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Describe your idea and concept of your work in relation to the festival outlines:

My campaign response to this year’s Memefest brief of failing dialogue is looking at the concept of failing dialogue in today’s society may be caused by individuals assuming that since they are raised in the same way or living in the same place as people in their lives that they must have the same views on certain issues.

My strategy to spark dialogue was to create a guerrilla campaign made up of posters and stickers that would attempt to create an interest in conversation between people who view them. I have displayed controversial conversation starters to have with specific people in your life in the hope that they will begin a dialogue and
open up the pathways with people in your life that you either know so well you never considered trying to get to know them better or to gain a better understanding of people you interact with in society like your doctor or your teacher.

The secondary stickers display a controversial opinion that may come from the conversation starter that aims to perhaps shock or inspire people to discuss the topic further, for example:The poster may display the conversation starter “What does your brother think about equal pay?” While majority of women may just
assume their brothers would support equality between the sexes the sticker displays the question “women deserve to be paid less than men?” This aims to spark instant conversation over whether people answer that question Yes or No.

What kind of communication approach do you use?

My campaign consists of posters both print and electronically presented and stickers.

What are in your opinion concrete benefits to the society because of your communication?

Regardless of anybody's opinion to the questions I pose, the campaign just aims to get people back into having conversations with substance and realise that you can never know a person front to back, there is always more to learn when you open the pathways for dialogue.

What did you personally learn from creating your submitted work?

In my own research when working on this campaign I realised just by talking with fellow students, co-workers, friends and family to brainstorm conversation ideas the powerful effect opening up this kind of dialogue can have and I was really surprised with some of the responses I got from people I thought I knew so well. It just shows that if you keep communication open with the people in your life there will always be more to learn about them.

Why is your work, GOOD communication WORK?

The design of the posters is kept very simple yet eye-catching to keep the text the real hero. I have displayed the question on uneven black rectangles to mimic the look of newspaper cuttings and reflect the idea that these questions are current issues in today’s society. The boxes are also angled to mirror the way a question is open ended and is awaiting an answer.

The bottom right hand corner of each poster reads the slogan “Start a Conversation” and is the only context given about what these posters are supposed to mean. I have designed them to look like the corner has been ripped off to mimic the look of somebody taking the information to hand it off to someone else for further discussion. While this may not physically happen it represents the hope that whoever reads the poster will then take that question and pose it to somebody in their life, who then in turn may do the same and so on.

I have designed 10 posters, all depicting diverse conversation topics to have with all different people in your life. Each topic relates to the colour that I have chosen to help strengthen the message.

I believe my campaign truly encompasses the brief as it is so simple in it’s message but the follow through by somebody viewing it could really change their perspective and the way they communicate with the people in their lives forever.

Where and how do you intent do implement your work?

For this campaign I would want the posters and stickers to be printed and hung throughout Melbourne's laneways, train stations, everywhere that a wide range of people will be able to view them. The decision to only use a few colours was to firstly allow each topic to have it’s own identity but it will also allow for environmentally sustainable printing options and the use of vegetable ink or screen printing is possible. I would also want to use the electronic poster displays at train stations and such to display my campaign to also reduce the impact on the environment. I would also create social media accounts to accompany the campaign where people could go to comment on posters they had seen, share their thoughts and even pose their own questions for the world to answer.

Did your intervention had an effect on other Media. If yes, describe the effect? (Has other media reported on it- how? Were you able to change other media with your work- how?)

The posters and stickers like stated above would just be the first step to kick off the campaign and they would be followed up by social media posts, interviewing people after they had viewed them - The purpose of this campaign was never to target social media for ruining dialogue as I think it's actually done the opposite it just needs to be used for conversations of substance which is what I aim to do.