User:FLEM/Graduationprojectproposaldraft

Keywords

notebook

prototype

play with pages to have more space and connections

modularity, structure vs playfulness, mess and inspiration

analyzing and researching other peoples notebook / needs / limits

modular notebook kit

test cases, different needs

everyone is different, many things / ideas thoughts on the notebook and note taking

more confusing for the practical project, the thesis part is a bit more clear

instructions, conceptual art, sol lewitt, unknown outcomes

distributive work

1 What do you want to make?

General introduction, what you’re concretely thing you’re thinking about: an installation, performance, etc.. Whatever

I want to organise a series of meetings and workshops on the topic of notebooks, with the purpose of analysing the use of notebooks in contemporary society as well as try to grow the awareness people have on notebooks as tools, to discover how they are made and how they can be unique and personalised. Lori Emerson in the book Reading Writing Interfaces describes how in recent years design is getting every day more invisible and users are becoming less and less aware of the processes underneath the device they use: I think that humans are also slowly losing their connection with nature and materiality, and I am wondering if it wouldn't help to reconnect to craftmanshift through the creation of notebooks, the touch of paper and the lines of a pen on the surface. I would like the meetings to be collective experiences of discovery, moments where to play with this object. Till now I have heard a few stories about notebooks and I am sure there are a lot more to discover; some of them underlines how easy it is to buy new notebooks but how hard it is for someone to start or finish them: I believe this is also connected to consumerism habits. We live in an era where we can decide to continously fullful our desires , without even understanding what we really need. I assume that many people buy notebooks because they are attracted by the idea around the object, but then they never start or finish them because, still my assumptions, they do not really know what is their need of having such an object. I would like to create a space where people can explore experiment and discover the possibilities of notebooks. I want people to discover what they need from a notebook, and then, if they are up for it, to discover how they are made and how easy it can be for everyone to create their own.

For the project to continue after the end of the series of explorative sessions and to give a space to the information that will be gathered through these events, I plan to create a digital interface where people can fill in their needs (with the option to customize even more by directly getting in contact with me) and download and print instructions OR receive by post the materials and the instructions to create the notebook by themselves. Users will receive a magic modular notebook kit that has been created through experiments, study cases, workshops, meetings, conversations, surveys, in order to analyze and research other peoples notebook / needs / limits through these activities.

2 How do you plan to make it?

Describe how you will go through reading and writing practice.. How it will come together and possible outcomes.. How could the project come together as a hole

I want to create a conceptual map that reconnects the uses of notebooks and organise the collective explorative sessions based on thematics like notebooks as diaries, notebooks as annotation tools, notebooks as generators, notebooks as temporary archives, notebooks as craft, notebooks as community memory..I need to research on all of these topics, as well as the History and development of notetaking & notemaking and Notetaking, learning and memory: how is it connected?, as well as creating a Glossary of Notebooks to specify what i am working on, giving a context to the materials. The research aim is being able to introduce participants with more consciousness and knowledge on what we are trying to achieve during the explorative sessions.

In chuncks:

(A) Create a temporal community for temporal archives (notebooks): a space to discuss and analyse notebooks in a group to gather information and underline the limits of notebooks.

In particular, organise Collective Explorative Sessions where participants could: 1. discuss & analyse their own notebooks & find solutions collectively 2. create together new physical prototypes. Or other types of workshops like Exploring pen&paper or Collective writing through the use of notebooks (TBD).

To achieve this, I have to plan the dates and thematics of the workshops, find and contact the right locations, start advertising and invite people to join.

During this session, participants also had a piece of paper to pick from a selection I made for them to start reasoning with their hands/annotation methods throughout the session.
first explorative session with xpub2 students on 26.09.22
questions I gave the participants to choose from before starting the session
the plan of the session 01
the plan of the session 02

(B) Create a collection of sample notebook prototypes: together with the participants ideas could merge, but at the same time I will also do the same work by myself (both to be more an help with tools and concepts with the participants but also to research new ways of using a notebook).

At the end of the year I would like to have different categories/concepts that could feed the interface. To try out the prototypes, I will distribute them to people to see what is their use of it, to gather comments and reviews on the notebook they are trying.

a multicolumned notebook: could we fold it more?
first notebook kit: An adjustable and editable notebook with included tape and papers for continuation
sketches for new prototypes

(C) Work on hybrid/digital prototype: an online tool to create and print layouts and customised instructions [the notebooks kits].

3 What is your timetable?

Include a timeline of what needs to be done, to understand if plans are realistic. Break it down in smaller steps.1 month-2 months chunks

29 SETT-17 OCT

i want to go back to research a little bit, work on the glossary, contextualise what i've been creating till now.

study some notebooks' history and development.

I want to produce another notebook prototype and organise my case studies in a more structured way.

→ i have to prepare a nicer way to make people talk and think about their notebooks, to organise the right workshop for the public moment at Leeszaal.

17 OCT [PUBLIC MOMENT#1 Leeszaal] - 6 NOV

I have to create a conceptual map that reconnects the uses of notebooks and plan the events for the year based on thematics I described in the above section.

i want to prepare something to be done at the zine camp, to move a little bit more to the practical side [like make people play with paper with exercises and fun]