A Manifesto for Change in Ten Tapes.
We knew it would be a success but not a revolution
LOU OTTENS
For my degree major project, I chose to base my work around cassette tapes, exploring their influence on society, technology, music, and politics. The project is presented through a collection of 10 cassette tapes, each paired with a five-panel foldout J-card communicating a specific aspect of tape culture. Each cassette also includes a ten minute audio tape featuring interview clips, music, and narrative fragments that expand on the subject matter. Alongside this, I created an animation that explores the process and craft of creating a mixtape, highlighting the time, effort, love, and creativity that went into making a mixtape for someone.
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Throughout the project, I made the most of the tactility and format of the cassette tape, exploring different cases, sizes, and fold-out elements that could fit within the plastic shell. Along with the tape and J-card, four of them include a fold-out printed on 60gsm paper, capitalising on the thin nature of the paper and allowing the layers to be seen through each other. All four panels can be arranged in many interchangeable ways, encouraging the viewer to get hands-on and interact with the physicality of the tape. My project uses the cassette tape as both a physical object and a vessel for a manifesto advocating for physical media, highlighting its role in creativity, connection, community, and expression. It argues for the continued relevance of tactile, tangible formats in a digital age, suggesting that we remain, fundamentally, analog beings
