bar experience. Several visits to site as well a series of design team meetings and a charrette day with the artist and my peers were organised over the 1 month period we had to design the exhibition.

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DESIGN DEVELOPEMENT: (05/03/17 - 18/04/17) Email correspondence Email send to respond to Amy’s comments, our questions/queries in an attempt to tie up any loose ends/discrepancies.

2nd Site visit Re-visit to the site to meet with Amy and discuss our initial responses to the brief, to check if we were on the right track.

02/04/2017

Internal design charrette An internal half day charrette was organised to pool together our conceptual responses and quickly progress our ideas and try to create an overall approach to the project.

Refined Ideas send to Amy.

Initial site visit First group meeting with Amy Lord (Artist) and first look around the site. Discussion about the brief and what was to be expected going forward.

Hi Amy Thanks for your comments. If you and the team don’t mind me answering some of your comments on their behalf, I think a number of these revolve around how the Late Shows actually work.

Friday night are Ouseburn only venues, so if you are opening then it will be outside of the general loop so, I think, if people come to you on the Friday, they are quite likely to stay. Providing seating etc. on the Friday night makes sense. This might also give you the opportunity to be a bit more “curatorial” about what happens where and when in the building.

Seating in Room 4?

Saturday night is all Late Show venues. There will be a lot going on and people move through each venue to try to fit in a range of experiences. Because you are city centre I would guess there would be a fairly steady foot fall (at the Holy Biscuit we got waves whenever the busses arrived or departed). So I would suggest standing only in the bar on the Saturday night. However, somewhere to put down glasses is necessary.

Standing only in room 4 (with places for drinks) is totally fine, but seating in Room 1 still essential Thanks for confirming Room 1 will be a more “conventional” performance space for music, talks and performances, although I would not recommend talks unless they are very short - max. 5 mins - the Late Shows really tends not to be a sitting down kind of experience, although there were 5-10 minute Shakespeare performances at the City Library in 2015(?). I think we’re probably happy to leave this to you to plan, but we will need to liaise over the interface between room 1 and 2. Will keep this in mind when programming that space.

I’m afraid I’m maybe responsible for any confusion in the terminology in Joe’s email: the “rooms within rooms” idea is for free-standing booths, not to “line out” the existing spaces.

Will the freestanding booths be those we discussed for room 2 feedback?

I also called Katy’s 1:1 feedback conversations a “performance” (because that sounded better than “interview”, maybe better to think of it is more like a “consultation”? Katy is thinking through how she would be comfortable doing this. Perhaps this is something that could be combined with your idea?

Ah ok thanks for clarification – Katy - What is the interview about, what are the questions/purpose? Need to know this before I can think about combining with my idea – the purpose of mine is to creative a moment of fleeting intimacy between strangers I’m going to look into the tech for the video confessional on Monday. Not being a Catholic, I don’t have first hand experience of the manual variety, but I also wasn’t expecting the “secrets” to be that intensely secret that we need to make this soundproof! It was a bit more tongue-in-cheek...

Is the purpose of the video confessional booth to give feedback about the event or is it an experience in itself? If the former, it will need to be sound proof because in responding to the event and the work, people might want to discuss how it relates to their own mental health issues? That’s why I think it needs to be private…

When we have been discussing, I believe it was Joe, Katy, Liz and Andrew’s expectation that they would be taking it in turns to man their interventions - i.e. the silent bar, the paint pots (plastic ponchos for drunken painters are a good idea!) and “consultations” [but they will have to confirm this themselves rather than me volunteering them!] That would be great.

Regards, Sebastian

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Received brief First week spent familiarising ourselves with the brief. First internal group meeting to break-down information within the brief.

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Plan Layout

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Internal DTM To go assess where were we with the conceptual response, taking on Amy’s comments during our site visit as a means to refine our ideas going foward.

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Materials list A materials list was com in order to think about m rial requirements. Poten costs/Budget/Services/ rial Sources & availabili SM used to our advantage in order to create some sort of feedback?

JC/ The ‘selfie experience’ - Stupid obsession with taking ‘selfies’ with everything, could this be set up leaving the visitor in the feedback installation as last port of call.

LM Removal of infill from room 3 to room 4 to improve circulation route. Create more of a one way JC LM/ Cofession booth located in Room 3.

KJ the space, could it be used as something other than just seating?

JC/ long enough to want to sit for a long time? Depending if Amy has a definite idea in mind for LM/ Room 1 uncertain as to the potential use of the space. Are people going to be hanging around SM Approach to project as a ‘Family of objects’

Internal design team meeting (DTM) Meeting to discuss initial responses to the brief and the site. Basic document send to Amy outlining our initial ideas.

Email correspondence Amy replied with comments to our refined ideas document send after design charrette.

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JC

express him/herself Writing on a white wall - evokes memories of the ‘naughty child’ left alone with a crayon to

KJ

Interested in the idea of hanging feedback installation- could be difficult to execute?

JC

become more meaningful/intense/personal pant likely to feel more or less connected to the experience? Does the sensory experience By creating a controlled enclosed space with the visitor must enter/interact with is the occu-

SM entire first floor space. People intrigued to interact physically with the installations.

JC/ A series of follies/objects inhabiting each room, creating and overall approach through the ence. One personal experience face to face, the other open chatty environment convivial.

SM The social & silent bar - Continued theme of juxtaposition of shared and individual experiJC

exchanged and no words are spoken. Ingrained within our British ‘pubbyness’ The silent bar transaction - The idea of the pint waiting for the regular as he enters. Money is

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We need to develop and overall theme approach for the 1st floor installations

SM social spaces. A space within a space. The personal and shared sensory experience.

JC/ Interested in the interplay between enclosed controlled environment with open breathable KJ

Different approaches to obtain feedback- Audio/Visual/Physical/Confession/Spoken etc

SM Leading people through the space - sending the visitor on a journey through the space SM Confession Booth SM Marina Abramovich - Performance artist JC

Cheap affordable, participants create the installation vibrant space. Linked to feedback?

White room concept - Coloured sticker/Paint + stencil/ Coloured post it-notes?

General Comments:

People present: Joe (JC), Andrew (A), Liz (LM), Sebastian (SM), Katy (KJ) DTM: 31/03/2017 Experiments in Happiness

EVENT (19/20)

CONSTRUCTION (18/04/17 - 18/05/17) Construction phase (Day 1) Site had been cleared and was ready for painting. Discussion about resourcing and when each member of the team would be on site.

Feedback loop structure Carpenters on site to assist with the erection of the tent structure for the feedback loop + internal partitions for phone creche/confession booth.

‘Silent Bar’ construction One week spent in the workshop constructing the silent bar structure, with assistance for Dave the technician.

Silent Bar Silent bar dismantled and walked down to the site & reassembled + painted with.

Material sourcing Talk with university & workshop technicians about material supplies and assistance in the construction of the ‘Silent Bar’

Amy working on site from this point on.

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Chairs sourced 24 second hand chairs were sourced and peers helped to transport these to the site, where they were re-upholstered and painted.

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PROC ES S

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Final Clean Up Removal of any unwanted materials + finishing touches

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Design refinement Date set for design freeze.

Design moving towards final iteration. Material requirements and sources being reviewed and contacted.

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mpiled matential /Mateity.

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Carpenters services Carpenters on site to assist with construction of the end bar + removal of internal partition.

Final design proposal Final design document sent to Amy, Construction drawings, and material requirements.

Painting on site Full team on site painting the ground floor spaces. Help outsources to peers who offered to lend a hand.

Confession Booth Confession Booth constructed and painted

Final construction push Coloured light bulbs arrive on site. Fabric fixed back to tent stucture. Friends lending a helping hand to finish any painting

Final Event Open to the Public for two days

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MOO ENHANCDCOCKTA ING IL ON SITEBAR

FRI 19th MAY 5pm – 11.30pm

SAT 20th MAY 2pm – 11.30pm

13 GREY STREET Newcastle NE1 6EE

A site-specific Live Art project taking over an empty building on Grey Street, Experiments in Happiness uses science, psychology, philosophy and art to explore the idea of happiness and mood. Drop in, free entry but limited capacity.

www.amy-lord.com @_mintmoon #EIH

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Presented as part of The Late Shows 2017. www.thelateshows.org.uk

The project was a research and development project conceived by Amy Lord with the specific focus on the science, psychology, philosophical and artistic associations we have with ideas of happiness and mood.

Key Plan:

Silent Bar

Video Confession Booth

Feedback Loop & Child’s Play

Performance Space

Due to the tight timescale and funding through Arts Council England we needed to work efficiently in planning the proposal and decided that each room was to house a different mood or experience. Playing with the idea of a shared experience and an individual one, as well as ideas as uncanny, child’s play, isolation and out of the ordinary.

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The selected site was on Grey’s street, a central street which was described by architectural critic Nikolas Pevsner as ‘One of the finest streets in England’. The building was an 18th century, 4 story disused office space.

Performance Space: The performance space was the biggest room which we were designing for, and needed to act as the orientation space for visitors to the rest of the exhibition. A more functional space for seating and a small stage for live performances.

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An affordable approach had to be developed for the large scale performance space. A key element of the project was to reduce costs be sourcing free materials such as paints, chairs, lights, and up-cycling what was already on-site.

The central room was a small, awkward space, which would have a lot of through traffic, with the bar next door. A confession style booth was designed as a verbal form of feedback, where the occupant could individually leave feedback, to a concealed microphone and camera behind the grate. The internal partition with window to the left of the image was removed to improve circulation

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Feedback Loop & Child’s Play: The second room was designed as another form of interactive feedback associated with the idea of child’s play, painting the entire room white and allow visitors to paint there feedback onto the walls, with different colours representing different moods which they felt prior to visiting and after.

The Silent Bar: The long room was selected to contain a more conventional style bar serving unusual cocktails associated with moods and emotions and the 1 to 1 silent bar, where the individual entered a 1:5 scale model of the room they were just in, unable to speak, to find a silent bar tender and attempt to order a drink. Making the everyday experience of the bar into a out of the ordinary experience.

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I was in charge of designing, sourcing materials and constructing the silent bar. A detailed survey of the room which it was to be located was undertaken in order to recreate the 1:5 scale model. The bar was designed off site in the workshops as a number of panels which could be taken down, transported and re-erected on site, all by hand without the use of tools.

Several design iterations were developed to improve structural efficiency and cost whilst remaining safe and structurally sound.

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Room to write and record White Fabric on exterior Light with White Strip light

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Exisiting Double Plug

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Confessional Booth

Feedback Loop

Plan Layout 1

Tunnel to past between spaces Exterior transparent plastic

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Private Space for Reflection Black fabric on the interior with white fabric on the exterior Cushions to line floor in the corner Soft lighting - light with fairy lights

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Timber Support Frames

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Direction of travel

Plan Layout 2 Plan of Room 3 - Feedback Loop

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The feedback loop was a infantile structure reminiscent of the dens which you used to make as a kid with bed sheets and pillows. A reflection space within the loop was included for visitors to leave individual feedback about the event.

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A basic timber frame was constructed within the space to which fabric was stretched over and fastened back to.

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LAYOUT_Room 4

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The performance space had a simple stage made out of salvaged timber palettes and a number of chairs and tables which were donated to us. We reupholstered and painted each chair as well as painting a rectangle on the floor and walls, to give the impression that the floor was sliding up the wall. A chair was suspended side-ways on the wall to enhance the uncanny experience.

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We had a total of 1 month for the construction of the project. This involved painting each room of the entire building. As well as painting, I was in charge of the construction of the silent bar. A great hands on experience to design and build and an opportunity to ‘get your hands dirty’!

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The silent bar was tested in the workshop to ensure it was a structurally sound. It was then dismantlement and brought to site, where it was reassembled and painted, to give the same appearance of the room it was located in.

My colleagues were in charge of the construction of the feedback loop, den structure.

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Feedback loop and self reflection space ready for visitors to release their inner child and cover in paint!

A number of peers lent a hand in the endless painting and reupholstering of over 25 chairs, which we, were incredibly grateful for.

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The live show opened at the start of the Late Shows for a total of 2 days.

The exhibition saw over 600 visitors through its doors, making it a huge success. Everyone involved had a great time and some really positive feedback was left by our visitors.

One of the most well received rooms was the feedback loop/paint room.

Where people truly embraced their inner child and transformed the space from a blank canvas to an explosion of colour over the two days.

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A birds eye view of people transforming the space.

Performance Space.

The slightly uncanny sense of a skewed perspective.

Only one chair was left unused....

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Myself as the silent bar tender, in the 1:5 scale model of the room.

It interestingly brought out an awkwardness in the visitor most of whom giggled uncomfortably while i remained silent.

Transformation of the bar room.

I designed the ‘Your Happy Place’ sign, created using a stencil, a back light and recycling the old window which was removed from the internal partition we took out to improve circulation.

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The video confession booth raised some interesting feedback, mostly slightly inebriated visitors recounting a secret or two.

YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPPY PLACE YOUR HAPP

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