Once George Orwell said: “Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.” I feel like nowadays this Novelist’s quote can be interpreted in every individual’s life in the most personal, meaningful and different way. When I think about my most valuable things of my past: my family, friends, native country and memories with them, they now determine my present choices. And I know that these existing priorities will always reflect in my future.
As a result, nowadays I often find inspiration in my personal life and personal background. I feel that all the experiences I’ve had in my life and the people who are related to them, made me grow as a person. That is why I am always attracted to explore meaningful and sentimental aspects of my life. I express how they affected me, my emotions and feelings visually through fashion. When I came to United Kingdom from my small country Lithuania, those important moments that I had back home became even more special and valuable. As well as people who inspired me the most became even more valuable here. Those are the reasons why I really enjoy doing projects about my personal history and do the research from archives that only me and my family has.
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| My dad programming in his office. |
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| One of first dad's conferences |
I chose to do this final project about my dad and his profession in IT. I want this project to not solely centre around my family, I want to prove that imagination is a strong weapon and even subjects, such as IT, that looks like the hardest and the most uninteresting thing in the world to me, can be turned into something personal and very exciting. As far as I can remember my father was always aiming to create and invent some new technology and bring it to the world. I take inspiration from my dad’s inventive mentality to always aim to do something new in fashion.
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| Dad created his own company. Conference with his co - workers. |
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| Secret computer. Was always curious to find out what is in there. |
When me and my sibling were growing up we always saw our dad as a serious business man, always focused even after his work, usually doing mysterious calculations on his own computer, a lot of phone calls, suited going to different conferences all over the world. We looked up to him as he was the person who knew everything in the world. For a long time we even imagined that he was a super-secret agent with a lot of missions all around the world.
I wanted to follow my Dad’s example and be the best IT specialist I can become. I was learning with my father during every weekend when he had free time. I was trying to do my best in IT classes in the high school. It was a shame because I was really bad at it and found it incredibly boring and draining. But in my imagination all the equations made interesting prints like some kind of art form, I loved the colours of the programming apps, shapes of wires, discs, structures, forms made me very excited in my own imagination. I was imagining a world of programmers as a world of secret agents. But how would this actually look like?
RESEARCH REFERENCES
Thinking about my subject matter I thought of some references that can help with further my research.
A reference that interests me greatly is a movie called Spy Kids. It features two children who find out their parents are two secret agents, and then join them on their quest for world peace. In my childhood it was a very significant film because I could relate to the plot line of the children finding out their parents are spies. Even when I watch the trailer I have referenced I feel a sense of excitement in making that discovery. Additionally, the movie featured specialised watches, suit and their extraordinary futuristic technology. The movie accurately represents how I saw my dad as a mastermind of technology and how I fantasised about working with him as a secret spy one day.
Another source of research would be the movie Matrix. One of the best movies ever created in the whole history which involves characters who are trying to save the world using the most advanced technology, so advanced people can’t believe it’s legitimacy. I used to see my dad in that light and believed he was an inventor of out-of-this-world technological advances. When I think about my childhood, the Matrix perfectly describes how I saw my dad and how my childhood dreams look like now. It was like my dad always fighting evil. Always wearing a costume, making calls, bringing his computer everywhere with him even when we were having dinner together near the table. The Matrix is one of my main references because of it’s insane costumery and accessories, from spy glasses to iconic black leather trench coats, the movies suit and classic, yet exaggerated, silhouette inspires me.
Furthermore, The Matrix’s soundtrack and it’s deep roots in techno and electronic dance music instantly brings me back to my childhood imagination and brings to life the music I imagine I would walk to if me and my dad were a team of spies. It’s dramatic rises and drops and strong thumping bass lines make for epic entrances and exits and infuses power into my walk. It dramatises my world I imagine I would live in if my dad was a spy.
Beyond The Matrix, an artists whose music I love and brings my vision of a spy world to life is Charli XCX’s mixtape Pop 2 and her Vroom Vroom Ep, produced by Sophie. This powerful music propels my vision even further into the future. It’s anthemic nature and synthetic sounds inspire my spy world to be filled with attitude, rebellion, patent leather and latex. I might use these songs in my project as sonic inspiration and I will be interested to see how I can translate them into my world of fashion. I am excited to do drawings and other explorations to further deepen my connection with the music and it’s relation to my project.
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| From the Charli XCX 1999 video, a reference to The Matrix |
Moving on, I am thrilled to visit the London Film Museum Bond in Motion in Covent Garden, as part of my project to further explore the representation of spies and technological advances represented in contemporary art forms, such as film. I want to absurd all of the visuals to strengthen my concept. I am interested to look at the cars featured in the films and the shape and definition behind their technological gear.
Additionally, I hope to follow an electrician around for a day or explore the unviersity’s electrical components for inspiration of the shape, colour and thickness of wires and their arrangement in an electrical cabinet.
When I think about the technological advances of the past few decades, it makes me think of the rapid development of technology. For example, Nicole Sherzinger wore a Twitter dress which was an electronic dress which allowed users to tweet on her and it would show up on her dress instantly. This shows the close relationship between humans and technology and how interdependent they are, I hope to further explore this in my research and uncover how crucial technology hzas been in my family life. Without technology, my life would be completely different as my dad would have a different job. His strong relationship with IT really deepened my imagination because I fantasised about becoming a spy and taught me how to strive to become something and have goals.
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| Nicole Sherzinger in her twitter dress. |
However, the most important research is when I will come home to Lithuania, I will search my dad’s office and interview him. Ultimately, detailing the workplace where I thought he may be a spy and all of his technological inventions.
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| Above is my dad pictured doing his job as an IT specialist. |
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| Above is my dad in conference about IT. |
To relate this to past my projects, for my preventions project, I did a photoshoot amongst a building site and the colour of the building site were revolved very much around safety and practicality, just like wires and other safety notices around working in technology. The highly synthetic and ultraviolet colours of my project, such as neon orange and neon green, relate to this project as wires and other technological object are brightly coloured. Furthermore, my suits & belts project utilises a lot of traditional business wear and I hope to combine elements of both my preventions project and suits & belt project to make a collection inspired by the strong influence of technology throughout my life and my fantasies about my dad being a spy.
