Three weeks to go until Dictionary opens, and one of my pieces is finished (more or less).
“Lost in Translation” (above) is a series of five towers, about 75cm high, made by looping with cordage made from English-foreign language dictionary pages. Every so often, when joining in a new strip of paper, I left the end sticking out to form “feathers” so that you can see what the cordage is made from.
Each tower is made from a different dictionary: Arabic, Finnish, German, Italian, and Mandarin. As you might expect, the thickness and quality of paper varied considerably between the dictionaries. The pages of the German dictionary were soft but weak, so I had to use more strips in the cordage bundles, while the pages of the Arabic dictionary were thicker and much stronger, but harder on the hands. Based on my (very) small sample, the Italian dictionary had the best weight-to-strength ratio!
I called the piece “Lost in Translation” because the instant translations we can get on our phones mean that foreign language dictionaries are becoming obsolete. But as well as definitions and translations, dictionaries often provide history and context of a word, as well as examples of different usages. So are we losing out on the richness of an experience in return for convenience?
I am still working on my other piece, “Babel”. This is a much taller tower (currently around 250cm high), also made from (mixed) dictionary cordage using macrame. It’s a bit tricky to get a decent photo of it in my living room, but you can see the different colours of the paper in the image below.
The ends of the cordage will be left unfinished lying on the floor, again so that people can see extracts from the dictionary pages. The ceiling of the gallery is higher than my ceiling at home, so I am having to guess how long the cordage needs to be. I will take a bag of strips with me to the gallery for any last-minute extensions required once it is installed! I’m not sure yet whether to put the covers of the dictionaries inside the bottom of the structure – another decision to be made during the hanging.
As always, I LOVE your work – the way you have connected the torn dictionary paper into your woven ‘castles’ . Inspirational and beautiful! Can’t wait to see them, I like the enormity of them. Not sure about the dictionaries inside but you’re the creator and maybe it would look wonderful!
Congratulations!!
Thanks so much Judy. The plan was to show the dictionary covers in some way so that the link to the theme is obvious, but maybe they won’t be needed! I need to see the piece hanging in the gallery before I decide.