THE RIDE
DESCRIPTION
My First Pregnancy the Ride is a physicalization of me and my now husband's experiences and trials during my pregnancy in 2009 and January 2010. A ride was one of the first ideas I had for my thesis. It offers a way of conveying multiple factors we faced once we thought there was even a chance we were going to have a baby. Issues stemming from social, religious, political, psychological, physical, and gender centered areas. The other aspect a ride offers is a feeling of duration. The riders can only go forward and never backward...that element alone dictated much of my thought process as I came to terms with being pregnant.
I also thought about producing a series of "webisodes" where my husband and I would plop down in front of a camera and just tell our story. The breakdown of our story encapsulates 6 to 7 episodes which I listed below. Soon after, the ride idea came to fruition as a series of vignettes or scenes much as one would see in a dark ride like the "Carousel of Progress" or "Hall of Presidents" at Disneyland that would physically represent our story told from the home videos.
Here are the episodes:
Episode 1 - "Pre-Prenatal"
In this episode Jeremiah and I discuss the shift from our normal day sense of reality to a sur-reality where everything we do and everyone we know now has a new sense of importance the instant we thought I may be pregnant. This includes shopping for a pregnancy test and jaunting off to a going away dinner for my 3 month internship, taking the test, the quiet chaos after seeing it positive, and a rough joke with a bit of truth in it.
Concepts for ride section for Episode 1:
Episode 2 - "The Evangelist Witch Doctor Clinic"
The morning after we took the test we decided to get a professional test done to make sure we were really having a baby. Not but 50 yards away was a pregnancy clinic advertising free pregnancy tests... it was a no brainer. Little did we know this clinic was a "Pregnancy Crisis Center" which is a more eloquent and misleading name for a Pro-Life Clinic. This episode conveys our two seperate experiences. Jeremiah in the waiting room and I in the back, we recall how what we thought was a normal clinic started to become a very aggressive and disturbing place.
Episode 3 - "The Long Road Ahead"
The morning I found out I was having a baby was also the morning we were leaving to drive to Portland, OR where I was interning for the next 3 months. Episode 3 details the 18 hours we dedicated to figuring out what the hell we were going to do and how we were going to do it.
Episode 4 - "In the Land of Beer and Coffee and Not a Drop to Drink"
In episode 4 I was in Portland and Jeremiah back in Los Angeles. It was this time I became completely controlled by my body, dealing with isolation as I had to face some very serious and inescapable decisions.
Episode 5 - "To Begin Again in L.A." **
Episode 5 and 6 tackle the issues of our less than usual situation, I without a job, a place to live, a husband, insurance and a rolling educational pursuit about to be stonewalled.
Episode 6 - "The Home Stretch"
Episode 6 touches on our relations with our family as we prepare to become one ourselves.
Episode 7 - "L&D (Labor and Delivery)"
It's this episode where the abstract becomes reality.
**5 and 6 may be combined
A404/Black and White Studio Set-up
This is an early idea of how to approach the space in A404, which may/may not be the final space (permanent set perhaps?). I've already thought of different layouts and plan to keep changing it with the input of others. Also note this layout is based arranging content based on each "Episode" of the documentary element.
New Install Sketch
Original Sketch
ANIMATRONIC PANORAMAS
I had the idea to mock up certain scenes of the episodes inside panoramics with live actors or just people who like acting standing in as animatronic robots (with super make-up)... could be cool. Here's some refs:
