Week Eleven (Participating in Abandoned Materials)

Individual Reviews:

Sam:

Abandoned Materials, the Market of Abandoned Childhood, was a flashback to being younger and everything that entailed. Fairy bread, forts, tamagotchies, teen magazines, 90s jams, and our old flip top phones came back into our lives and transported us to an earlier time. Every stall was hands on and this made me feel really involved. Every stall was fun to participate in, and brought with it feelings of anticipation, happiness and nostalgia. The market had a clear direction and was easy to flow from stall to stall. It was sad the leave the market, abandoning our childhood once again. It was awesome to see that the teepee from our own market stall was repurposed as part of the forts for this market.

Connor:

I thoroughly enjoyed the Abandoned Materials market. It was very cohesive between each and every stall continuing the theme of going back in the past and to your childhood. The market started off with a health and safety briefing, then we crawled through a tunnel made out of boxes and a child’s foam jigsaw mat on the floor which to me represented crawling back through into my childhood. The market was full of bright and fun colours and lots of games and activities for everyone to join in. My favourite stall was the one where two people get to pick a throwback song from the 2000s and battle it out in music related challenges and the winner gets their song placed in queue to played.

Bridget:

Even though I wasn't able to attend this Market of Abandoned materials, the reviews I heard from participants and reviewers were very positive. With an interesting take of abandoned childhood, this would have been a very immersive and nostalgic trip back in time. With the idea of childhood this would have allowed for a very interactive stalls and would allow for memories and fun to follow from one stall to another. Im sad that I wasn't able to attend this market and it sounded like a huge success and was fun for every person who attended.

Group Review:

The market of Abandoned Materials, one of abandoned childhood allowed for an inviting trip back in time to a place where we loved being younger and everything seemed exciting, which still excite us to this day. As stated in this quote, “The current ethic of participation (Bishop and Kester) homogenizes the spectrum of social encounters by arranging them hierarchically under full and equal Participation” ( BEECH, D., HEWITT, A. and JORDAN, M., 2012. The Freee collective don't want you! Public, 23 (45), pp. 3. ) this was shown with the flow of the market, from crawling through a tunnel to having fairy-bread to having 2000s music battle, this allowed us to get involved and allowed for an inviting reception. Participation was a must in this market. By using things that people had from when they were younger and doing childhood activities, to really played with that idea of ‘abandoned’. With the enthusiasm from the marketeers and the offerings taking people on nostalgic trips it was very enjoyable as an participant.