Field of Traces
Structure and material hold memory
My work examines the evidence
01 TRACES OF MEMORY
02 ENDURANCE OF CARE
03 CONDITONS OF ABSENCE
04 ACTS OF REPAIR
05 NOTIONS OF BELONGING
06 MAKING FUTURES
Listening to the Building
In writing about Tacita Dean’s The Russian Ending series, Dietrich writes that each postcard of a historical event was:
“…a fragment impregnated with history.”
We seek those fragments when beginning work within historically, communally and culturally significant built contexts. An acute awareness of the particular history carried by those fragments is gold dust, from which we gather and connect memories evident in a building’s fabric and legacy. This gathering of imagery, material, feelings, stories and evidence of change forms a constellation of collected pieces around the building, which in turn, as we form connections between each, shows us why we care.
Each collected fragment, and each act of care or repair made to the body of material within its context, will affect memory.
Related references
Tacita Dean, The Russian Ending
Dietrich, D. (2002), 'The Space in Between: Tacita Dean's Russian Ending', Art on Paper, 6(5), pp. 48–53.