Alone.
“During the intervening liminal period, the state of the ritual
subject (the “passenger,” or “liminar,”) becomes ambiguous,
neither here nor there, betwixt and between all fixed points
of classification; he passes through a symbolic domain that
has few or none of the attributes of his coming state.”
- Victor Turner
I felt really stuck going into this project. I am a person who loves clear rules and a guide of where I am supposed to be going. This project was quite the opposite of that. We were tasked with exploring the idea of liminality, loosely guided by Alan Lightman’s Einstein’s Dreams.
It started with a fun dive into Prof Grady’s Random Actor software, where we got to play around with motion tracking and imagery. This was a fun exercise and I really enjoyed getting to just test it out and dance in front of a camera, seeing how the different effects work.
I started by thinking about what liminality means to me, and all of the different in-betweens of my life. Right now, my time is heavily split between two spaces: my apartment and the studio. I usually am in the studio all day, and then only go home to shower and sleep. Pinning down what I do in the “in-betweens” is difficult.
My biggest in-between is the walk to studio in the morning and my walk home at night. People often ask me why I don’t take the T, but the reality is that I like the 15 minutes where I am alone and getting fresh air (and maybe sun). Sometimes, the walks are the only time where I am truly by myself and enjoying my own thoughts. These are my in-betweens.
I usually arrive to studio very early and leave very late. It is quite common that on my walks, I do not see anyone else. I decided to try and photograph this experience, so I took some pictures in the wee hours of the morning when I was both arriving and leaving studio.
Originally, I wanted to turn this experience into some sort of motion or video, but Prof Grady thought that aesthetically that did not fit in with the kind of work that I enjoy doing. He would be completely correct.
He asked me what my hobbies were, but I genuinely had to answer. The only thing I could come up with was the idea of sewing books and how I really enjoyed that process this semester. Even though it was something that was completely focused on my school work and design practice, it was still something that I really enjoyed.
Prof Grady said maybe I could sew the images, or do some sort of needlepointing. I sat on this idea for a while. I wasn’t sure why, but it didn’t feel right to me just yet.
I then came to my best realization yet: a sewn spine is the in-between of a book. It is something that is mostly overlooked, as a normal person probably is not paying very close attention to the way that a book is bound.
I’ve sewn a lot of spines this semester. But what I haven’t done yet is sew words. I finally had my idea: sewing a book.
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You’re probably thinking, “Christina, you’ve sewn so many books this semester already!” And while true, I mean sew a book like sew the text onto the page. Instead of typesetting it in a font and leaving it at that, I wanted to create the words out of my thread.
You’re also probably thinking, “Christina, where is Einstein’s Dreams in all of this?” And to that I say, have no fear. I chose the May 10 chapter, because it dealt with time and being alone. Since my images were taken at weird hours and when I was alone, I thought that this passage would be perfect for me to use.
So I got to sewing. And boy, did it take me a long time. To sew all of the pages that I used, it took about 32 hours of work. A lot longer than I anticipated it to take! But that is okay. I binge-watched new TV shows, rewatched old ones, put on a few YouTube videos, whatever I could to pass the time while I sewed.
Once I sorted out all of the pages, I realized that I still had to keep sewing. I decided that an accordion-style fold would be a cool way to display this, specifically because people wanted to see the backside of the paper. Since the stitching was a part of the process, I wanted to make sure it was still visible.
Instead of a normal accordion fold with tape or glue, I used a stitching pattern to hold the pages together while still allowing for the book to open all the way up. Since it is stitched, it also holds its form as a book if necessary. Pretty cool process!
This project scared me. But it turns out that doing things that scare you is a really great way to grow as a designer. I don’t think I will sew letters again anytime soon, but I won’t count it out of my practice forever.
