INflate EXflate - City of Joondalup

An inflatable garment research collaboration as part of the City of Joondalup’s
2015 Urban Couture programme between fashion and costume design
students from Curtin University, Edith Cowan University and the Western
Australian Academy of Performing Arts facilitated by visual artist, Kieran Stewart.
3 March-30 March 2015 | Joondalup Art Gallery | 4/48 Central Walk, Joondalup
INflate
EXflate
Model Partner
Makeup Partner
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Contents
Co Foreword - INflate EXflate
Introduction – Where inflatable techniques and fashion intersect
Artist talk with Kieran Stewart
‘What’s on’ in the City of Joondalup?
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Featured Student Designers
Danielle Marklew
Joana Ehmes
Marlie Fialho
Kimberley Pace
Lynnelle Wilton
Natasha Veurink
Olusolafunmi Ayodele
Ryan Buckley
Sita Carolina
Tarah Pahn
Wenbin Wang
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FOREWARD
INflate
EXflate
2015’s Urban Couture programme
brings you all things inflatable.
Kieran Stewart, a visual artist
based in Victoria visited the City of
Joondalup to work with fashion and
costume design students from Edith
Cowan University, Curtin University
and the Western Australian Academy
of Performing Arts.
Students and artists collaborated
on inflatable garment research
to challenge traditional forms
of dress and to re-invent standard
dressmaking techniques to create
inflatable garments. Kieran Stewart
ran a series of workshops to
explore, investigate and re-examine
patternmaking techniques by
inflating the space between the
body and garment, further creating
unique silhouettes.
Participants experimented and
manipulated the spatial and temporal
dimensions of the body against
inflatable objects, with Stewart
demonstrating inflatable construction
techniques found in commercial
inflatable applications including bags,
rafts, tubes and geometric shapes.
INflate EXflate aims to create a
dialogue by encouraging viewers
to re-examine ideas about garments
and their relationship to the body.
It re-imagines commercial inflatable
techniques found traditionally in
blow-up pools, mattresses, freight
packaging and inflatable boats
and how these innovative techniques
can be translated into fashion and
contemporary garment design.
The INflate EXflate exhibition at
Joondalup Art Gallery will run from
Tuesday 3 March to Monday
30 March 2015
Tuesday to Friday
10.00am – 2.00pm
Special opening hours during
the Joondalup Festival
Saturday 28 March
2.00pm – 6.00pm
Sunday 29 March
2.00pm – 6.00pm
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Photos taken at ECU and WAAPA inflatable workshop.
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Where inflatable
INTRODUCTION
techniques and
fashion intersect
Kieran Stewart is a self proclaimed
problem solver and improviser by
nature, who uses his inquisitiveness
and analytical ability to learn new
skills using different media. This is
ultimately how he fell into inflatable
art, by trying to make something
out of nothing, ‘an inflatable, full
of empty space’. This exploration
of new skills and techniques is
part of his ongoing exploration
of work expanding his broad and
multidisciplinary artistic practice.
The opportunity to work with fashion
and costume design students
using inflatable methodologies is
something that appealed to Stewart
and his desire to share construction
possibilities in the creation of wearable
garments. Being involved in the 2015
Urban Couture programme has given
Stewart the opportunity to leverage
these skills and pass them onto other
creatives with the support of the City
of Joondalup.
This project has been based around
the following premise: create, design,
innovate and make. The journey to
create inflatable garments started
back in September 2014, when
Kieran arrived in Joondalup to run
a series of workshops with students
at their respective fashion schools
along with local visual artists at the
Joondalup Art Gallery.
One of the incredible things about
inflatables is how discreet and
versatile this medium is within
the commercial space, and how
frequently it is relied upon as
a means to achieve commercial
outcomes on limited budgets. To give
context to commercial ranges of
inflatable products, the following are
examples which are commonly used
including air mattresses, bicycle tyres,
blow-up pools, sun lounges, inflatable
boats, swimming floatation devices,
inflatable venues and domes,
industrial freight packaging bags,
domestic and commercial housing
insulation, inflatable space stations,
hot air balloons and inflatable signage
to name a few.
The commercial world designs
products using inflatable techniques
because this has many financial
benefits. For example, a blow-up pool
comes packaged in a carton the size
of a shoe box and may only weigh
10 kilograms. When inflated using only
an air pump, it can reach the size of
a small back yard pool in ten minutes,
withstanding the back pressure of
10,000 litres of water. Compare that
to a fibreglass pool structure and the
associated transport, logistics, crane
hire and installation costs, and you
will start to see why inflatables offer
a more cost effective solution when
designing products.
One pertinent historical example is
the use of inflatable military decoy
tanks from WWI, which is a technique
still used (albeit in a more advanced
format) as part of deployment in
contemporary forces. This seemingly
basic tool has been developed by
military forces to produce hundreds
of inflatable decoys indistinguishable
from the real thing at a distance.
With contemporary fabric
technologies and computer aided
design, such objects can be produced
with increasingly greater speed and
complexity.
In terms of the space where fashion
and inflatable art intersect, this
becomes a more complex area
of experimentation. The use of
inflatables in fashion can be as
straightforward as a direct reference
to the process of inflating a garment
creating dramatic silhouettes.
Alternatively, it can be used in
a multifaceted manner to create
structural mechanisms to aid in
designing visionary products that
transform the market place.
An example of the latter is a Swedish
design company Hövding, who have
been designing a working inflatable
helmet that presents as a fashion
accessory. This garment appears
as a scarf or a neck collar, until it
is triggered by an accelerometer
in the event of a crash when it rapidly
inflates into a fully encompassing
bicycle helmet. In an accident, the
motion sensors pick up the abnormal
movements of a cyclist and send a
signal to the airbag which then inflates
in a tenth of a second to form a hood
that surrounds and protects nearly all
of the cyclist’s head and neck, whilst
leaving the field of vision open.
International studies have indicated
that statistically bicycle helmets
can reduce injuries by at least sixty
percent. Four in ten people who die
in cycling accidents would have
survived had they been wearing
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a helmet. Despite these alarming
statistics, the vast majority of cyclists
do not wear helmets for a multitude
of different reasons. These reasons
comprise of the following such as
their bulkiness, impracticability to
carry around, or the thought that
they are unflattering to wear. Unlike
traditional skull shells, the ‘invisible‘
and inflatable helmet appears like a
functional scarf, with the advantage
of an airbag folded secretly inside.
Innovation such as the Hövding
bicycle helmet is a prime example
of the evolution of inflatable design
combining fashion and engineering
to solve a common marketplace issue
and safety concern.
Opportunities to apply inflatable
techniques to fashion, garments,
cloth and product design using
contemporary fabrics and techniques
are vast, with the City of Joondalup’s
Urban Couture programme providing
a catalyst for collaboration between
Stewart and fashion students to
provide an informed introduction
to these possibilities.
INflate EXflate aims to exhibit these
students’ ideas through displaying
their documentation of testing,
marquettes, video work, toiles and
sketches. It is through this crossdisciplinary collaborative design
process that visionary ideas emerge
and we continue to support local
Western Australian student designers.
Dummy used during World War 1 by the British.
Hövding bicycle helmet.
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ARTIST PROJECT STATEMENT
Being invited to contribute to
INflate EXflate as part of the City
of Joondalup’s Urban Couture
program has been an amazing
experience for me as an artist.
I have been inspired by the efforts
of the fashion and costume design
students at Curtin University, the
Western Australian Academy of
Performing Arts and Edith Cowan
University, particularly in relation to
how they have explored and adapted
the skills they learnt from the inflatable
workshops they attended.
It has been fascinating to see how
they have utilised these skills in
their own terms to produce inflatable
fashion creations, and it is even better
to see the outcomes from these
students’ experimentations that
are so amazing and refined.
I feel very privileged to have worked
with so many talented students from
various Western Australian fashion
institutions on this collaborative
research project.
Kieran Stewart
Visual Artist
Come along and see Kieran’s
work in person at the Joondalup
Art Gallery from Tuesday 3 March
to Monday 30 March 2015.
Artist Talk
Kieran Stewart
Friday 27 February 2015
10.00am
Joondalup Art Gallery
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K.Stewart Deadmen 1# 2010
K.Stewart Deadmen 1# of 3# 2013
K.Stewart Deadmen 2# of 3# 2013
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EXHIBITION WORKS
Kieran Stewart has produced
two works for the INflate EXflate
exhibition; an inflatable garment
disguised as a personal shelter
(outcome #1) and a transportable
mini-pavilion hidden inside a wearable
back-pack (outcome #2).
Outcome #1
My response to the brief of creating
an inflatable garment was to interpret
the functionality of an inflatable on
the body. I was interested in creating
a garment that could incorporate
inflatable aspects into fashion, as
well as achieve an architectural
outcome. As such, I have explored
the development of a personal
inflatable shelter that is hidden within
the structure of a couture garment.
Outcome #2
As part of Urban Couture, I wanted
to extend the developmental process
of designing inflatables using the
techniques from the workshops
I attended. I was also interested
in exploring the possibilities of the
TYVEK material used to create
these garments.
As such, I have created a portable
mini-pavilion that will be taken back
to the universities involved in this
project, to facilitate discussion
and mini workshops on fabric
technology and design.
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The mini-pavilion will be contained
in a wearable backpack and can
be inflated via a compact battery
and fans. The goal of this mobile
venue is to expand upon the
outcomes of the INflate EXflate
project as well as demonstrate
the possibilities and portability
of inflatable design and industrial
fabrics in fashion.
Test design concepts of MiniPavilion Fabric Sample #1
Test design concepts of MiniPavilion Fabric Sample #5
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MATERIAL CASE STUDY
TYVEK is fabric engineered for
protection, durability and comfort,
used in a variety of industries
but most well-known for medical
protection suits. It is heat resistant
and non-permeable, making it ideal
for use when creating an inflatable
object as air cannot leak through
the material.
Each tertiary student involved in this
project received 10 metres of TYVEK
to test, design and create their
inflatable garments.
STUDENT DESIGNER
Danielle
Marklew
Title of work: Body of Death
Description of work: My work
considers the changes in the body
as it decays. Soon after death,
increased bacterial activity causes
the body to swell. On the inside the
muscles stiffen, whilst on the outside
the skin becomes soft and slippery
as it deteriorates. Over time orifices
peel open and attract insects
to burrow within, with the body
eventually collapsing and leaving
a flattened form.
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Joana
STUDENT DESIGNER
Ehmes
Title of work: Untitled
Description of work: The idea
behind my work came from the
relationship between the ‘lived in
body’ and the garment, and how
they influence each other over time
by leaving a mark through the same
repeated movement. My design
explores this relationship by creating
links to view the body and garment
as one single entity.
STUDENT DESIGNER
Kimberley
Pace
Title of work: Blow and Squeeze
Description of work: This inflatable
piece is an extension of my current
body of work from my Masters
research, which explores the
in-between conditions of the
corporeal body.
My research investigates the abject
in-between condition of the corporeal
body through questioning the stability
of bodily margins. It explores the
idea that all bodies are penetrable,
fluid, excessive, ambiguous and
in-between. My research of the
in-between body asks how do
these unclear boundaries between
internal and external body entice
and repulse us. These ideas
are demonstrated through a
dialogue between the body,
garment and object.
I decided to use blow up dolls to
create the inflatable elements in order
to continue exploring the dialogue
between desire and repulsion. The
bladder inflatable of the blow-up doll
allowed a more intimate relationship
for the wearer by becoming an
extension of the body. The contained
air of the inflatable doll blurs the
margins between the body, garment
and object as the inflatable elements
are simultaneously contained within
and ooze from the garment.
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Lynnelle
STUDENT DESIGNER
Wilton
STUDENT DESIGNER
Olusolafunmi
Ayodele
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Marlie
STUDENT DESIGNER
Fialho
STUDENT DESIGNER
Ryan
Buckley
Title of work: Between
Description of work: I explored
the idea of working with space
between the garment and body
created by air. I achieved this by
using a clear material that depicts
a floating bubble, further portraying
this space as hollow.
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Sita
STUDENT DESIGNER
Carolina
Title of work: Tutu
Description of work: A constricted
core and an inflated behind. A
response to an investigation of
origins and influences found in
Asian culture in particular Javanese
dance and ballet.
STUDENT DESIGNER
Wenbin
Wang
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Tarah
STUDENT DESIGNER
Pahn
Urban Couture
Diary 2015
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Date
Program
Venue
27 February
Kieran Stewart Artist Talk
Joondalup Art Gallery, 4/48 Central Walk Joondalup WA
3 March
INflate EXflate Exhibition
Opening
Joondalup Art Gallery, 4/48 Central Walk Joondalup WA
8 March
Social Media Workshop with
Emma Bergmeier-Varian and
Claire Mueller
Joondalup Art Gallery, 4/48 Central Walk Joondalup WA
13 March
Networking High Tea and
Launch at The Breakwater
The Breakwater, 58 Southside Drive Hillarys Boat Harbour WA
16 March
Jaime Lee Major Artist Talk
Joondalup Art Gallery, 4/48 Central Walk Joondalup WA
18 March
Urban Couture Graduate
Capsule Showcase
Rooftop Car Park, Lakeside Joondalup (access via Grand
Boulevard, entrance near Sisters IGA)
28 – 29 March
Joondalup Festival,
Fashion Tableaux
Grand Boulevard, Joondalup
28 – 29 March
Anya Brock Mural
Joondalup Festival held in Central Park, Joondalup
28 – 29 March
Joondalup Festival,
Fashion Photography
Exhibition
Joondalup Festival held in Central Park, Joondalup
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‘WHAT’S ON’
IN THE CITY OF JOONDALUP
Getting
Social
Master the ins and outs of the ever
evolving world of social media, with
the City of Joondalup’s Getting Social
workshop. From Instagram etiquette
to the best photo editing apps and
top tips for finding and maintaining
followers, Getting Social will help
you get the most out of Instagram
and Facebook.
Registration is required for this
workshop so please phone
9400 4230 or book online by
visiting joondalup.wa.gov.au
Workshop with Emma BergmeierVarian and Claire Mueller
FREE EVENT
8 March 2015
Joondalup Art Gallery
4/48 Central Walk Joondalup
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‘WHAT’S ON’
IN THE CITY OF JOONDALUP
Anya
Brock
Popping up all over Perth in hidden
laneways and on the side of buildings,
Anya Brock’s work is finding its way
all over Western Australia and will
come to Joondalup in March 2015.
Brock is well known for her use of
bold, expressive black lines on top
of kaleidoscopic colour palettes.
Working with acrylics and oil, Brock
uses shards of colour in a geometric
fashion to render contemporary
illustrations of zebras, budgies and
fashion landscapes.
Be Ready, 122cm x 122cm
Acrylic on canvas
Anya Brock
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Joondalup Festival goers will be
treated to a live demonstration of
Brock working her magic, as they
watch the festival site transform
into a world full of colour and fashion.
Brock will be painting at the
following times:
Saturday 28 March 2015
2.00pm-6.30pm
Sunday 29 March 2015
2.00pm-3.00pm
ANYA BROCK
Fashion Illustrator Mural
FREE EVENT
28 – 29 March 2015
Joondalup Festival
Central Park Joondalup
T: 08 9400 4000
F: 08 9300 1383
90 Boas Avenue Joondalup WA 6027
PO Box 21 Joondalup WA 6919
Connect with the City
joondalup.wa.gov.au
This document is available in alternate formats upon request.