Erin Hall, Topo Map

For the topographical map project, my main idea was to use a thicker medium than paper, but I decided with the time constraints that I should go with my second plan. This was to create a tiny booklet sewn together with a topographical map inside said book. I achieved this after cutting a 5 in by 5 in square out of the inside of the book itself. This is my end result of the Topographical map project...

Mini Golf - Office

Our theme for the mini golf project was "Office". We lined the course with cardboard painted to resemble an office hallway. The part where the hole was, was lined with graphs and other office-y looking papers. We used office supplies like staplers, phones, cds, and a printer as obstacles. Our main obstacle was a spinning revolving door, but that broke fairly quickly, so we replaced it with a phone which was much more stable. Finally, we scattered shredded and crumpled paper on the sides for a messy look. Our par was 4.

Snow Bridge

Initially our group wanted to make a series of pointed arches out of bricks of hardened snow. We planned to make the bricks out of a bucket mold and then carve the bricks down to the size and shape we needed them to be. When we got to class on Monday we realized we were a team member short, so we had to work our hardest and see how much work we could get done. In class we got 7 bricks, 2 keystones, and 3 bases all constructed. With the crew we had we were not able to make enough bricks to make the extra arches, so we decided we would settle for one really good arch instead of rushing 3. We left the bricks to solidify, since they were still quite slushy. We returned Monday night and constructed the arch out of the hardened bricks. We used the stakes as supports and used a slushy snow mortar to pack in between the bricks to help them join to each other. We finished constructing the arch, brick by brick, and used them all because one was dropped during the process. Luckily we planned ahead and had constructed an extra just in case this had happened. One of the keystones ended up not solidifying successfully and the other did not fit properly so we had to carve the actual keystone out of the backup base we had made using one of the tubs. We left for the night with the structure still supported with the stakes (Picture 1). We came in on Tuesday morning and removed the supports (Picture 2). The arch was very sturdy and had a nice minimalistic feel, but the pointed arch concept was not going to become a reality because of the thinness of the keystone. We spent the rest of Tuesday attempting to pack snow on the sides to give it a smoother and cleaner feel. The snow was fluffy and very difficult to pack though, so we had quite a problem doing this. We ended up making a slush mixture and packing it on the sides. We used a ruler to carve this to a good curve and we used knives to even out the bricks on the inside in to a smooth arch. We finished our snow bridge and cleaned off the two bases and tried to remove all the dirt we could. We were satisfied with our bridge and liked the simplistic and elegant feel of our arch (Pictures 3 and 4).

Erin Hall, Object-small faucet

My object was the small faucet like structure. I decided that I would utilize plastic water bottles to build the majority of the structure, (and liked the 'message' that the plastic water bottles represented). I had quite a difficult time obtaining the said plastic bottles, obtained mostly through 'dumpster diving' and asking around. It is incredible how many bottles are thrown away in the trash. The rest of the 'faucet' was created through objects donated by REPO. I had difficulty with attaching the top red piece to the rest of the structure, because it was too heavy to just hot glue. Eventually it came together and I was relieved to finally be finished.

Erin Hall, Saturday 12 PM - 2 PM

My idea was to create something that had a function, which was inspired by the metal of the (once bike tire) wheel. I decided to create a structure that was similar to a tree using the step ladder as a way to suspend the piece, and incorporating the bike skeleton as *tree branches* to hang the chain and tire wheel from. I scattered some dirt and leaves to give it an outdoor effect, along with a lovely little rock and mug that another art student/students brought in. The words when I began this adventure were; White, Suspended, and Spewing. When I finished I converted the word Spewing to Swinging. I believe that this is not what I envisioned, but I believe that with the time restraints, limited supplies, along with the difficulty in altering the metal frame structure, yes it could have been better but at the same time, it could have been worse. I did enjoy the process, and felt there was an energy of freedom and child-like enthusiasm that I have never encountered before with a Foundations project. I really hope that despite some broken rules we continue to have similar projects, especially ones that can evoke the same stream of mental stimulation I had during the project.