For our first session we were asked to bring 3 objects in for our introductory task about decoding objects. We have since been told that our brief for the final submission is to place an object within a space and so we were asked to have a think about our objects as well as our proposed placements. One of the objects I brought it was a roll of duct tape, and although initially this object didn’t pop out to me as one which I wanted to base my entire project around, one idea which really jumped out at me in London was about taking everyday objects and placing them in a context which they wouldn’t usually be placed. Because of this, I tasked myself with using duct tape as my object to come up with a slightly out of ordinary object placement based around it.
Firstly, to decode the tape, I mind mapped some of the main uses for duct tape, although I was playing with the idea of an unusual use for duct tape, I wanted to look into the normal, everyday uses to almost get them out of my head and onto paper in order to look deeper into it.
Next I looked into the materials within duct tape and into many of its characteristics. I thought about the 2 opposing sides of it, the adhesive, sticky side as opposed to the coated side of it which has an almost bumpy texture to it and can be coated in different colours and thicknesses. These opposing characteristics are something which I think could be interesting to look into. I also looked into the recognisable characteristics of duct tape, such as the grey colour and textured shine it has, this idea could also be something which could become very interesting and I could look into the way we perceive it or why we recognise these particular aspects of tape.
Next, I wanted to delve deeper into thinking about tape and look more into other uses or meanings for it, be it physical or metaphorical, so for this I asked an array of people to tell me the first thing they thought when I showed them the duct tape. I got a large amount of answers and noted down some of the most interesting ideas to me. One of the most interesting concepts brought to my attention was the idea of duct tape being used as a restriction. Often within films or tv programmes this idea of tape being used to restrict peoples movement, sight or voice is often used and I think this idea of it being a silencer was one which really struck a nerve. It got me thinking more about what cases this would be used in, for example kidnapping, but also made me think about more of a metaphorical approach, for example domestic or sexual abuse is something which many people don’t speak out about, however there is no physical objects stopping them from talking.
After my decoding of the duct tape, the idea I’m looking to take forward is the idea of the duct tape being a metaphor for someone being silenced or kept quiet and could be linked to domestic or sexual abuse
Overall, my decoding of the duct tape really opened my eyes and inspired me to realise that everything, even everyday objects can have connotations and metaphorical meanings which often we would never realise until we look further into them. It taught me that often things within art and design, as well as every day life, aren’t always as they first appear and if you delve into the deeper meanings, other things will open up and become clear. Although next time I might think about creating one mind map with much more information fit into it which would allow me to compare ideas much more, however I think doing separate mind maps still worked well to generate ideas and decode the object. The idea of decoding is something which I use often within my discipline to formulate ideas, and this exercise has proved even further that it is a worthwhile task to carry out during the idea generating stage of a project.
Ben Jackson 