After experimenting with typography in the environment a
while back, I had quite a positive reaction from the public whilst doing this.
I am currently working on an advertising awareness campaign for Buy Nothing
Day, something I have expanded on after working on designing a symbol to
represent this day for the Creative Times. After combing both of the research I
had found from both of my two previous research projects, I have combined both to
lead me to come up with these concepts.
My first concept is about attracting an audience and making
the public aware of Buy Nothing Day, after going on the high street and asking
members of the public what they knew about this day, I learnt that most people
were unaware about this day, or importantly the reasons behind this. The idea
behind this concept was to create something without buying anything. “Use
something. Buy nothing.” The public reaction was quite different to the
reaction I had received after my first experiment. This actually meant
something, and the public were curious to know more about this. I had polices
officers stopping to talk, Cheshire council and a range of different ages
approaching this and talking about it. One man accused me of intending to
create ‘war’ because it was a strong political statement. The idea behind this
was to make people aware about high consumerism and environmental issues, and
get the public to react to this by using something they already have instead of
buying anything unless they really need to. Otherwise the public’s reaction was
quite positive and the police and council wished me good luck with my project.
I was really interesting to have the pubic ask questions and want to know more
about this, and using this opportunity to explain about this day, and it was
great to hear members of the public saying they will definitely act on this and
take on board what I had told them, others photographed the process on their
mobile too, and people who had walked past during the initial stages of this development,
promised they would come back to see the end process, and it was nice to see
them come back to talk about this and show an interest.
More importantly, this had a much greater impact on the public whilst I was creating this than it did after it poured down with rain and I had took shelter. Without me there, the public just walked past this or on most occasions over it. I learnt that this campaign would not work as a stand-alone typographic piece, which I had initially intended to create. I learnt the public only wanted to question it and want to learn about this day, and show interest whilst I was with it, the public acted curious as to what I was doing, this was seen as something different. Yet, without me there, this was seen almost as an ‘everyday’ thing. I learnt this concept is going to need so much more than I had initially thought, although finally I loved doing this and I got so much out of it to move on and continue working on expanding this concept.
More importantly, this had a much greater impact on the public whilst I was creating this than it did after it poured down with rain and I had took shelter. Without me there, the public just walked past this or on most occasions over it. I learnt that this campaign would not work as a stand-alone typographic piece, which I had initially intended to create. I learnt the public only wanted to question it and want to learn about this day, and show interest whilst I was with it, the public acted curious as to what I was doing, this was seen as something different. Yet, without me there, this was seen almost as an ‘everyday’ thing. I learnt this concept is going to need so much more than I had initially thought, although finally I loved doing this and I got so much out of it to move on and continue working on expanding this concept.