“The enchanted loom: Weaving identities through collaborative memory”

Artist: Michelle Wilson
NeuroGrad Collaborator: Mahdieh Varvani Farahani

Abstract

Events occur only once and are lost forever once they pass, but memory is a process that never stops. Every remembrance of a memory is a new memory, colored by the particular emotional, perceptual, and material environment in which it is remembered. In this new media piece, we attempt to demonstrate the vulnerable but resilient nature of autobiographical memory by weaving a snapshot in time, Asa’s birth story as told by her parents. The video shows the embroidery process used to create an image of the new baby. Its creation involves layering thread, back and forth repetitively and snipping layers to create a fuzzy texture, both an illustration of iterative memory and a physical ode to fiber tractography imaging. The video component shows that what appears to be messy up close can make sense if given a greater perspective. An audio element will include Asa’s parents telling their respective stories, cut and strung together to create a collaborative memory. The interview was loosely inspired by the Autobiographical Memory Interview used in the author's research characterizing memory in depression. As Charles Sherrington said, “The brain is… an enchanted loom where millions of flashing shuttles weave a dissolving pattern, always a meaningful pattern, though never an abiding one.” This piece attempts to transfix a snapshot of that dissolving pattern, a space to capture a fleeting moment. This process has challenged us to explore memory as a collaboration between truth, time and relationships. we hope it does the same for the viewer.