I guess you’d call my work a public art. I go out into the environment, I sit and observe people and I write down whatever comes to my mind about their actions. I then try and put my writings back out into the environment in some way.

What is the largest work you've done this year?

My biggest piece was done at the start of May this year. I chartered an aeroplane to fly a banner with my writing on it over the beach in Great Yarmouth.

The writing said ‘a tiny woman runs with a puffball dog in tow’.

Eleanor Rasman Watch the end of year work - Sunday 4 May, 2003

How did this idea come about?

I decided I wanted to do a large piece of work, that I wanted to charter an aeroplane and that it was going to fly over a beach.

I decided on Great Yarmouth because it’s got a large beach which was good for practical purposes, but it’s also full of interesting people - people that are very easy to observe. From the residents who live there to those just visiting for the day.

I went there over a period of a few weeks and did a great deal of writing about the people there.

The writing for the banner was an observation I made about a woman in the High Street. It was a lady I saw running with a huge white puffball dog. She was very tiny and old and the dog, I imagine, would have been leading her if it could but she was running along and dragging it behind her.

It was a very amusing image at the time and from that came my writing and then the banner.

In a way your combining creative writing with visual art.

Absolutely. Most of my work involves text. The writing is something that's come over the three years of my degree.

Rasman's writing

The writing isn’t particular sophisticated but there are just things that come into my head that are quite humorous and whimsical.

It’s about making other people observe what I’ve observed that normally they might just pass by during our normal hectic lives.

We’re normally so focussed on where were going or what we’re doing, that we don’t take time to look at what’s going on around us. I’m trying to make people more aware of this.

By observing this myself and then putting the writing out there in a different way, I’m hoping that other people will start to look around them and see who it is I’m writing about. I like to think of it as public art. It’s something that’s being put out there for the public to see.

I think a lot of people do have questions about my work, but I think that’s good. I think it’s amusing for people to think why I’ve bothered writing a sign and floating down the river so people can see it as they walk over bridges.

What feedback did you get from the flypast event?

I was flying alongside the banner in another plane so I could shoot some film to make my final piece, but I’d got other friends videoing people watching.

I did get a lot of reaction from people and it’s interesting watching the videos back and seeing how people reacted to it.

The actual finished piece is a film that’s made up of observations that that I’ve made and the actual banner towing event itself.

It begins trying to explain to people in a film form about how my observations are derived. It uses film of people in Great Yarmouth going about their daily lives, it the flicks up with a piece of text that is an observation that I’ve made so people can start to understand how I’ve derived these observations.

The film then picks up the pace and goes into footage of the actual day of the banner towing that we took from about six camera shots.

It’s given a humorous edge with the kind of big brass band music you might here at the beach. I’m really pleased with it.

Now watch the film - Sunday 4 May, 2003

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