Wednesday 21st May
Review and finalisation

Session mapping all the projects
 


CG: Gordon draws out each project idea as individuals talk through what they have done and explore the implications. This is the first time we have all heard and seen each other's work. Many more ideas are sparked off as a result – not least the Fair Isle knitted dog jacket with electro-luminescent fibres!! More practical ideas include the use of these fibres to create 'glove lights' or 'lighted gloves' for example for young children walking back from school in the winter.

A group of us visit Steph's exhibition at the Museum. The work is the result of her MA study, which also involved a series of interviews with local maakers.

Everyone is busy finalizing potential products. There is not much time for anything else. What strikes us is the extensiveness of expertise and experience we have between us. You get the feeling we could do almost anything because of it.

 

Quote of the day

 


"I'd be tempted to go hairy and sparkly".

CG: We walk into town. Heather notices an image of a globe on a cardboard box in some rubbish beside a scruffy building in the industrial area we have to walk through to get to the town centre. The globe has the words 'Poles Apart' above and below. The ribbon around the globe has the words Magnets (UK) Ltd. Heather takes the box with her with an idea that it could be adapted for a logo or brand image for the Maakin Lab.

SB: This is a day of highs for most everyone. The group is very integrated and works really well at all levels together. The technicians are willing and helpful and the atmosphere between everyone is very generous. This spirit of spontaneous and cumulative generosity still always surprises me at every Lab. The response continues to be a 'given' in every group, regardless of disciplines and physical environments.

I speak to Carole about the possible value of looking at 14 years of PAL as a research project. I being to explore the possibility of this as an action research PhD using PAL as a longitudinal study. I imagine this research and the production of an e-book (possibly using TK3 software developed by Bob Stein, with whom I created a series of interactive media research labs using this tool) as a useful and integral part of my work with PAL over the next few years. This possibility is very liberating and challenging.

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