The Humble Bee Fashion Interpretation
Phoebe Day
Concept Proposal The aim of my exhibition is to ensure that the decline of wild honey bees in Britain is seen as a more serious issue when it comes to the health of our environment. The decline of the bees will have more than a significant impact on our environment and our food sources, yet it is something not many people have any idea about. I didn’t however want the exhibition to preach to people and be too serious. I wanted to outline the issue in a more ‘conceptual’ way. The exhibition will be held at the Saatchi Gallery in London in two of their adjoining gallery rooms. Room one: The main gallery space will house the conceptual presentation of how the decline of bees will affect our planet. Bees are responsible for pollenating over seventy per cent of our food sources so without them this would deteriorate. The most obvious way of showing this would be with the use of flowers, the thing most people associate bees with. The idea is that covering the whole gallery floor space will be gerbera flowers. A mixture of red, yellow and orange flowers will be placed individually to cover the entire space. The gallery will be hired for a week and to represent what would happen without the bees, the gerberas will be left to wilt and slowly die. To represent the effect of the bees there will be a projection of a busy working hive on all four walls. At the start of the week it will be filled with a buzzing noise with thousands of ‘busy bees’, then as the week progresses the flowers will start to die and in turn the amount of bees in the hive will decrease, leaving an eerie silence. A simple but effective visual representation of what the world would be like with no bees. Room two: It has been suggested by various scientists that if humans do not change the way we behave when it comes to the environment, we may have to start pollenating our main food sources ourselves. One suggested that it would have to be done to mimic the bees by brushing each crop with a paintbrush. To add an element of interaction, in the second room visitors will be invited to paint a section of a bee hive, on the walls of a gallery, just like the live one in the previous room. The aim is to highlight to people how long and how tedious it would be to live the life of a bee, but in a more creative manner. Hopefully people will come away from the exhibition understanding more about the importance of the bees but also having seen something visually awe inspiring and interacting with the experience as a whole.
Time Line
Strategic Implementation Logistics Venue: The Saatchi Gallery, London Two adjoining galleries - ground floor 1 week hire (open from 9:00 til 22:00) Gallery provides tecnological equipment (projectors)
Total
£54,500 Materials:
Flowers for exhibition [fiftyflowers.com] 160 Dark Orange Super Gerbera Daisy x 40 boxes 160 Burgundy Super Gerbera Daisy x 40 boxes 160 Golden Orange Gerbera Daisy x 40 boxes
55776 flowers needed to cover the 1600m2 gallery floor. Extra for emergancies Flowers available all year round
Budget of around
Average vase life of 5 days. Less in gallery: perfect for the purpose.
£150,000 for
Total
£56,815.20
the exhibition.
Poster
The Saatchi Gallery
1st - 8th August 2012
Could you live the life of the humble bee?
The Humble Bee...
Promotional Material
The Humble Bee Could you live the life of the humble bee?
The Saatchi Gallery Exhibition starts 01/08/12 until 08/08/12
Website Promotion All Media Advert
Could you live the life of the humble bee?
Flyer
The Saatchi Gallery’s newest exhibition outlines the effect the decline of the bumble bee will have on our planet. It’s an issue that more people need to be aware of. Bees are responsible for pollenating over 70% of the world’s food sources. Without them, the world as we know it is in demise. The exhibiton is a visual representation of life without bees. A stunning display of gerberas adorrnes the gallery floor, a pleasure to see the flowers in full bloom. As the week progresses though the declining bee takes its toll on the beauty.
You are invited to try out life as a bee. Humans will one day have to be responsible for pollenating crops. Something that is predicted to cost the government in excess of £1.8 billion a year. Try your hand a paint brush pollenating and see if this is something we need to put a stop too before its too late.
“A must-see exhibition” Sunday Times
ViewPoints
Room one Fresh Flowers Thousands of Bees
Room One Dying Flowers Deminishing Bees
Room Two Pollenate a honeycomb Gives the visitors a chance to ‘interact’ with the exhibition