Peter Shenai

I make work at the intersections between art, design, music and other creative areas. Much of my practice is collaborative; is informed by discussions in contemporary philosophy; often inhabits a variety of social contexts; and (because it is project-led) invites a bespoke curatorial process. Having spent my first year at the RCA on the Sculpture programme and my second year on the Information Experience Design programme, I have benefited from a range of critical perspectives, each of which has brought their own unique vocabularies and values to bear on my work. This two-programme, two-campus experience has assured me that the best art can edify and amaze many different demographics, even if these demographics don't share many values or much vocabulary. Today I believe stronger than ever that art can appeal to a diversity of people, rather than to a mere closed-group, without compromising on its integrity and depth. Pondering my future at the close of my time at the RCA, I plan to continue to make work in this vein - artwork that resonates with increasingly wide demographics, and yet retains its philosophical, artistic, and playful driving force. 

My graduating project, Change Ringing, resonates, quite literally. It incorporates a set of six bronze bells I have designed and cast, whose shapes are mathematically derived from graphic statistical representations of summer temperatures at seventeen-year intervals over the course of the twentieth century. Arranged in a line and struck in order, the bells voice a series of inharmonic spectra that communicate sonically the story of climate change during the twentieth century. This series forms the basis for a musical composition by composer (and my collaborator) Laurence Osborn: a twenty-five minute composition, scored for string orchestra and the bells themselves, which premieres on 28th June  2014 at LSO St Luke's, Old St, London. Change Ringing, which has been funded by London Symphony Orchestra, The Arts Council, and other arts/music organisations, will tour the UK from the summer until December this year. The bells will be presented to many different demographics and in many different formats - the latter including: an interactive installation; a musical performance; open-air performances; a centre-piece for mindfulness-meditation; and a large-scale immersive event, featuring lectures, art and new music for the bells, launching in December this year. Details can be found at the project website "www.change-ringing.co.uk" and at my website. 

I have also worked on developing the brand identities for 80,000 Hours, a new charity that helps maximise the good people can do with their careers; and for Millennium Images, a picture library renowned for its artistic slant. From September onwards I will work as a Creative Strategist at a creative brand consultancy - Big Green Door - where I will be taking on a role that has been tailored to suit the analytic and creative skills I have acquired during my education at Oxford and the RCA.

I plan to continue making things my whole life, and I feel no strong reason to insist on making them only in one industry, in one genre, or for one audience . Instead, I plan to make things in as many ways as possible. Doing so, I hope to escape the static rules, intractable dogmas, and pervasive banalities that limn life otherwise. Art, for me, is merely freedom from the above; it is a semiotic, aesthetic, and ever-changing playground - one in which I hope to never stop playing. Perhaps I'm merely trying to respond positively to the negative implications for adults in Wittgenstein's observation of our former selves: "I can well understand why children love sand". Perhaps, art begins in the sandpit, and perhaps, it is a desire to stay there longer than others.