Poodlepods - Secretarial Art Project 2016
A Pointless Office-Orientated Dynamic Learning Environment (with Pippa dolls and PowerPoint)
“There has never been a first-rank woman artist. Only men are capable of aesthetic greatness. Women make up 50 per cent or more of classes at art school yet they fade away in their late 20s or 30s. Maybe it’s something to do with bearing children.” - Brian Sewell, Art Critic, Independent
Poodlepods is a learning platter that explores the question: does female low employment status diminish creative exploration undertaken outside of that job and therefore it's artistic value?
Taking inspiration from the free-market higher education sector where the artist was employed as a secretary, it comprised a completely not-on-brand website set in the imaginary 'University of Admin' perched low on the muddy shores of Narragonia and five elements to be 'completed' at various stages of the artist's Career:
Re-purposed PowerPoints - Humanoid Resources training videos 2016 - 2018 (weekly, sometimes hourly)
Office Supplies Shop
Poodlepods Pippa's existentialist Instagram dolly horror picture show 2017 - 2019
Pippa's Pay Gap Picture Book - a fun board book (in progress)
Exhibition Monograph - 2007 - 2021 (in progress)
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Acknowledgements:
Thank you to all the wonderful typists, admin assistants, filing clerks, personal assistants, receptionists and other support staff who helped me realise this project. It is still the one closest to my heart. It was from Poodlepods that I found myself in Smallditch. We laughed our heads off, quite rightly. Thank you artist Gee Voucher who provided one of the most amazing retrospectives of work I will ever see, Instagram friends who still to this day support Pippa and have stuck with Smallditch and the late writer Sylvia Smith. We both temped and lived in Leytonstone at the same time – I might have even passed you after work in Tesco, I hope so.
Historical images for the slides gratefully sourced from the Internet Archive Book Images on Flickr:https://www.flickr.com/photos/internetarchivebookimages
Further reading and acknowledgements: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-28976849
All concept, text and slide design using MS Office PowerPoint 2013
Pippa doll made by British toy company Palitoy in the 1970's
Sindy doll made by British toy company Pedigree in 1979
PowerPoint 2013 part of Microsoft Office
