Evaluation from the documentation

The aims and objectives set at the start of the project were threefold:

• To create a piece of interactive art encompassing the ideas behind Impressionism,
• To interest the public in interacting with it and
• To prompt users to think about technology in art

However as the researched progressed these aims and objectives subtly changed. I realised that there were in fact many examples of widely accepted successful digital art installations and therefore most of the public interested in art already are perfectly aware of the power of technology in art. Essentially it is only the public art gallery visitor who would see this project in its installation form anyway; it has no place outside an art gallery be it makeshift or established.

Instead the project began to focus more on paying homage to the skill of the Impressionists and the approaches they took towards art. It retained the core of the initial objective of encouraging the audience to think about technology as a new artistic medium, but it didn't prioritise it.

Interactive aspects of the project

The system designed was a definite success in interesting people enough to interact with it going by the reactions of the participants during testing, all of whom regardless of their age, sex or background wanted to interact with the artefact for longer than their allotted time slot in the testing schedule. This was very gratifying because it was exactly what I was aiming for. Linked to this, one of the sub objectives discovered in the research to be implicit in the idea of getting people to interact with the artefact was a seamless 'invisible' interface. The simplicity, sturdiness and immediate natural instinctive nature of the infra-red pen used as a tool to interact with the artefact addressed this issue very satisfactorily, although I could have taken it further and tested and tweaked the multi-participant aspect of it.

Art encompassing the ideas behind Impressionism and process

Strengths

As various academics in my research pointed out, it is particularly interesting and challenging to try and use technology as a tool to create art because technology requires the scientific mindset of a programmer to manipulate it to achieve the desired outcome. Manipulation of more traditional mediums such as paint and clay on the other hand is purely instinctual, apart from requiring knowledge of a few basic fundamentals and techniques.

Multimedia technology and programming knowledge do however have the benefit of having the power to do just about anything in this day and age. The flip side of the coin is that artists have to think very carefully about just how direct they want their message to be (see research, distances): they have to play with layers of nuance and work out how to gracefully intertwine subject and medium so they complement each other.

The research I did into artistic appreciation was invaluable as it identified getting caught up in technology as one of the possible pitfalls of the project and helped me keep perspective while designing. I was able to completely throw away many hours of hard work creating oval masks and institute a far simpler brush stroke drawing system in its place when the test results suggested it would make it more fun to interact with and reflect the aims of the project better.

Conversely I was also careful not to get carried away with the physical technique of the Impressionists even though I was very interested in it. A new medium requires completely new approaches and above all I did not want a naïve or straightforward port of Impressionism like a filtered video or similar. I am pleased with the complexity of the ideas behind the project and feel it adequately addressed the notion of incorporating Impressionist ideals in an understated way in the artefact on several different levels:

• Light and colour were clearly explored and made the focus/subject of the artwork
• The "critical distance" discussed in the research as necessary for full appreciation of artwork was maintained between observer and artwork, just as Monet did with his Waterlillies panorama
• The choice of video as a medium meant motion was captured as well, which is something the Impressionists were interested in
• The video was of everyday scenery rather than romanticised countryside, in keeping with the ideals the Impressionists had
• Water featured in the video reflecting and accentuating the light and colour in accolade to Monet's final passion
• The process and use of technology and videoing technique was fluid and changed as needed (the Impressionists did not adhere strictly to formulae). Technology was a means of achieving affects

Weaknesses

The Achilles heel of the sophisticated understatement of the project's tribute to Impressionism was that the audience frequently didn't make the leap and connect it with the Impressionists. This prompted the inclusion of a traditional picture frame around the display to try and bridge the gap somewhat; deliberately chosen as the most subtle addition to aid the cohesion of the entire piece because the audience 'getting' the connection with the Impressionists was not an overtly stated aim in the project. Besides which, one of the axioms which made Impressionism such a decisive art movement was that they were far more concerned with the public appreciating and enjoying their art than understanding it. Their transient, direct art bypassed the conventions and tools of messaging used previously by artists (e.g., the apple and blue of the woman's dress representing moral relativism, etc) and hit the eyes and minds of the audience directly, only requiring a sense of aesthetics in their audience.

The project makes no pretensions to having the kind of mastery over medium that the Impressionists were blessed with which allowed them such liberties. Indeed, the actual medium (in the sense of paint being the medium of the painter); the video, is a noticeably weak point in the project.

Part of what makes the video so unsatisfactory is the camera moving slightly in the wind or when the DV tape was changed, the rest in the actual quality of the footage and its length. The editing is inexperienced and choppy and it shows. Another issue throughout the project was keeping to schedule and managing time. Three assignments due in January meant that I didn't as much as glance at the project throughout that entire month. It took far longer than anticipated to get back into it, and as a result I started filming with only a little under a month to go before the hand in deadline. The rushed quality of the video is a direct result of that and the uncooperative weather (which on the whole seemed to regard the early morning around dawn as the ideal time to start pouring with rain).

Elements of the project were possibly too ambitious, for example I never got to properly try out the multi-participant possibilities of the artefact (documented in the flash section under 'technical').

However it is the framework and concept which are what I’m really proud of and it is the framework and concept which a number of academics now argue is the crucial make-or-break component of modern multimedia art (see research) and was subsequently the focus of the majority of the effort expended on the project.