We want to beautify the Fine Arts building on the San Francisco State University campus with student interactive texting and computer controlled projections of scenes, artwork, or photos to make it a more inspiring place to learn and make art.
The Fine Arts building is nothing like either of us imagined it would be when we first attended school at SF State. Not only is it difficult to navigate through its various disjointed parts, but it is visually uninspiring both on the inside and the out. Vast walls of cheap beige spray-plaster, white walls, windowless classrooms, fluorescent lighting grey floors, and blank modern functional fascades all contribute to the lack of creativity and inspiration that this building vibes. Both being art majors, this was very disappointing. The building’s exterior is bland, gentrified even, and above all, completely uninspiring. It might as well be a hospital. This is not an accurate reflection of the students working inside…or is it? Would a more inspiring place to work and learn and develop one’s craft and art and style affect the output of the creative projects and evdeavors produced therein? This is our assertion.
Since the physical features can not be altered without serious ramifications, graffiti projects can not be executed without having to remove the artwork, and the processes that allow “approved” artwork and/or murals can take months, even years to complete, we would like to use projection as our main media. It is completely removable, portable, and has the potential to remain dynamic and changeable. If an outdoor location is not viable for successful projection–conflicts with the sun–the interior is almost as uninspiring save for a few temporary installations sprinkled throughout the building. Students will be able to text a disclosed word (disclosed perhaps on posters or in a text or BlueTooth issued text image) to a texting service number that will activate the projector and potentially a particular image matched to a certain word. The associated word used may reflect in some way the image shown. I like the idea of stickering or wheatpasting in public places the words and our webpage name to complete the circle as Loca did in their BlueTooth project “Set to Discoverable.”
We would also like to create a webpage (probably WordPress blog format) to share the project’s intentions, documentation, and potentially, an interactive interface where students can upload their own image and attach a text word to the image. This will allow other students to help spread the word about the project by sharing the text password for their image plus the texting service number so other people can call up that image. A digital projector is needed, along with a laptop computer with WiFi capabilities, electrical supply, a texting service account, a little programming time, and some ugly blank walls and corridors (which we already have a lot of).
We aren’t certain on the texting process but will be doing research to ascertain the direction we need to be headed in. Any suggestions would be appreciated in lieu of that and also in lieu of connecting the texting to a computer to a projector. Perhaps blue tooth might be a better way to go about the interactivity part, and would add to the locative value of the project; students would have to be in the area to upload a photo or other image to the computer and to activate it. I discovered the “Use As Remote Screen” on my phone We aren’t certain what is possible given time, equipment, or programming, and would appreciate a little coaching, but that so far is our initial dream for this project.
