disconnected visions
Hyperlocal (with AR) and playing cat’s cradle with the concept of time
Textile and multidimensional works on hyperlocalism and disability.
Created in residency for Carrie Able Gallery
While I was in residency at Carrie Able Gallery, I was wrestling with the idea of my disability and chronic illness. I was identifying as disabled for the first time, and I was experiencing illness which kept me close to home. Though I felt like I wanted to be creative, physically creating things the way I normally did, with dexterity and a lot of physicality, wasn’t possible. The works that I made in this residency reflect how I was feeling at that time.
In playing cat’s cradle with the concept of time, the hands symbolize the human touch in exploring the world, connecting with others, and creating. By using my hands to manipulate threads and fibers, I’m embracing the tactile and intimate nature of working with textiles and traditional fiber crafts. I think about gardening gloves, how they have a dual purpose - to protect us from dangerous things in our tame microcosm of nature that is a garden, such as thorns and poison ivy, and to put a physical boundary between the human body and dirt. There are studies that show that seeing greenery and touching soil and plants with our skin increases mood. So why are we compelled to put so many boundaries between ourselves and the world around us? The viewer is invited to wear the gloves, and even share a set of gloves with someone else. It calls back to my piece On Virtual Touching (Beyond the Heart-Sphere), which explores the connection of people in quarantine who can see each other through online video calls, and it invites people to explore their connection with others in their immediate space. In the Greek mythology of the Fates, Threads symbolize life. In myth they also often symbolize the inter-connected-ness of people. To me, they represent the intricate web of relationships that exist within ecosystems and communities. The use of threads in the work represents the interdependence between humans and the environment. Thread, to me, is the beginning of a deep thought into life, connection, relationships, and even quantum physics.
The maps represent the way that we see a place changing with time and cultural lenses. Focusing on being hyper local in my day to day life helped me get through a tough health time. The tactile textile piece which used traditional dyeing techniques to create a map, was displayed with an AR code which allows the viewer to see another layer of the artwork superimposed over the piece. The AR layer depicts a leaf-like vein system map. This is how I explored my limited mobility at the time.