introduction to MEMORY QUILT
I have always been an extremely nostalgic person. Whether this is a byproduct of the values I have inherited from growing up in a large family or something I was born with, an innate bias toward items and songs and tastes and smells that remind me of people and places now gone, I am not sure. The imagination of nostalgic people tends to romanticize the ability to go back and relive another time, perhaps because of a distaste for the realities of today or because of the beautifully complex stories our pasts tell. About 5 years ago this past February, my immensely sentimental family lost our matriarch, my Grandma Elsie. This event not only changed all of our lives with the gap she left behind, but also sparked this trend in her husband, children, and grandchildren to keep her alive somehow through the framing of her handwritten recipes, the reproduction of her traditions, the retelling of her stories, and the longing to capture some part of who she was by using her belongings. Most recently, my aunts gathered all her old muumuus, cut the old Hawaiian fabric into pieces, and made quilts for everyone to keep. Customs like this are not out of the ordinary when people deal with loss. There is something beautiful about the touch of fabric that looks and smells like someone you love, the smells of foods and places that they loved, the sounds of familiar voices and music, and the images that give place and meaning to our memories. For my final project, I was inspired by these things to honor my own memories from childhood and the stories these memories tell. As I have worked more and more on this project, its original intentions have evolved to encapsulate not only my own memories and personal narrative but also build upon these stories through the heritage of those I want to honor.
This project meets at the crossroads of memory and identity. Our memories are shaped by our senses and, therefore, can also be recalled or triggered by these same senses. As I went about collecting information and sensory stimulants for this project, I realized there existed a complexity to these stimulants that offer a broader and, perhaps, even more interesting story of my heritage and the beautiful quilt of where I come from. The message comes full circle. For example, the songs that play within the audio of memory may be connected to an activity or the music that was played while I was a child, but upon further inspection, I realized that these songs carry other memories with them. These are the memories of those whose lives and stories and memories interweave with, precede, and very much define my own.
My project consists first and foremost of a large quilt hung up, with the outside being quilted and the inside being plain. Outside of the installation, the quilted part can be seen and touched and even smelled. Once visitors walk into the center of the installation, they will be able to see visual stimulus of colored particles projected onto the inside of my quilt (the plain white part). Played off of a python program, the project will also play ambient sounds from my memories, a collection of voices, music (reproduced for the purposes of this project, but not owned by me), familiar sounds, and good old fashioned 90’s static sewn together from my very own home videos.
Memory Quilt is in essence a narrative installation, using memory and the stimulants that trigger memory as its subjects, plot, time, and place. My goal is that Memory Quilt will stand out not because of what my own personal narrative said that made audiences think about it more, but rather the way elements of my personal narrative can be comforting to my audience in a way that reminds them of their own formative memories with their grandparents, parents, siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and friends. Perhaps the singing of children reminds them of being on the playground or the smells of a garden remind them of home. Memory Quilt aims to stitch together these ephemeral narratives to build a larger understanding of our own cognition as it relates to our personal and shared histories.
*audio and imagery pulled from home videos & photo albums as well as from various cultural references from the artist's childhood
This project meets at the crossroads of memory and identity. Our memories are shaped by our senses and, therefore, can also be recalled or triggered by these same senses. As I went about collecting information and sensory stimulants for this project, I realized there existed a complexity to these stimulants that offer a broader and, perhaps, even more interesting story of my heritage and the beautiful quilt of where I come from. The message comes full circle. For example, the songs that play within the audio of memory may be connected to an activity or the music that was played while I was a child, but upon further inspection, I realized that these songs carry other memories with them. These are the memories of those whose lives and stories and memories interweave with, precede, and very much define my own.
My project consists first and foremost of a large quilt hung up, with the outside being quilted and the inside being plain. Outside of the installation, the quilted part can be seen and touched and even smelled. Once visitors walk into the center of the installation, they will be able to see visual stimulus of colored particles projected onto the inside of my quilt (the plain white part). Played off of a python program, the project will also play ambient sounds from my memories, a collection of voices, music (reproduced for the purposes of this project, but not owned by me), familiar sounds, and good old fashioned 90’s static sewn together from my very own home videos.
Memory Quilt is in essence a narrative installation, using memory and the stimulants that trigger memory as its subjects, plot, time, and place. My goal is that Memory Quilt will stand out not because of what my own personal narrative said that made audiences think about it more, but rather the way elements of my personal narrative can be comforting to my audience in a way that reminds them of their own formative memories with their grandparents, parents, siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and friends. Perhaps the singing of children reminds them of being on the playground or the smells of a garden remind them of home. Memory Quilt aims to stitch together these ephemeral narratives to build a larger understanding of our own cognition as it relates to our personal and shared histories.
*audio and imagery pulled from home videos & photo albums as well as from various cultural references from the artist's childhood