Converted Objects

This practical coursework focused on working with experimental design techniques and playfully using language, which was to be utilised here as a vehicle for conception and imagination. The starting point was a selection of various everyday objects, furnishings and architectural elements. Their characteristics and properties (form, function, materials, value, feel and context) were to be described by listing their attributes. After individual features were replaced by their respective opposites (antonyms), the objects’ meaning, function or properties were to be described anew and reconceived. Next, the students were asked to visually capture the reconfigured objects with an initial freehand sketch, before realistically placing them in an image by using the digital montage techniques taught in the course. The aim was to use language as a means of demonstrating experimental design techniques, as well as to playfully question or re-articulate the essence and manifestation of objects that surround us every day, or even to lead them to absurdity.