September 2012 - Jessica Marquis

6:57 PM

Genealogical Artifact Revision

7:41 PM

Genealogical Artifact

My grandma kept the quilts in an old armoire in the upstairs bedroom of the cabin. Our cabin was a teeny little place nestled in a grove of quaking aspen trees up in the Heber Mountains. It really was too small for all of our extended family to fit comfortably, but we did it anyway. That upstairs bedroom was for all of the grandkids to sleep in. We would pull out the quilts from the armoire and spread them out on the floor to sleep on, because we couldn’t all fit on the bunk bed.

Sometimes we would pile up all of the quilts, the fluffiest pillows, and the couch cushions at the bottom of the stairs, and then would take turns sliding down the stairs on a mattress. We could do that for hours and hours. Even when the quilts and pillows at the bottom of the stairs didn’t quite cushion our landing, we would keep climbing back up to take another turn.

It was on these quilts that my cousins and I would read Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets together before bed. If we hung a quilt off the top bunk of the bunk bed, we had a fort, a ship, a teepee, or whatever our game called for at the moment. We wrapped up in these quilts while we watched general conference together as a family on the little old TV up in the corner above the game table in the cabin’s main room.

We would lie on these quilts and look up at the ceiling before bedtime. My grandpa had covered the entire vaulted ceiling of that bedroom with hundreds of glow-in-the-dark stars arranged in actual constellations. He would point a flashlight at each star arrangement and tell us its name and during which season we would be able to see it.

My grandparents sold the cabin in the spring of 2003. The number of grandkids was increasing and there just wasn’t room for all of us anymore. The day we moved out all of the furniture and cleaned the place out, my grandma told each of the grandkids that they could take one item with them to help them remember the cabin. If there was one item that could sum up every family gathering, cousin sleepover, and happy memory at our cabin, it had to be a quilt.

I went upstairs to that old armoire and picked the blue floral quilt. It wasn’t the biggest or the most fancy. But it was soft, and it was my favorite of them all. We drove away from the cabin at the end of that day, and I hugged that quilt to my chest. I knew that particularly great era of my childhood was ending.

My grandparents have since divorced, and I only see my cousins on special occasions. Besides, the cousins who are old enough to remember the cabin days are grown up and moved on. The quilt I picked from the cabin now sits folded on my bed in my apartment. As much as I’d like to, I can’t return to that special time in my life. But I can wrap up in that quilt and, by extension, the memories.

Artist’s Statement:

This quilt is a metaphor for the memories I made during my childhood at our cabin. It is a really special place to me. It was a simpler time in my life, and it was such a magical place to be a kid. I feel like the ties with our extended family were stronger back then than they are now. Quilts in general are comfort objects to me, but I have a personal connection to this particular quilt because of the place and people who shared it with me when I was a kid.

Why we have such deep connections with objects will always fascinate me. We all know that we can’t take things with us after we die, but still, we as humans tend to feel such strong ties to random things. We associate them to people we love, places we’ve been, and times in our lives. It really is so interesting that these items can actually become memories.

This connection to makes me think of horcruxes. Voldemort picked the objects from his life that were most important to put his soul into. He didn’t just pick any old item that wouldn’t be recognized. He deliberately chose items with great personal value to contain the shards of his soul. In a way, I feel like we do the same thing. We have certain items that are so important to us, that they figuratively contain pieces of our souls. I have no doubt that this quilt would be one of my horcruxes.

We read “Ode to Things” by Pablo Neruda during the week. This poem perfectly illustrates this idea of objects containing parts of us. It states, “…they were so close/that they were a part/of my being,/they were so alive with me/that they lived/half my life/and will die half my death.” I absolutely loved that piece. It stated so beautifully how important objects can be to a person, even if it means absolutely nothing to the next person.

My older sister read my narrative and gave me feedback. She has the same experiences with the “cabin era” of our lives, and knows how important my grandma’s quilts were during that time. She said she could picture exactly each of the events I talked about and remember the tie to the quilts. She suggested I change some words around, but she said I captured that time of our childhood well, and the quilt is a great representation of the memories. I don’t remember what item she picked to take home from the cabin, but I bet now she is wishing she had taken a quilt too.

5:30 PM

Process Piece - Kelyn and Jessica

Artists’ Statement:

We chose to record the process of getting a haircut. In class we discussed processes, and we thought this fit perfectly. Getting a haircut is such a common process that everyone does, but one that people may not think about much. Many people probably even view it as a chore or a bother. It’s just something people have to do periodically. We chose to record a haircut at a salon because there are such a wide variety of sounds going on, and there is a distinct beginning, middle, and end.

As discussed in class, society wants to see end products instead of the processes that lead to end products. We as a whole aren’t patient enough to watch processes unfold. That’s why haircuts might seem like a chore to some people; just something that has to be endured to get a desired outcome. In our process piece, we show many of the different steps that goes into getting a haircut. By listening to the sounds, we are more attentive and we notice each step more.

At the same time, our process piece is a metaphor for how society view process. A full haircut at a salon can take 15 minutes or longer. We condensed all of our sounds down to one minute. The purpose of our process piece is to show the steps of a haircut, and to appreciate each part that goes into it. But we cut it way down. We totally conformed to the impatience that society shares by not giving each step its proper time.

In class, we had a brief discussion on Hegel’s philosophy. Our piece expands the concept of Hegel’s philosophy by taking into account Hegelian dialectic. Hegel explains how the relationship between a consciousness and an object moves through various stages, and relies on inadequacies to be the driving force at each stage in order to influence the consciousness to become more adequate. The Hegelian dialect is a process in which the consciousness corrects itself to make its awareness more adequate to the object. As the consciousness develop, it eventually arrives at a stage of absolute knowledge.

Looking at our process piece through the Hegelian dialectic creates a brand new vision of what we attempted to do. The process piece at first sounds inadequate and unsure of what it is. However, as the process piece progresses, we obtain a better idea of what it is representing. In this way, the mind is becoming more conscious of the object and becoming more adequate to our process piece. This acts as a metaphor for how we may confront subjects that we are unsure about, much like a haircut, and how we are unsure of how the hairdresser will cut our hair. However, by close examination of the process piece, or the work of the hairdresser, we begin to see the whole image. Likewise, we can apply this to our everyday life by closely examining and taking our time with subjects we do not understand, so that we can achieve a stage of absolute knowledge.

We also did a separate remixed version of the haircutting sounds for fun. This version gives the process a whole different feel.

Check it out here.

5:56 PM

Thick Description

1:54 PM

Music Mosaic

Cello Suite No. 1 - J.S. Bach, Arranged by The Piano Guys

I started playing the cello in high school, after years of begging my mom to let me change instruments. Violin had its moments, but I always envied the kids in my orchestra who got to play cello. When I got my own cello, the first thing I did was play the deepest note. I got chills. The heavier, richer instrument appealed to me in ways that violin never did.

This arrangement of Cello Suite No. 1 has a constant, underlying rhythm. Fast-paced and unbroken, it is always there, even if in the background. I represented that with black lines and lettering in the images. The thin black lines are always present and continuous. They bend freely though, not restricted. The lettering also shows the main theme's uniformity, but it is paired with the flowing countermelody.

I used warm colors to show the warmth and richness of the cello. The reds, oranges, yellows, and browns are all earthy wood tones, which is what the instrument is almost entirely made from. The cello is made of warm materials and thus produces a warm sound. It is also a curved instrument, with no harsh lines. While listening, it is never cold, nor does it have straight edges.

When listening to the light, legato melodies and harmonies in this arrangement, I pictured adding a drop of paint to water. The paint is diffused, lighter in color as it spreads. It swirls out into billowing clouds, and fills its container. It extends out in a unique pattern every time, never to be replicated. The sound of the cello does the same thing. It's deep and rich, but is light and warming at the same time. The sound swells inside me and fills me with warmth.

Mimicking a watercolor technique represents how the melody grows in each phrase of the piece. Though the orderly pace of the piece is present in the sixteenth notes, the longer, bulding notes in the countermelodies aren't contained by the rigidity. I feel that these images represent both the constant pulse of the piece and the flourishing melodies and harmonies.

These artworks represent my feelings toward the instrument and the beautiful piece: warm, inviting, free. It has patterns and evenness, yet allows for growth. The images warm me, and the sound expands to fill my being.

Genealogical Artifact Revision

Genealogical Artifact

Process Piece - Kelyn and Jessica

Thick Description

Music Mosaic

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