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If I had to estimate I’d say about 30 percent is spent flipping around on my phone, playing music and checking facebook, probably more than some and less than those addicted to the habit. The majority of the world has a phone, they can walk around with it flipping through their facebooks and instagrams and share stories with each other. It’s so strongly ingrained within our culture that we’ve pretty much become totally dependent on it, the daily routine now consists of always having them on us throughout the day. This is a supporting document of the performance piece I conducted on the 18th of February 2015 in Bristols Broadmead Shopping Centre, it was met with a lot of confusion. Here I will outline the processes and description from start to finish.
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D E V E L O P M E N T
I went onto gumtree and looked for some old, broken motorcycle helmets. I managed to find one for £10 and met up with the owner outside the BRL Hospital to which he then remarked.
“It’s your problem now.” Which briefly engaged a slightly concern as if it was going to blow up if I fiddled with it too much, but regardless the next day I got to work on crafting it into the final piece to be used later.
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I pictured the final result having a black coating so it doesn’t distract the viewer from the piece overall which meant sanding down all the gloss from the surface, then the paint could be applied.
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It was quite difficult to get within some parts, some of the grooves were really tight and maneuvering the sandpaper inside them was no easy task.
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With the gloss coating mostly removed form the surface of the helmet I began painting it entirely black, leaving the soft cushiony surfaces alone so it remained a comfortable fit for my head.
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I gathered a bag of phones from a recycling plant called Green Source Solutions and had them all disabled so I can attach them to my helmet, initially I was going to ask a bunch of people if they had any but doing so proved to be too unreliable as they weren’t being gathered quick enough for me to continue.
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I used a black silicon acetate to stick them onto the helmet, the larger house phones had a habit of slipping off and sliding out of position, I wanted them symmetrically opposite each other like a pair of ears simply for aesthestic purposes. The worst part about this was the smell, the substance smells very rotten and is a pain to wash off your hands. 13
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I had to hold the heavier house phones in place for several minutes so that they at least held a little stronger. The smaller phones stuck down with no problem which was expected as they were much lighter than the house phones. I had to sit in on a workshop session whilst I worked alone on the piece. During which the lecturer passed behind me and uttered:
“Martin, you’re crazy.� Once I was sure the phones were on tight enough I left them alone to dry onto the helmet overnight though I was pretty concerned about them slipping off or getting knocked, so I secured it out of reach.
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“I remember having this one.”
“I remember having this one.” 16
H A P P E N I N G S
These are some of the comments I recalled being said whilst I was creating the piece.
“Christ I haven’t seen this phone in ages!”
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“Martin, you’re crazy.”
“You’re crazy.” 18
“This looks... interesting.”
“Where did you get all these from?” 19
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P E R F O R M A N C E
With everything read and with permission from manager of Broadmead and the Police just incase people get a little alarmed at the whole get up, I set off to the location and positioned myself in front of Marks & Spencers
“Oooh look, perfect spot.� Outside the shop was a big blue stone sphere, I sat there for around 40 minutes with 1 break in between to warm up my hands, when I stood up my rear was extremely sore and felt bruised from sitting on such an awkward solid surface but I managed to do it in the end.
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“I heard them talking about this in the office.”
“What the fuck?” 38
H A P P E N I N G S
These are some of the comments I recalled being said whilst I was performing with it.
“That’s a little creepy.”
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“Did’ja get it?”
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“Hold the phone... this is a public exhibition...?”
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After going back and editing all the footage more ideas came to mind on where I could go further with this, how it could be more interactive with the public. The original intention of the piece was to simply intrigue but in the end it was almost like In traded seats with everyone. I was no longer performing, I was just sitting their totally immobile whilst everyone else performed around me, checking on their phones, taking selfies with me, texting their friends and just going about their daily routine. I definitely feel that i’ve engaged with the public in this form by making them use the tools available to them to talk and communicate, people became curious, interested and baffled but eventually shared what happened. In essence, I became the audience.
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