When we were asked to come up with an idea to creatively express the concepts and human experiences of space, I ventured out into the city to look for inspiration. I soon noticed just how much useless information are available all over the city. Information that dosen't necessarily help anyone in any way. So, out of plain impulse, I started collecting these materials of "free information" wherever I could get hold of some. At this point, I had no idea what I was going to do with these papers. All I knew that I wanted to derive and make something out of them. Later, as I looked through all the material I had collected, I thought of making a collage of the city bringing together its artificiality, as expressed by all these useless pieces of information that mostly comprised of "great deals" "limited offers" and "low prices". However as I went through the papers, I discovered some nice words that got me thinking how the city also has so many wonderful things. I thought there was a great paradox building up here, especially because I found most of these papers around the subway (where these ads promoting the artificial are mostly seen) and it's also where all sorts of art music and poets linger around filling the city with a lot of colour and creativity. I realized the artifice overshadows a lot of the things which are truly beautiful and original in the city. In the process, I ended up picking out words, and found myself making more of a typographic collage of the city - of the most cliched image of the city (i.e. an image that is as seen and commercial as the ads on display --- the skyline!). The aim was to show how the artifice overshadows the real colours of this glorious city.
In my next step, I created a total digital version of my collage. No more paper, only the 'illusion' of paper and I colour coded it to show how under the artifice, there were other things hidden. As mentioned earlier, this project was a direct interpretation of what Times Square seemed to be to me and in the third step, I tried to portray how mass commercialization just blurs out all that we could've otherwise noticed about a place.
I'd like to work more on this project and make a series of images based on the concepts of space, human experience and commercialization.
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