Soundtrack My Life: https://soundtrackmylife.tumblr.com/
Artist’s Statement
This project was an enjoyable one. At the beginning of the project, I already had in my head an idea of what I was hoping to accomplish. The idea for this project actually stemmed from an idea I had for an app/website, called Soundtrack My Life, that I came up with when I was in 11th Grade. I always listened to music as the soundtrack to my life, the background music that swelled with pain in moments of doubt and fear, and followed parallel with my long summer days of bliss and boredom. I wanted a service that would allow people to post songs and tag them with certain experiences and feelings. For example, when they were listening to a song on Spotify and it felt like it went with an activity they were performing or a way they were felling, that could add that song to the community of music lovers who all did the same, and that way one could enter the app or site and search certain moods or activities and find out what other people listened too when they were in that mood.
I didn’t quite do that for this project, given the restraints. However, I created a form of the idea with the lyrics being the main art that would be curated. Also, to maximize responses, I didn’t ask the people to tag the feelings or activities they associated with the song as part of the lyrics.
When I posted that first query, I saw the power of the community begin to unfold. I got insights into my friends’ music tastes, and even their personalities and the ways they interacted and experienced art. The result was more than the sum of its parts.
That being said, I wish I had been able to do exactly what I wanted to do back in high school. Again, I found myself coming up against the restraints of the medium. There’s only so much you can do with Tumblr. I chose it because it was easy to get an aesthetically pleasing look and it was simple and fast to learn. This brings up an interesting point: The medium that you choose to present an idea on greatly determines the efficacy and the success of the project. Choose the right medium and your project can blossom. That is the exciting part about these new emerging mediums: people have to opportunity to express their art in a way not previously thought possible.
-Tanner
Comentarios