As the course was essentially a graphic design degree, I decided to package the work like a box of chocolates, with a few sample paragraphs typewritten (yes, with a typewriter) onto Cadbury's purple foil which was used to wrap real Dairy Milk chocolate melted into hearts.
I did a massive amount of research and looked into the history of chocolate as well as what it meant to modern society in order to contextualise its potency in art and importantly the differences in approach between female and male artists. 
I hope people find it interesting. It was written a long time ago and as such is very much of its time (please read it with forgiving eyes). However, it's always been close to my own (chocolate) heart: it contributed heavily to getting a first class degree and my tutor at the time said I should publish it. Now, all these years later, I finally have!

https://issuu.com/alexvann/docs/the_power_of_chocolate_alex_vann 
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The presentation of chocolate has continued to be important and this is reiterated by the elaborately designed serving pots and drinking cups of 18th century England.
Richard Cadbury began the vogue for art in 1868 with his painting of a young girl with a kitten on the lid of one of his boxes. Many Victorian chocolate boxes had important uses after the contents had been consumed. Nowadays, millions of pounds are spent by huge companies on designing and manufacturing chocolate boxes, not to mention advertisements offering the product to the consumer in brightly coloured packages of gold, silver, red, yellow and orange etc. 
Because of its nature as a gift, the packaging has traditionally been aesthetically attractive and alluring.

Edward Ruscha, known for his use of words as image rather than pictures, experimented in the late 1960s with unconventional substances with which to paint. This included fruit juices, lettuce, egg yolk, spinach, blood, gunpowder, tobacco and rose petals. At the 35th Venice Bienalle in 1970 he created the ‘Chocolate Room’. Made up Of 360 sheets of paper silkscreened all over with Nestle’s chocolate, visitors found they could write messages into it with damp fingers. 
Dieter Roth often used chocolate and cocoa powder mixed with acrylic paint and glue as a medium. Like Ruscha, he had experimented with foodstuffs for paints. Claes Oldenburg and Joseph Beuys and more recently Paul McCarthy have also used chocolate as paint, usually mixed with something else and as part of a ‘larger picture.’
What Chadwick, Gallaccio and Antoni have in common (and how they differ from the above, male artists) is that chocolate forms the entirety of the piece - the be all and end all. It is not only the medium but also the concept that is on show. I believe that they have considered carefully its history, its use, its potent influence on today’s society and its metaphorical importance.

In ‘Gnaw’ (1992), the American artist Janine Antoni (b. 1964) takes a 600lb block of chocolate and nibbles away at it for 45 days. She then spits out the pulp and it to create 45 heart shaped boxes for holding chocolates. She says she is referring to eating disorders and how society can pressurise young girls into such activity. 
Bulimia Nervosa is where a person (usually a young woman) binges on exceptionally large amounts of food (usually high calorie foods like chocolate). She then goes through a process of purging the food (usually by vomiting or starvation). 
Constant vomiting causes the stomach acids to eventually eat away the enamel on teeth, causes ulcers and stomach/bowel disorders. This lifestyle governs her every waking hour. Disgust and hatred of food are substitutes for disgust and hatred of the self.
Anorexia Nervosa is far more common in females than males and usually occurs in girls from families where high achievement and scholastic success are highly valued. It is this pressure from family, friends, media, everywhere which leads people to find solace elsewhere. The fear of failure to be accepted dominates her life. The calorie is one escape route. If a girl can control the calorie, and in turn the way she looks - her physical presence in the world, then she has at least succeeded in one thing and her body shape is the only thing that really matters to her at that time. 

Antoni is shaping. She paints, draws, sculpts, molds and models with her body. By using a 600lb block of chocolate she is blowing out of all proportion an everyday foodstuff in the same way that the media blows out of all proportion the importance of body shape as opposed to inner beauty. The body is an easy target because it is tangible. Antoni has also done a series of busts, self portraits in chocolate and soap (‘Lick and Lather’ 1993) in which she eats and washes away parts of the sculptures - parts of her own self image. 
Her regurgitation of the chocolate from the ‘Gnaw’ block mirrors the bulimic’s purging activities. The act of modelling 45 heart shaped boxes from the spat is a comment on packaging (of chocolates and the inner ‘self’). The boxes look like well produced packaging trays - only when we know the truth behind their construction does the stomach turn.
Chocolate is a luxury item but has many positive and practical functions. It is a valuable portable snack food providing quick replenishment of energy (used by sportsmen and mountain climbers etc). And lastly, and most importantly perhaps, it is a gift. That is the double irony being dealt with in ‘Gnaw’. Antoni, the artist, through her processes, is providing heart shaped gift boxes for us, the gallery goer, the consumer. 

The ‘paint’ was made by melting 315 bars of Bournville plain chocolate to 63 kilos of liquid and mixed with vegetable fat for adherence to the consistency of household paint. Like Antoni (and Helen Chadwick) the amount of chocolate is taken to excess to be able to use it as a medium with which to create a public exhibition. 
“Excess is expression.” Gallaccio says: 
“I’m completely addicted to chocolate, the idea of making a chocolate room should be something really heavenly and excessive...it has particularly female connotations of binging and desire.”
Its prime associations are with mortality, deterioration and putrefaction. Like Antoni, who literally eats away the chocolate herself, Gallaccio lets light, oxygen, water vapour and mold eat at the chocolate. 
‘Stroke’ is essentially a light room made dark - subversive use of materials turns a familiar substance with all its associations with childhood and vibrancy into an excremental lament for loss. Gallaccio is using flowers and chocolate as triggers for associations such as love/ romance/sensuality/greed and satisfaction. 
The notion of self disgust/self loathing is perpetuated by advertisers who are responsible for creating a generation of Kate Moss wannabes who are bombarded with the paradoxical image of the young beautiful slim girl tucking into a bar of pure indulgence and sin. The irony here is that neither is correct. 
It’s like saying 

Read the whole thesis here: ​https://issuu.com/alexvann/docs/the_power_of_chocolate_alex_vann

Alex Vann is a multi disciplinary artist and graduated with a first class degree in Design for Communication from the University of Wolverhampton in 1996. 
He went on to work as a graphic designer at various leading agencies across the West Midlands and later on worked in secondary education for many years. 

He runs his own graphic design business in Wolverhampton.

As a musician and song writer his music has been used in plays, films and on radio, TV and online. He has performed at gigs and festivals as a solo artist and in duets and rock bands and has supported Paul Young, All About Eve among many others.

As a portrait artist he has been commissioned to create highly detailed paintings and pencil drawings for many years and painted a portrait of the 2016 Wolverhampton Mayor and his wife. He was a key artist on the ‘Wolves in Wolves’ public art project in 2017. He designed and painted two of the 30 5ft tall wolf sculptures: ‘Support Life’ and ‘Old Gold’. Support Life is now situated at University of Wolverhampton and Old Gold is located inside the Wolverhampton Wanderers FC Museum at Molineux Stadium.

He founded the company Real Arts Workshops (RAW) in the late 1990s following a final year university project and self publishing his own environmentally themed children’s book ‘Joseph The Useful Cardboard Box’ which went on sale in Waterstones bookstores across the country. RAW went on hold for many years as he explored other careers and was ‘re-booted’ in 2018 with his partner Gary to provide high quality and immersive arts experiences to various community groups; many of whom experience barriers to the Arts. 

Gary is profoundly Deaf and Alex is qualified to level 6 in British Sign Language (BSL) and BSL is integrated into a lot of RAW’s work. They use the Arts to break down barriers, build confidence and encourage self esteem and well being. 

Alex has a grown up daughter, Olivia.

Contact: alexvanndesign@gmail.com
Websites: www.alexvann.net
www.alexvanndesign.co.uk
www.realartsworkshops.co.uk

I was an artist on the Wolves in Wolves public art project in Wolverhampton in Summer 2017.
I designed and painted 2 5ft tall wolf sculptures: one called 'Old Gold' for Wolverhampton Wanderers Football Club featuring facts and figures about the club and one called "Support Life" about suicide prevention and mental well-being in association with University of Wolverhampton.  You can scroll down this page to read an earlier blog post about the ‘Support Life’ wolf.

The workshops that I held with various groups for vulnerable people (see various logos below) led to me reforming my community arts workshops company which you can visit here: Real Arts Workshops.

One of the things that was important to me was that the story behind the wolf was told via the dibond panel attached to the plinth. 
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Through the workshops for Support Life I was able to talk with professionals who work in this field and I was able to ask some of my questions. I gradually came to accept that even if Rich had been ready to talk (and he wasn’t) each person is a unique being with their own set of complex issues and my situation is different from his. See below for a list of these agencies with links to the work they do.

When Support Life was installed at University of Wolverhampton early in 2018, I noticed that the information panel wasn’t there. It bothered me that Rich’s name was missing when he’d been so important in the thought process behind the wolf design and painting. So I designed a new information panel and got in touch with the University about getting it installed. David Wedge from the Alumni office was really supportive throughout and I’m pleased to say the panel is now in place on the plinth and I hope people take the time to read about it.

We were over the moon to feature in the newly launched ZERO DEGREES magazine.
You can read the issue here: Zero Degrees Issue One. It features many local Wolverhampton business owners and personalities including Jody Craddock, DJ Janos, Alex Is, Mel Eves and of course me!

And another Express and Star article is available online. It's about my Support Life Wolves in Wolves design being relocated to Wolverhampton University.

I was over the moon when I was approached late in 2016 to get involved in the Wolverhampton City Council's public art project 'Wolves in Wolves' as the designer of not one, but TWO of the 30 5ft tall wolf sculptures dotted around the city. (Actually, 3 if you count the miniature Wolves FC one, but more on that in a later article).
I'd admired several similar art projects in previous years: 'The Big Hoot' Owls in Birmingham, the Gorillas of Norwich and of course Liverpool's Superlambananas (and, later on, Penguins) and always thought it would be great to get to design and paint a sculpture such as this, so this is a case of a dream becoming a reality.
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My brief was to design and paint the suicide prevention and mental-wellbeing wolf. Part is this brief was to hold art workshops with different agencies who deal with people at risk of suicide: P3, Haven, Papyrus : prevention of young suicide and Base 25, to get their ideas about what design should go on the wolf.

​Very early on came the idea of a jigsaw puzzle, which I tried to get away from, feeling it was too much of a visual cliché. However, I kept coming back to: usually a sign of a strong idea. It seemed to facilitate showing lots of viewpoints on the subject of suicide and mental well-being.
 
Also early on I knew that not all the pieces would be in place and actually one of them might be missing.
What was coming out of the workshops was this notion of people feeling disenfranchised and unable to talk about feelings. I thought it was important that the design address that, as well as other issues that came up.

​Some images from the workshops: Snakes and Ladders, noticing artworks (in this case Mondrian), Home, Family, LGBT ​(the photos are mine, the artwork belongs to the artists)

I was really pleased with the work that was coming out of the workshops and so the next step was to collate all the imagery and start planning the design to go on the wolf.

The Official bit......
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The design for this wolf came about following several workshops with different agencies. The jigsaw idea relates to how different aspects of life make up a whole person.

The five ways to mental well-being are picked out in the vibrant orange pieces and other imagery and words are used to support these.
Also shown is the board game ‘Snakes and Ladders’ which refers to how life can be full of ups and downs. The ‘missing piece’ can be found on the plinth.

Alex dedicates this wolf to the memory of his good friend Rich McMahon.

In Wolverhampton, between 2013-2015, 66 people ended their life by suicide. The majority of these 66 were men, a trend which is seen across the country and abroad.

Organisations’ and services across the city of Wolverhampton recognise the importance of taking proactive action to prevent suicide because suicide is preventable. In Wolverhampton, groups have come together to form the Suicide Prevention Stakeholder Forum. Coordinated through the Public Health and Wellbeing Team within the City of Wolverhampton Council, the forum is independently chaired and consists of a range of organisations from statutory, education and third sectors. Together the forum has undertaken a needs assessment on which basis a strategy and an action plan has been formed.

In January 2018 'Support Life' was relocated to Wolverhampton University.