kingBIRD: London Festival of Architecture I

In the studio making: Sound(E)scape for the exhibition Departure Lounge, London Festival of Architecture

The beautiful shadows of fabric (being crochet on the inside) through a white umbrella, a glass of wine and some comfortable converse; there you have it, the secrets of how this work was done.

This post is the first part of the story about the installation Sound(E)scape which were shown at The London Festival of Architecture in the show; "Departure Lounge" Pump House Gallery, London, July 2012. The exhibition is an outcome from a project called Across RCA and this work is made in collaboration with architect Rain Wu.

This installation is going to be a sound-scape or perhaps rather a sound-escape. The inspiration for this work is taken from the title of the show, Departure Lounge; the feeling of standing in the airport - watching the screens, showing all the departure destinations;

"and thinking what if my flight was going to a whole other destination than planned, where would it take me?"

The umbrellas are iconic British and the colour white is chosen to mimic clouds, just as we were flying somewhere else. In some of the umbrellas sounds from different and surprising locations will be playing. The umbrellas playing sound are on the inside padded with lanes of fabric crocheted, to give the illusion of a more private and enclosed space, from which you can depart on the imaginary sound journey.

When we decided on the crochet texture on the inside, it seemed as a good idea and it was, but it took forever and it was so hard physically that my arms were falling off. It was a true tour de force in 'granny skills'. But to be fair it was quite fun and kind of captivating to do this monotone manual labour. 

Help me out from here! I am being attacked by a killer-umbrella!
 - Ooh yes, rescued
- Thank you so much... I need a drink after this!

Rain was sorting out some of the logistics in the gallery. I was in the studio. As you can see, I had help and people kept me company and feed me and checked if I was alive underneath the giant umbrella. We needed 2 crocheted umbrellas - and the second one was, as always much faster :-D. In the picture beneath you can see John helping out attaching the crochet fabric to the inside.