Delaney - Small World

 Idea Development

    My initial idea development for this project consisted of me just trying to remember and write down what kind of objects I already have that could work. I ended up with a pretty good list of items, but I still planned on visiting a thrift store or something to come up with more ideas.

    I didn't really find anything that spoke to me when I looked around Laramie, so I decided to visit home over the weekend for more inspiration.

Cigar Boxes   

    I have a lot of cigar boxes at home. They do sort of have meaning to me that could fuel this piece. My family owns a little pawnshop, and cigars are displayed in their cigar boxes. When I was little, I spent a lot of time at my family's pawnshop after school, and for some reason I always begged them to let me have the cigar boxes. When I got older, I stopped asking for cigar boxes, but my family continues saving them for me to this day. 

    The meaning is there for the cigar boxes, but I didn't really have any ideas I liked for it.

Candle

    I had an idea I really liked. My mom and I love to buy big, thick candles and burn them. I really love to see how the wax ends up melting down the base of the candle.

    I thought it would be really neat to hallow out one of my melted-down candles and build my installation inside of that. My idea was that candles are often present on altars and such, so it would be cool to build some kind of weird temple inside. I wanted to sculpt a "giant" statue of a lady inside, as well as some fancy pillars and designs along the wall. I also wanted to make a little red fountain coming out of her hands- I thought this would add a slightly spooky element to it which I like. 

    Then, I was inspired by those "bleeding" candles that are sold around Halloween. They're usually white candles that have red wax inside, causing a bleeding effect as the candle melts. You can always kind of see a pink-tint to the candle, and it reminds me of flesh, which gets its color from our blood flowing under it. I thought it would be cool to paint the interior walls of this candle to make it feel like they're alive. This also would have connected my red fountain idea to the rest of the piece. I was also going to have the statue look like she's melting since she's inside a candle.

    Unfortunately, just when I had my heart set on this idea, I realized that it didn't quite meet the requirements for this project. Candles aren't already hallow, so by hallowing one out, I wouldn't really be working within an existing piece. Darn it! I still wanted to share though, because I was excited for that idea.

Tissue Box

    Initially, I wasn't really in love with this idea, but once I developed it a bit more, I'm pretty content with it. I think the aesthetic of it will be right up my alley. I realize that a tissue box isn't the most exciting thing in the world, but that's kind of what I like about it.

    I wanted to build something inside this tissue box that connects to the use of tissues. There were a couple of routes I could go with this- I figured the obvious choices were something relating to crying or being sick. I liked sickness the best.

    I knew I wanted the walls to be coated in some weird goopy stuff- kind of like mucus, maybe. But I also wanted to tell more of a story than that. I tried to imagine myself standing in this room, and decided it would be immersive if I felt like this was set somewhere specific.

    So, I added a hospital bed and an IV bag beside it. I think these two things add a lot to my concept without distracting too much from the wall-goop, which is the most important part of this piece to me.

Concept Sketches

    Below are the sketches I've done so far while thinking about what I wanted to do. I definitely plan on spending some more time in my sketchbook to really lay things out though. Especially now that I'm more decided on what I want to do.

Inspiration

    The artist I decided to pull inspiration from for this piece was Chiharu Shiota. 

    In this piece especially, I really liked how the focus of this installation is clearly all of these red strings she's weaved together, yet there's just regular chairs there. This is sort of the direction I want to go with my tissue box installation, where the focus is this mucus-y stuff, yet there's two pieces of furniture there.

    I was also inspired by this artist because of her color schemes. I love her use of the color red in all her work- red is my favorite color, and I find myself using it in almost all of my work too! I will definitely pull from her color scheme in my small world installation. Of course, I'm mostly pulling inspiration from the thread- I think I'll try using thread to make up the goopy stuff on the walls of my tissue box.

I also thought about making the walls of my tissue box look alive, and using thread to create subtle veins. I'm not totally sure yet though. I definitely have a few more things I still need to work out.

Delaney, this post shows really thoughtful process, and I appreciate how clearly you walked through your decision-making. Trying ideas, realizing when something doesn’t quite fit the assignment, and then pivoting is exactly how installation thinking develops.

Your reflection on the candle idea is important. Even though it didn’t meet the found-object requirement, it shows strong conceptual instincts around symbolism, transformation, and bodily associations. It’s good to recognize why it doesn’t work for this project while still valuing the idea itself.

The tissue box is a stronger choice for this assignment than it might initially seem. It’s familiar, domestic, and quietly intimate, which works well with your interest in sickness and care. Framing the interior as a hospital room is a smart move—it gives the space specificity and helps it read as an environment rather than a collection of details.

As you continue, I’d encourage you to keep focusing on how the interior functions as a room:

• Where does the viewer “stand” or orient themselves inside the space?

• How do the bed and IV help establish scale and presence?

• How does the wall treatment (the mucus/goop or thread) define enclosure rather than decoration?

Your connection to Chiharu Shiota is appropriate, especially in how you’re thinking about one dominant material doing most of the conceptual work, with familiar objects grounding the space. Be careful not to add too many different elements at once—let the wall treatment carry the atmosphere, and let the furniture support it rather than compete with it.

For now, your next step should be to:

• Commit fully to the tissue box idea

• Clarify what the wall material is doing conceptually

• Refine how many elements are necessary for the space to feel immersive

This is a strong direction, and you’re asking the right questions. Keep simplifying, testing, and committing to one clear spatial idea, and the piece will come together.

How a tissue box can function as a mini installation

A tissue box already implies:

• intimacy

• care

• illness

• grief

• vulnerability

• repeated, small gestures (pulling one tissue after another)

At miniature scale, the tissue box becomes:

• a private interior

• a space entered visually, not physically

• a place associated with bodies at their weakest moments

That already aligns with installation thinking: it’s about how the viewer encounters a charged space, not about spectacle.

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What Chiharu Shiota is actually doing (conceptually)

Shiota’s work is not “about red thread” — it’s about:

• entanglement

• memory

• absence

• bodily trace

• emotional residue

• spaces that feel inhabited even when bodies are gone

Her installations:

• fill rooms with connective material

• make the viewer feel surrounded or constrained

• turn everyday objects (beds, chairs, shoes) into emotional anchors

• use repetition to create atmosphere rather than narrative

The key idea:
Material becomes the emotional architecture of the space.

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Where the tissue box and Shiota meet conceptually

Here’s the conceptual bridge you can articulate to the student:

1. Interior as emotional space

• Shiota activates rooms by filling them with material that holds memory.

• A tissue box interior can be treated the same way: not as a literal room, but as a felt space.

• The box becomes a container for emotional residue — sickness, grief, recovery.

2. Thread as connective tissue

• Shiota uses thread to connect objects, trace absence, and suggest bodies that were once present.

• Thread inside a tissue box can function like:

  • veins

  • mucus

  • nerve endings

  • residue of repeated use

• This connects directly to the body without depicting it.

3. Familiar object + charged material

• Shiota often places ordinary objects inside extraordinary conditions.

• A tissue box is mundane and overlooked.

• Filling it with dense thread transforms it into something psychological rather than functional.

This is the same move Shiota makes with beds, chairs, shoes.

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How the tissue box can read as a “room”

You don’t need walls and floors — you need orientation.

Ask the student to define:

• Where does the viewer “enter” visually?

• What is the dominant material doing to the space?

• Is the space open, clogged, tangled, or suffocating?

Examples:

• Thread filling the interior so the viewer feels obstruction

• Thread stretching from walls to the opening like resistance

• A small hospital bed embedded in the mass as a reference point

At this scale, density = enclosure.

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How to prevent it from becoming decorative or literal

This is the most important guidance.

Encourage the student to:

• choose one dominant material action (thread accumulation)

• let that material do the emotional work

• keep furniture or props minimal and secondary

• avoid illustrating “sickness” literally

A good rule of thumb:

If you can explain it without the object, it’s probably too literal.