Thesis Ideas

What I want to do!

For my thesis I want to focus on the area of disability in particular for those with mobility issues. We will all face mobility issues of some form during our lives and we will all reach a point in our lives where we are disabled if we live long enough. I myself am a wheelchair user and every day is filled with challenges and considerations which do not exist for many others. I believe that there is an opportunity to create work that changes perceptions of disability, heightens awareness of the issues endured by disabled people or serves as a constant reminder that we all end up disabled in some way for parts of our lives. I hope that through one of these ideas I can create a lasting impactful impression that alters their view of disability.

Design idea 1

If I focus further on the area of changing perceptions of disability I would like to perhaps create an experience that looks at how to recreate elements of wheelchair use outside of what people may perceive when they think about wheelchair users issues. There are many problems and issues that are not spoken about or visible for others who do not have to use a wheelchair. This could be in the form of a game, a wearable or something that people have to physically interact/encounter.

Design Idea 2

Focusing on heightening awareness I am thinking about how to create an experience that is only usable or for people who are wheelchair users or mobility impaired. This in a way will disable everyone outside of that group. The idea would be to reverse the norm or status quo for just this one occasion or experience. Almost all of us will have felt left out at some point in our lives, by having to call on the emotional trigger of how we endured being left out I would like to attach an enduring value to the experience of not being able to have an experience. This could be done by way of an installation or by use of a device that is not familiar to the person taking part in the experience.

Design Idea 3

By creating a connection between a person experiencing a part of what it is like to have a disability today and their own inevitable future fallibility I would like to create an enduring representation of that persons future. I would like to create an experience where people will create their own piece of physical art that is a result of what they experience having a disability. I would like to look at data collection and how to translate that data into other representations of that data. This could be a P5 sketch, a soundscape, a set of physical feedback by way of Arduino or a 3d printed physical object.