Material Wisdom: A Proposition

Family values can be inherited through language, habits, and the materials that guide our recycled behaviours. The development of this proposition began from a series of projects involving a china set inherited from my late Oma; each project has involved using a variety of the pieces from this set as extensions of creative prompts. While the content that inspires each shape throughout this exploration originates from circumstances that developed after her passing, the tools which communicate the themes came straight from her dining room. Of course, the fragile nature of these tools impacts the quality of the work they are a part of. The china presents the possibility of gentle interactions with violent concepts and offers grace to the exploration of ideas that commonly inspire aggression.

Artistic Proposition: Using the china, create a scene that represents the worst case scenario response to the “what if?” questions that distract me.

“What if World War III starts tomorrow?”
Like many Canadians and citizens in general, I have recently experienced the anxiety and uncertainty initiated by the current political climate. Threats of tariffs, loss of sovereignty… fascism… are not only on our metaphorical doorstep but also literally at the tips of our noses. Social media presents itself as both a tool for staying informed as well as a catalyst for catastrophizing.

In the creation of this scene, a centre was the first thing to come to mind, followed by the scattering of random, small pieces. I didn’t know where all the pieces should go and which ones to use –– that is, the variables they represented weren't clear. At the end of the scene, I took a step back and looked at the pieces and the shapes they created. Pieces on their sides, upside down, strewn apart: it was violent. The whole scene was violent as if the pieces were dismembered, torn apart by an explosion of my imagination. Regardless of “war” in the title of the Worry, the scene was not intentionally violent.
I went back and perched some of the pieces upright in an attempt to demonstrate an absurd chaos rather than a violent one.
But war is violent. So why was this not coming up in my worry response?
I was wondering how war would affect my job, how it would affect grocery shopping, what the media would look like. There were so many variables flooding to my mind beyond the obvious toll of violence… and it was the sheer amount of unknown variables that I found myself trying to represent. This is what was so scary about them. I’m afraid of what I do not know, which is such an enormous amount of worries to hold in a medium that in an intangible space such as one's mind.


Delicate hands; delicate words

A key quality in the work is the inherent care necessary for creating with China. The intentionality needed when maneuvering such delicate pieces informed the dynamics of the creations, even if the inspiration for the piece is violent or intense in nature. Atkinson writes that “Propositions link actual feelings to the articulation of possible worlds and their potentialities,” the potentialities of this proposition being dictated by the constraints of the medium (Atkinson 438). But within said constraints lives pockets of gentleness in tough topics.
Regarding new materialism, Garber suggests, “matter matters to how life is lived, while emphasizing that animacy is inherent not only to what we think of as animate beings but to all types of matter” (Garber 7). The breakable nature of the pieces invites a delicate discussion of the sentiments being catastrophized and encourages the creator to be patient with oneself rather than scrutinizing.

Echos of a wise voice telling me: “it’s silly to worry”

Voice became an ally in the proposition. Saying each worry out loud allowed me to open a kind of dialogue between my monkey mind, my rationale, and other speakers who are difficult to identify. Working the pieces became a soothing practice. It wasn’t because I completed each worry sculpture and felt the relief of seeing a visual representation of the issue. The time I spent working with each worry awarded me a familiar response to such sentiments: what’s the sense in worrying about that? My Oma’s repetitive answer clicked between the plates and hung in the air on set of The Worries.

At first, I was hesitant to incorporate elements from my own kitchen set or other surroundings –– such as plants –– to contribute to the scenes. Was I cheating on the proposition to incorporate elements that were not the china? But I thought of a proposition for research-creation put forward by Manning which involves the opening avenues to “new forms of knowledge,” suggesting that “research-creation proposes new forms of knowledge, many of which are not intelligible within current understandings of what knowledge might look like” (Manning 133). In this process, the combination of materials, both inherited and obtained, invited a dialogue between genealogical intuition and developed rationale, a melding of the voice telling me what elements were at my fingertips are inconsequential. Listening to the wisdom that the objects bring out, inspire, or wisdom that I’ve actually acquired which becomes buried underneath the noise of Doing The Right Thing with all of the time in my day.


New Understandings and an ongoing process

Embarking on this proposition subconsciously began as a source of respite from the noise of little persistent worries. However, constructing those shapes outside of my mind didn’t relieve stress; I’m not cured of my anxieties and the persistent worrying which steals my energy and draws my limbs to the ground. These creations do, however, help me specify the pinpoint of the worry. I am worried about politics. And I am worried about what could happen if I have a TTOC who can’t carry out my lesson plan. But I’m worried about the possible chaos of unknown circumstances most of all, an anxiety that highlights the naive yet inevitable nature of my twenties.
Garber explains that “experiencing objects involves more than words can cover because objects are tactile and kinesthetic, making the experiences [with them] synthetic and not just analytic” (Garber 9). In contrast to rationalizing (or attempting to rationalize) The Worries recorded for this project, the tactile experience of creating the figures allowed me to use energy with my hands and the china pieces rather than keeping it locked in an endless analytic loop in my head. A proposition that keeps me moving with motionless objects provides at least a contrast to the restlessness of everyday worrying.



References

Atkinson, D. (2024), Seeds for Reclaiming Art in Education. International Journal of
Art and Design Education, 43: 433-447
Garber, E. (2019). Objects and new materialisms: A journey across making and living
with objects. Studies in Art Education, 60(1), 7–21.
https://doi.org/10.1080/00393541.2018.1557454
Manning, E. (2016). Ten propositions for research-creation. In N. Colin, & S.
Sachsenmaier (Eds.), Collaboration in Performance Practice: Premises, Workings and Failures (pp. 133–141). Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137462466_7