Ever Tried, Ever Failed, part 1

This week we got introduced to a new topic as part of our contextual unit and it is all about failure.

Failure is a lack of success and we are conditioned to feel like we haven't tried enough when we fail.

Scott Sandage is a professor of history at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh who wrote about the origin of the word in his book “ Born Losers: The history of failure in America (2005)". He makes links between personality and failure, which turned the word negative, giving it a new concept. Before this, we knew failure as a part of life, nothing to be ashamed of. But since the great depression it has become negative and something to be ashamed of. He also talks about the phrases “good for nothing” being created as well,

So the term has become linked to money as capitalism becomes important.

We are all going to fail at some point whether it is big or small - this can make people very nervous, the phrase ‘we are human’ is a way of not too being scared.

Failure can mean trying something new but it just hasn't quite worked out - this is crucial for making art . Even if you think your work is a failure someone else might see it as a success or they might know a way of helping you improve it.

We looked at desire paths which are the easiest route to take that diverts from the path actually intended. There are modern routes on the internet as well e.g. hashtags.

It is a concept introduced in Bachelards book ‘ the Poetics of Space’ 1958

“A desire path is a path created by usage, not a pre-determined path. Normally these paths are created by people taking shortcuts across fields to get from point A to point B more quickly”.  Gaston Bachelard

We talked about parks and how there are always shortcuts people have made, are the paths a failure as people have chosen another route or would people always go off track?

We discussed Nike's billboard advert with American footballer Colin Kaepernick is it a success or failure??

It is one of the most lucrative campaigns but it saw their sales rise by 33% over the weekend the add launched - it failed for some as it saw Trump supports calling for a boycott of the company and some people went to the extreme of burning their Nike products but it was a massive success for others as they liked what Nike was standing for. It was a massive risk and I feel it paid off for the company, they would have know that it would upset some people, people they may not have wanted as customers?

Moonshot Factory - Google X Ted Talk - The Unexpected benefit of celebrating failure by Astro Teller.

It was a really interesting talk with some crazy but amazing ideas. He told us how sometimes it is good to know when to stop and an idea won't work and how sometimes shifting your perspective is better. Failure doesn't necessarily  mean you've ended a project, sometimes it means you've found a more creative path and being audacious makes people uncomfortable but that can be a good thing!

Celebrating failure is important as it encourages you to be creative and get out of your comfort zone.

Part 2, Seminar

We got shown some useful photographers that look at similar topics.

• Stephen King Photography looks at “Desire Paths”

• Jan Dirk  - Desire Lines - one goal = find the place from A to B

• Richard Long - calls himself a walking artist - photograph what he encounters (what has impacted the land?)

• Fay Godwin -- avid walker - photographed where people would block public footpaths that cross into their land even though when they brought the land it was there - also photographs when people dump rubbish in the countryside

• Andy Goldsworthy - land artist - makes art out of the land then photographs it to document it, he makes his mark but it wont stay there. I really like this work as even though he is changing what is around him he is not harming anything and it makes something beautiful out of nature that will naturally disappear apart from the images he takes.