Mai Qiu

Blog 4 

This is my 4th blog post, which will share some of my opinions on the work of my classmates. I will choose two students’ works for analysis, because I think their works have many similarities with my theme, and they let me see some very novel ideas and creations.

The first concept design that I want to reflect on is by Mabli Jones, who designed the characters of human beings after 1000 years of environmental damage. His character have thick rough skin all over the body, on the top of the skin there is a layer of mucus and mask attached to the face. Its design is very figurative. Many of the features of the character he designed have powerful and specific functions, which make human adapt to the harsh environment of the earth and the complex environment of other planets. I think it’s very imaginative. To be honest, it’s hard for me to imagine what changes will happen to our bodies and what kind of life we will live in 1000 years later. This is probably my work habit. When I design relatively specific characters, I must find a lot of evidence and logic to help me design a reasonable character. When I design some more mysterious and mythical characters, I don’t consider all the rational logic and certification in the physical world. So I think Jone’s working style is very special. He can combine the most rational design with the most bold imagination. This is very different for me, and it is worth learning.

The second concept design that inspired my thinking was made by Annie Foo. Her work depicts a wounded woman. This woman lives in a world where the environment is overloaded with garbage due to over consumption and fast fashion. Then the whole world is facing an apocalyptic over landfill. In the same way, I think his works are also very imaginative, and the term “apocalyptic” mentioned in her concept is the main reason that attracted my attention. I think her story design is very alarming. It’s like what we are experiencing now. What this epidemic brings us is a catastrophe and turmoil sweeping the world. Everyone’s original life has to be broken and changed. The beginning of all this can be explained that we don’t have a more responsible system. Every one of the influencers (I mean people at the grassroots level) of this outbreak around  the world, making small influences finally leads to the growth of the number doubled, and before the outbreak, we had no idea that things would get here. We even thought for a time that we have a good enough system to support us to maintain a good and healthy life. I think now what we can do is to learn from the turmoil. There is no perfect system but better. Once again, I think it’s very important for human beings to keep on reflecting on themselves.

Blog 3

This blog is about the detailed description of my personal development and personal outcome on the practice option Develop a Character. I will analysis the parallel between the practice option and my personal major, and also record my personal achievements. In I mainly choose to study sustainability as one of the themes of this unit, so this blog will also focus on this theme.

First of all, the practice option Develop a Character has provided me with many new skills in the practical operation of making fashion images. We learned a lot of professional methods about special effects make-up in class. I think understanding these will give me new effects I can try for my actual shooting and production process in the future. The course also provides me with a lot of basic knowledge about make-up, so that I can better communicate with the make-up artist in my later shooting process. Secondly, our tutor talked about how to be more ethical and sustainable choosing, using and recycling products for make-up using. I think my major has a lot in common with this. I am from Fashion Styling and Production course. In the process of making fashion images, we will also use a variety of props, clothing, materials used for the setting and consumables such as paint, plastic sheets, fabric, etc. Therefore, it’s really important for us in the whole production process, we make careful and eco-harmless choices when selecting objects in the early stage, using in the shooting process, and the treatment and recycling of objects in the later stage. Although the two majors often face different kinds of objects, it is the same essential thing to make a conscious choice.

Let’s talk about my personal outcome. I’ve created a character that is connected to ecological balance. This character originally needs actual special effects make-up and image production, and then it is presented in the form of image. However, due to the epidemic situation, we were unable to obtain relevant materials, so I could only explain the concept of my creation and my sketch. This character is inspired by the concept of earth, nature and ecological balance being as the centre of everything. The origin and importance of this concept are explained in more detail in my first blog. This character actually represents everything, including all the material and consciousness in the world, including our earth, nature, your thoughts, my body and so on. I want to personify the sum and let him present in front of us as a person with head, body and facial features. His whole head surface is blue, and then spread down to the middle of the body, gradually spread to the limbs in the process of body skin surface gradually become black, in which hands and feet as the ends of the body are the deepest black. This highlights the character’s ability to self purify and metabolise, as well as his ability to make dark, dirty actions. It has a white dot in the centre of its head and a white dot in its heart, which emphasises the importance of consciousness for this role. I want to pass on to the outside world that the insignificance of human beings in the world through this character. Therefore, we should always be cautious and introspective.

Blog 2

This blog is mainly to share with you the impact of Better Lives unite on the way I work in the future. The theme of Better Lives unit is divided into three parts, the first is sustainability, the second is diversity, and the third is social responsibility. In my first blog post, I mainly focused on the topic of sustainability, so I also chose to elaborate the impact on my future work from this topic.

First of all, the biggest impact on me should be the impact on my consciousness. This shows when I make decisions, I will make more careful decisions because of the situations mentioned in our lecture. This means more sensitive self-monitoring and self reflection. For example, when I want to print my unit handbook, and you know they are very long, maybe 20 or 30 pages of paper. Usually I will simply click the print button on my computer without any thinking, and then a stack of printing paper inserted to the printer will become my unit handbook. Now I will hesitate before pressing that button, can I make the page layout more compact? Can I set up to print two-sided paper? Do I really need to print these documents? Can I read some documents on the tablet. These subtle differences in work may only change a little and have a little impact at present, but in the long run, if everyone has a more careful consciousness, it will have more impact than just a stack of printed papers in my hand. I know it sounds like a cliche, but it’s also an irrefutable fact. Second, as a styling student, it is an important part of my work to find the garment resources for shooting. My more careful decision-making will help me in this part of the work, also more in line with the ethical. I more want to avoid the purchase of the form of access to my one-time shot garment resources, because it is unsustainable. I am more and more willing to rent or borrow to get the sources of the garment to replace the purchase. As I accumulated my experience and qualifications, this became more and more easy for me. I found that there are many independent designers and student designers. They have many excellent works. Their works may not be commercialised, so they may not get a lot of media exposure. They may only do such one piece for a certain project. I usually find them through social media, I contact them, and ask for example “would you like to lend me this coat from your certain series? I want to fashion shoots about a certain theme. I think your overcoat will be very suitable.” This is a truly win-win and efficient way to use resources. Their works can draw more attentions through the fashion content I produced. I also have garments to complete my work. At the same time, I will not generate more unnecessary one-time consumption. I’m glad that the designers and showrooms I’ve met so far are willing to accept such cooperation requests. Otherwise, if I want to continuously produce fashion content, maybe my whole bedroom will be used to stuff clothes I won’t wear, and I’m trying to avoid this from happening.

Blog 1

Last week, I watched online lecture #5 by Kate Fletcher for the Better Livers unit. This lecture’s about Nature. Kate gave me clues I was not sure before about the purpose of this unit. And she gave me new ideas on the topic of sustainability. 

Kate started from the deforestation of the aborigines on Easter Island, which led to the near extinction of their population. She listed how much great impact human production and life had on the ecological balance of the earth since the Anthropocene. Although the facts she provided were shocking, but I’ve heard too many such statements. They’re worrisome facts I’m numb after listened again and again. I even thought if I take environmental protection as the most essential, my actions will run counter to the value and pursuit of the existing modern economic society. Do I need to return from the industrial society to the rural areas and live a self-sufficient life to truly achieve the sustainable and environmentally sound life?

In the last 20 minutes she inspired me. Kate addressed if the fashion industry take action to sustain the environment, the industry would shrink by about 75%. The structure and form of fashion industry will undergo subversive and unimaginable reorganisation. I agree. The core of fashion industry nowadays is composed of various production and consumption. Production is constrained by capital. Capital pursues economic benefit. It’s hard for capital cutting 75% of its own interests. This is not in line with the operation logic of the capital market. But as an educator from the industry she have the courage to admit in order to make changes in this industry, part of the interests need to sacrifice, she’s very brave. This straightforward voice, we do not often hear because her expectation means the reduction of economic benefits, which’ll touch the nerves of some vested stakeholders in the industry (we all are). So most of the time, we’ll avoid talking about this obvious topic.

In this regard, she gave a constructive answer, “fashion industry can replace the economic interests centred logic with the logic of taking the earth as the centre.” I immediately thought it’s impossible for her to change the power core, and thinking inertia of this industry. But I thought again, 100 years ago, in my country, China, it’s common for people to be traded as something owned by their family. Now in the world I live in, a great progress has been made on human rights, nobody can imagine someone’ll be legally sold . We think it’s hard to change one’s mind because everyone has the cognitive limitations given to them by times they lived in, but throughout history, we can see the speed of ideology transformed. Some changes are led by several grand movements, then the masses make silent changes in their consciousness in response to those movements (e.g. the rights of people of colour, homosexuality and women), then in the ordinary daily life, we gradually become what we’re now. If we keep expressing what we believe and keep the action, it won’t be as difficult as we think. It’s important we realise we’re going to do something we didn’t have to do before, and give up some benefits we have. Only when the whole industry’s clearly aware of what we’re going to pay, will it start to think and weigh whether it’s willing to pay for the survival of our environment.