Unreliable Memories, a sculptural piece of art made from cardboard and other materials, is an inquiry into the link between memory and narrative, through a series of images and interactive pieces. Using new media technology, drawing, animation, comic art and print-making, I have processed my own memories from recent and distant times, converting them into narratives. They are odd, unexpected, humorous or mundane observations of the past.
The materials and approach (cardboard contraptions activated by wind-up technology, layered drawings, reflected animation, hand-cranked cartoons, storage boxes, domestic and found objects) reflect the complex psychological activity of summoning memory. Many diverse artists, filmmakers and authors have inspired me in this, such as: Diane Landry, John Canemaker, Hayao Miyazaki and Craig Thompson, to name a few.
These pieces investigate how we store and revisit memories. My particular focus is in how we order and consolidate memory into a narrative form in our minds, in our effort to make sense of our experiences. And if, as narrative theorists have proposed, narrative is the defining human trait, the way we treat memory is closely linked to it. The two are indistinguishable. Just as we impose a certain order, with certain conventions (beginning, middle, conclusion) on films and novels, so we seek to do the same with our recollections. Narrative has a strong bias toward order, toward things hanging together, toward their having meaning. I wonder if our seeking of meaning, in the stories we tell ourselves, is our attempt to understand the essentially chaotic and unpredictable nature of life — if it is, in some sense, a particularly human act of courage and faith.