TCPP01: 9 YEARS IN MANHATTAN DIARIES

TEN years ago, I moved to Manhattan. It's hard to understand the past ten years without a larger reference of space and time. We often recollect minor memories by associating them to more significant events; they serve as lampposts within our hall of memories.

I have a particularly bad memory so in December of 2002, when I discovered the Manhattan Diary created by Per Annum, Inc., I thought it would be a good way to help me keep track the recent past and near future. I've been keeping one ever since, which means I now have 8 completed journals and 1 still in progress.

It's a rather small journal thus putting constraints on how much I can write each day. Even with small handwriting, I am only able to capture distanced and abbreviated details of the day. When I was concerned with it, I would list the things I ate that day. Sometimes, I would write inspirational quotes. Other times, I wouldn't write at all. But, most days I did write and those entries might read something like this (2003.09.03 entry):

WORK. HOME. MOM MADE DINNER.

DANNY COMES OVER. EAT DINNER.

PUZZLE. TV. SLEEP.

For my thesis, I have been thinking about creating a time capsule project based on these journals. The time capsule project would be a commemoration of my time in Manhattan. As I move on with my life to a new space and time (Atlanta, GA circa January 2012), I anticipate that I'll often want to look back to this period of my life. But instead of flipping through 365 days X 9 years of information, I might want to see this information holistically, in a more object-oriented fashion.

Info-graphics (charts, diagrams, graphs) summarizing certain aspects of the past 9 years seems to be the obvious design solution. This would be like a financial report illustrating activity over a span of 9 years. When I shared this idea with my thesis advisor, he told me about Nicholas Felton, a graphic designer who designs an annual report each year about his personal life. Check him out here).

But, what kind of information might I want summarized?

(1) menstrual cycles (TMI? Sorry!)

(2) sundays I actually went to church

(3) days spent at work versus those spent playing

(4) span of days I didn't write anything

(5) days in manhattan vs days away

(6) cycles of shopping, eating out, drinking

etc...

The objective and target audience of the project will dictate its contents. I'll need to think about this some more and get back to you. In the meantime, if my limited readership has any feedback or ancillary thoughts, do feel free to share them!

MEMORIES = TIME CAPSULES

the memories we create are time capsule events.

they are a way of reconnecting our future selves to our past selves. the recollection of a memory is like the unveiling of any time capsule event, it can result in revelation or, more commonly, just some perspective.

time capsules are the visual embodiment of a memory.

what does a memory look like? a frankenstein of sewn-together blips of words and imagery, reduced to neurological signals in the brain. some reside in the deeper parts of the hippocampus while others lay out in plain sight, allowing one to easily reach for a casual anecdote.

what does a time capsule look like? it too is a hodge-podge of disconnected objects that are strewn together to create one thing. it is an economized and symbolic expression of the memorialized event. it too is hidden from plain view until the day it is unveiled in the future.

OBAMA TIME CAPSULES

this morning, i came across an ad for a customizable photo journal that answers the question: where were you when obama won the election? (ad for the book, below).

the book is filled with iconic photographs of the president shot by the author/photographer, rick smolan, as well as maps and info-graphics of the election results. but the kicker is that you may customize it by including pictures of yourself amongst smolan's professional shots. according to smolan, "half the people in the room picked up their cameras and took a photo of the television set just as obama won," so he came up with this customizable time capsule book.

the ad was posted in august 2009 and at the time, i believe it was selling for $35 though i just googled up a man selling his customized book for $250 on amazon! i have to say that the fact that there is a market for such time capsules is really surprising... but the more i think about it, i suppose it shouldn't be.

check out this slick video posted on amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/mpd/permalink/m3BTHN0VANG5A7/ref=ent_fb_link.

though i am definitely not smolan's target audience, i can appreciate the sentiment. when we remember larger events, we always do so from personal perspective. our memories are driven by our personal references to space and time; it is our way of connecting to and coping with the world around us. so it is no doubt that questions in the form of "where were you when...?" are prevalent in the daily world of conversation. and it is common to engage in the question. it's a way of connecting two individuals separated in space to one point in time.

the memories we create are time capsule events. they are a way of reconnecting our future selves to our past selves. the recollection of a memory is like the unveiling of any time capsule event, it can result in revelation but more likely, just some perspective.

TCPP00: ISE POSTCARD PROJECT

One of the interesting things that I discovered in my research was the ISE SHRINE of Japan. Built about 1500 years ago, the temple is taken apart and rebuilt every 20 years. The tradition not only embodies Shinto ideals of ephemerality and the death and renewal of all things, it is also a means of engaging the present day generations in an ancient tradition that passes on the building technique from one generation to the next.

The concept of actively engaging the present-day generation in a past-time ritual seemed pretty radical to me amidst the time capsule projects I had studied which undergo strict dormancy periods of 1000 years or more. Challenging this idea of dormancy led me to define a new time capsule project that is also born of my personal experience.

As I posted earlier today (in SPACE, TIME, & GRAPHIC DESIGN), I moved around a lot throughout my life and whenever I did it was through handwritten letters that I kept in touch with the friends I left behind. I had religiously saved these letters and it was these artifacts that helped me reconcile myself with each new space and time. But handwritten letters are a dying means of conversing and though it is definitely not as convenient as what the internet offers, its death takes with it certain tactile qualities that digital media cannot replicate.

Digital correspondence has also changed the way we see time itself. A lag in correspondence today is really a very short span of time compared to the lags built into handwritten correspondence where spans of days, weeks, even months are acceptable. The difference in the concept of time essentially changes the content of communication itself where larger lapses of time must be captured within the smaller physical limits of a page or a postcard.

The ISE POSTCARD PROJECT doesn't seek to make social commentary on digital communication, but to rather engage others in an exercise that actively preserves a dying culture of handwritten letters and to also view the "Now" as a longer span of time.

The ISE POSTCARD PROJECT takes place as follows:

1. Pictured here is a unified stack of two sets of postcards, perforated in the middle.

2/3. The post cards are meant to be split between two people who then engage in handwritten dialogue, which they send to each other via postal service.

4. When the dialogue is completed, each participant only has half of the dialogue and the half that isn't their own.

5. It is only when they come together that the entire picture is experienced and the full extent of the dialogue is realized.

(Images taken from my Thesis I presentation to faculty).

SPACE, TIME, & GRAPHIC DESIGN

I've taken about a month's break from my thesis topic on Time Capsules so I figure it's time to start back up. I am hoping this blog will help focus some of my fragmented thoughts and to attain outside perspective from the obligated readership of friends and family.

My instincts tell me to tread lightly with this because whenever I explain my thesis topic to friends in the program, I am often met with furrowed brows and polite gestures masking a cynical, 'good luck with that.' But I take this with a grain of salt for all along the battle has been to explain a rather complex connection between Time Capsules and Graphic Design, not to prove its relevance. For the sake of succinctness, I will not explain this connection (at least, not in this entry) but instead embark on explaining why the topic has meaning to me at all.

I guess it all begins with my own archetypal instincts to understand space and time. The first time I grappled with the concept was when I moved from my rural hometown of Plymouth, Massachusetts to Seoul, Korea in 1988. I was only 9, and prior to this the only other Koreans I had met were my family members so the change could not have been more dramatic. I learned early on that there was a larger universe that existed in dimensions way beyond myself and that even the incremental passing of time could result in infinite change.

The largest difficulty was reconciling between my polar opposite existences as a small-town American girl and foreigner living in the bustling city of Seoul. As I evolved into this new existence, I became disconnected with my former self and needed a way of keeping ground. What helped me acclimate were the artifacts of my previous space-time; namely my Barbie and the Rockers doll and my third grade class picture, to name a couple. The tactility of these objects were proof that my former self had actually existed and that she still existed somewhere inside of me.

I would move yet another 4 times in my life and each time was a new challenge in self-reflection and re-acclimatization. What I learned in 1988 would help me to see relevance in the objects around me and the bigger ideas they could represent. This resulted in the ceremonious accumulation of photographs, letters, journals, and souvenirs that I would later survey with melancholy reflection at various times of displacement. Though I did not dub it so at the time, I had created time capsules for myself, to be opened and reflected upon in a future space and time.

I have felt, personally, the power of communicating across an abyss of space and time even if that communication was to myself. The efforts alone have resulted in a better understanding of who I am, how I became this way, and who I want to be. How much more of an impact could a time capsule make if tackled at a global scale? But, as much as I know myself in the present, I cannot foretell who I will be tomorrow or years from now and therein lies the difficulty in constructing a time capsule that will be heartily felt in the future, especially at a global scale.

I am not looking to take on the challenge of defining the ultimate time capsule, but to instead assert the new and tangible forms they may take. But I'll save that conversation for a future space and time...