Blog Post #3
PROJECT OUTCOMES AND PERSONAL DEVELOPMENT
This is the third and final part in my series of blog posts for the Better Lives unit, in this one I will be focusing on the outcome of my project, which was Makeup Breakdown, and what I think I have learned from it. This was my first choice as my project because I wanted to see if I could learn anything new from the practices of the Make-up for Fashion course, as opposed to what I’ve learned so far on Hair, Makeup and Prosthetics for Performance. The result was honestly disappointing, I expected a little more, but I can’t form a full opinion considering we didn’t get to continue the lessons as they were planned, due to the sudden need for remote teaching. The current situation of the world and the order to “shelter in place”, definitely threw a spanner in the works for our project, considering it relied heavily on the university’s supply of products for students who maybe didn’t have access to any at home. For this reason, it was decided that we would create our final designs from non-conventional materials that we had in our homes. Even though I am a makeup student, and therefore own a lot of makeup, I decided to play along with the instructions and I actually got quite excited by one of the looks I created during our first remote lesson, in which we were instructed to create a look using the briefs we’d discussed in class of: imperfection and the fashion mistake.
The problems with this, for me, were that I live in a very, very small place with my boyfriend, so we are forced to only keep what is absolutely necessary and that we were also not given much notice as to what we were supposed to be doing. We were instructed to create two looks in two hours from nothing, which caused me to panic considerably. I ended up printing off some flowers to cut up and stick on my face because I couldn’t think of anything else to do at the time.
Seeing all of my peer’s final designs made me realize how much of a cop-out my work was, and how it wasn’t really in line with the Better Lives themes, as it had had the potential to be. By using the objects in our home, that would have otherwise gone to waste, to create art, we should’ve been representing social responsibility and sustainability. Instead of recycling, I created something new to go to waste because I panicked. My desire to prove myself as an aspiring makeup artist clouded my judgement and I overlooked the point of the exercise. I could have done a lot more if I had been able to keep the project themes in mind.