Graduate Studies, College of (Okanagan)
DSpace
UBCO
Jonsson, Tomas
Master of Fine Arts - MFA
University of British Columbia
At the same time as my fatherâs deteriorating health, the culmination of a long process of development in the neighbourhood my family had lived in for 40 years occurred. Through periodic transfers between home and hospital, we witnessed the uprooting of trees, the construction of roadways and subdividing of properties, including our own. Our house was soon marked for sale and redevelopment, and our affects moved to a new location following his passing. These materials, an archive of ephemera, photos and letters that tell the story of our family from their journey from Denmark and eventual settling in Canada, now sit in cardboard boxes and Tupperware containers. Using these personal âaffectsâ, I am engaged in a long-term performative engagement, using them as a lens to interrogate larger conditions urban development, migration, colonial histories, logics in which our history is implicated. These are teased out of the contents of the material and texts in my familyâs collection. Familial objects, gathered from my motherâs archive are mailed to our former address. As this house no longer exists, the materials are redirected, wearing the imprinted marks of the journey.
HOME TURF: RE-EARTHING FAMILY NARRATIVE by Tomas Jonsson B.F.A., University of Calgary, 2000 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF FINE ARTS in The College of Graduate Studies (Interdisciplinary Studies) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Okanagan) April 2018 © Tomas Jonsson, 2018 ii The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommend to the College of Graduate Studies for acceptance, a thesis/dissertation entitled: HOME TURF: RE-EARTHING FAMILY NARRATIVE Submitted by Tomas Jonsson in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Master of Fine Arts. Dr. Ashok Mathur, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisor Dr. Karis Shearer, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisory Committee Member Dr. Virginie Magnat, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisory Committee Member Dr. Francis Langevin Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies University Examiner iii Abstract At the same time as my fatherâs deteriorating health, the culmination of a long process of development in the neighbourhood my family had lived in for 40 years occurred. Through periodic transfers between home and hospital, we witnessed the uprooting of trees, the construction of roadways and subdividing of properties, including our own. Our house was soon marked for sale and redevelopment, and our affects moved to a new location following his passing. These materials, an archive of ephemera, photos and letters that tell the story of our family from their journey from Denmark and eventual settling in Canada, now sit in cardboard boxes and Tupperware containers. Using these personal âaffectsâ, I am engaged in a long-term performative engagement, using them as a lens to interrogate larger conditions urban development, migration, colonial histories, logics in which our history is implicated. These are teased out of the contents of the material and texts in my familyâs collection. Familial objects, gathered from my motherâs archive are mailed to our former address. As this house no longer exists, the materials are redirected, wearing the imprinted marks of the journey. iv Lay Summary: Through my studies, I have developed an artwork that utilizes personal narratives as a lens to interrogate larger settler / colonial narratives, teased out of the contents of the material and texts in my family's collection. These items are enclosed in envelopes, and mailed to our former home. As this house no longer exists, the material will be returned to the house it is sent it from, now marked with the markings of the failed journey. v Table of Contents Abstractâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦iii Lay Summaryâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦iv Table of Contentsâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦v List of Figuresâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.vi List of Supplementary Materials.......................................................vii Acknowledgementsâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦viii Dedicationâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦ix 1 Introductionâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦1 2 Chapter: Dear Virginieâ¦â¦.â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦5 3 Chapter: Dear Ashokâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..11 4 Chapter: Dear Karisâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦18 5 Chapter: Dear Peterâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦24 6 Chapter: Dear Stephenâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦39 7 Works Citedâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..48 8 Figures.â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦50 vi List of Figures Figure 1 Tattoo by Dion Kazsasâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦50 vii List of Supplementary Figures Figures 1-100 Home Turf envelope sculpturesâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦ Figures 101-122 Lettersâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦... viii Acknowledgements There are countless people I would like to thank for their care, guidance and friendship. Many of whom are named in this text, and others, while not named, are nonetheless there. ix This work is dedicated to land I have had the opportunity to be on, and to move through. 1 What is left to forget? Language has swept us all away. (Hollis, Groundwater 64) Dear Reader, Home Turf is an iteration of an ongoing artwork concerned with the Jonsson family home, located at 528 30 Ave N.E., Calgary, Alberta, from 1972 to 2013. Over a period of 10 years, and at the same time as my father's deteriorating health, a corresponding process of development in the neighbourhood culminated in our eventual departure from this home. Through periodic transfers between home and hospital, we witnessed the uprooting of trees, the construction of roadways and the subdividing of properties, including our own. Our house was soon marked for sale and redevelopment, and our effects moved to a new location following my fatherâs passing. The packing and move was understandably quick, and we're still now making our way through the material. Using these personal effects (which are also 'affects'), Iâve been involved in a long-term performative engagement, using them as a lens to interrogate larger conditions of urban development, migration, colonial historiesâlogics in which our history is implicated. These materials, an archive of ephemera, photos and letters 2 that tell the story of our family from their journey from Denmark and eventual settling in Canada, now sit in cardboard boxes and Tupperware containers. I'm using this project, part of my MFA through the University of British Columbia Okanagan (UBCO) as a way to support this effort of organization. This is a dual purpose, for my family but also for me to understand and work through my history. I'm trying to connect this violent rupture to the history of my family's trajectory of migration from Denmark to Calgary, via Montreal, and various cities in Ontario. How do I make a place for this narrative within an artistic and an academic context? Where is it at odds? These are my concerns through this work. Home Turf uses personal narratives as a lens to interrogate the overlapping conditions and logics of land use, development, and migration, in which my personal history is implicated. For my methodology I am following the concept of biotext, as identified by Joanne Saul and practiced by poets such as Robert Kroetsch, Daphne Marlatt and Fred Wah. These writers use their particular subjective locations and histories as the locus for writing that intersects with, and counters, dominant narratives that inscribe the landscape. I am interested in the tension of performative acts and material; the residual, unspoken, and informal information that resonate from the material. In pursuing this activity through strategies of 3 artistic inquiry, I am following artists such as Peter Morin, Vera Frenkel and Victoria Stanton, whose use of performative strategies to engage with and intervene in economic, colonial, and bureaucratic structures outline and unravel these structuresâ oppressive tendencies. Home Turf continues an ongoing interest I have in transposing personal family narrative into locally based sites, where the incongruity highlights historic and economic overlays and conflicts in the landscape. It also implicates my position as a descendent of immigrants entangled within a settler colonial narrative. The project comprises one hundred mobile sculptures circulated through Canada Post, Various national Postal Systems, and by hand (fig. 1-100). As part of this project, I have gathered materials from my motherâs archives, collating them in individual envelopes, and also including in each envelope natural materials from the site, such as grass, twigs and stones. Going through the books in my motherâs collection, I would draw quotes from each, typed along the top of each envelope. The envelopes are sent to 528, but as this house no longer exists other than as a street address, the materials mailed to that ghostly domain are redirected. Complementing these mailed sculptures, over the course of the year I have been writing letters (fig 101-121), which have become a method to work 4 through the development of this piece. The letters featured below are a re-alignment of these letters, reproduced as the following five chapters that trace the journey that the project took. Thank you for taking the time to follow this work. All Best, Tomas 5 Dear Virginie, When living in Toronto, I would regularly visit a labyrinth located in High Park. I would walk along the circuitous route that lay before me, carrying a question, or a thought that needed resolution. As I moved back and forth towards the centre, I would reach near places I had been before, but only by approximation. I felt this journey take place in my body, and in the environment I was moving through. The thought moved through me as I moved. As part of the 2015 Summer Intensive at the University of British Columbia, Okanagan, Dion Kazsas conducted the first iteration of the Earth Line Tattoo School. As I listened to his speaking on the school, I realized a shift in my thinking, and recognized the spiral as another, more generative path. The next day, I received a hand poke tattoo from Dion, on my left forearm, of a spiral, the concentric rings expanding out in three cycles (fig. 122). As my project developed, my writing as a performative practice has been following Fred Wahâs concept of âgarden-path sentencesâ (Wah, False Laws of Narrative xv), continually drawing out and articulating ideas into a practice. I am using the convention of generating vernacular narrative within conversation. 6 Going through this process has been a personal excavation too. Slowly, Iâve attempted to draw in more of my embodied sense of the place; to build, by gradual degrees, a knowledge of the site, imparted in even smaller degrees within the text. Perhaps this comes through as a tacit understanding, an interface that can be accessed by others through their own experience. Where Iâm living, understanding this place, what writing can tell about a place. Iâve been drawn to the poetic practice of biotext. The âbioâ in biotext âblurring the boundaries between autobiography, biography, history, fiction, and theory, and mixing prose segments in with poetry, letters, essays, and photographsâ¦ a form of writing that considers the relation between self, nation and self-narrationâ (Saul, Writing the Roaming Subject 81â102). Using literary conventions, the authors working in this way situate themselves in a complex set of relations, forces and conditions, and write routes through these. My project is a performative biotext utilizing personal archives as source material. This rupture, the loss of 528, has become a significant context for me to explore the complex intersections of the personal, social and economic values that inform a place. Going through the archive, Iâve been collecting the cast-off detritus and including these in the envelopes. On the exterior of the envelopes I include fragments of texts drawn from books in my familyâs collection. These books 7 are an assortment made up of books brought over from Denmark and those they've collected since. These fragmentary texts provide a disjointed correspondence to the material contained sealed within. Iâve been thinking of the material Iâm moving through, the mass of materials from my motherâs archive, the books we have on the shelves, the stories they tell. I want to let them speak, on the land, and also to let them exist, disseminate there. This project is an attempt at remembering, a memorialization, but also an attempt at breaking down this memory. I want to understand the borders of this, the personal, butted against the larger, impersonal, abstract forms that shape it. I find a similar approach in Tami Spryâs workâwhat she refers to as autoethnography. For Spry, this inquiry, âconcentrat[es] on the body as the site from which the story is generated, thus beginning the methodological praxis of reintegrating my body and mind into my scholarshipâ (708). In the letters that Iâve written for this project, Iâve endeavoured to situate myself in relation to 528. I see this in a similar way to what Fred Wah identifies when he âasks readers to imagine a scenario where they are reading the poem as the poet is writing itâ (Wah, False Laws xiv). My presence is less as a character in the story and more as a performed engagement, a subject that is performative and in process within the text. 8 The Ledger, a long poem by Robert Kroetsch, can be understood as a literary spatial field, not needing to be read in a linear way. Kroetschâs work is similar to that of other writers working in biotext who âemploy a range of innovative textual strategies, not merely to write about their own lives, but also to work through the experience of displacement rather than seeking simply to reflect or represent itâ (Saul, 4). Ultimately what I am doing is text-based, a way of reading a place. I want to consider how words are used, applied to a place. I want to find out what can I do with these words, this mass of documents. Iâve been thinking of Shawn Wilsonâs writing, which you introduced us to in your class through his book Research is Ceremony. Wilsonâs writing also doesnât follow a linear process, as opposed to the convention in academic writing. In his writing, he moves back and forth between different forms of writing: academic and personal letters to his children. He recognizes and is drawn by a feeling that the story he wants to tell needs to fit within the paradigm he is exploring (14). Nadine Tafoya (qtd in Wilson): âStories go in circles. They donât go in straight lines. It helps if you listen in circles because there are stories inside and between stories, and finding your way through them is as easy and as hard as finding your way homeâ (14). 9 Using a similar circular thinking, I have been formulating the imagined space of the installation. This will be in a library space, amidst local history and archives, where selected elements of my motherâs space will be installed, in the same way her house has been populated by the residual elements of the former home, the organizational structures; white binders with clear plastic sleeves containing decades of correspondence, and records. Our encounters, sitting at the living room table (built by my father), sifting through boxes of archival material. Or sitting at the kitchen table (purchased from Ikea) over coffee, talking through family matters, or on the couch, over a glass of wine, where I am able to hear her memories. How these stories come out, through innocuous conversation, suddenly opening up into potent moments; how history resurfaces. Iâm interested in the space between the spheres of the personal and the academic. When choosing to pursue this program of study, I wanted to give myself space to consider this history, to understand currents of thought and practice that have addressed similar violence. I also feel affinity for Wilsonâs observation that writing to an anonymous, abstracted reader is not satisfactory. âIn an oral tradition,â Wilson notes, âthis problem is overcome by utilizing the direct relationship between storyteller and listener. Each recognizes the otherâs role in shaping both the content and processâ (8). 10 In Wilsonâs writing, he has organized his document structure as distinct sections, differentiated by typography. For myself, Iâve decided to follow this path all the way through. Iâve been writing these letters over the course of the year. Each of these was written in a moment, a short period of concentration. Now, Iâm pulling the content of these letters together, letting them mingle and breathe a bit more. Iâm also turning them toward you, and towards Karis, Peter, Ashok and Stephen. Addressing you all in turn. In your class, we engaged in a reading of Rob Popeâs writing on creativity. He outlined the limits of language as a defining, containing structure, however necessary it is. Pope draws attention to the fact âthat the spaces ... between, signaled through typographic convention (dot dot dot), are a space where we can insert ourselves, where I can insert myself, in the textâ (168-194). â¦ All Best, Tomas 11 Dear Ashok, When we moved my mom to her new house, I noticed how important it was to set up the artwork, the furniture, and I remarked to her that it looked more like the old house than the old house did. My mom brings this up often, and I can see she really feels this. As much as she, we, loved that house, so many conditions that together created this feeling had fallen away. What I think reinforced a feeling of longing was the speed at which changes took place, and the way that they did. These are common changes, but the tempo is key. Itâs these conditions, these speeds that I want to think about. Also now, the void, not a void, the full, living space that is the vacant lot. Iâm thinking about the artworks in the house, of the painting of the Greenlandic freighter arriving with supplies. The painting was from Farmor, a wedding gift to my mom and dad. A copy of Emanuel Petersenâs original, an artist whose work we also have in our collection. My mom mentioned that Georg and Helle (my Aunt and Uncle), and their children spent some time in Greenland, and that she hoped to visit, but that the journey would have been too long. They would have had to fly to Denmark first, then there. She also mentioned that someone from Dadâs family was there, in Greenland, and as a result of the war had to stay as it was unsafe to travel. Niels (another uncle) was there too, to make money, working at 12 the radio station. I remember hearing about this, but not the other stories. This painting has travelled with my family from Denmark to Canada. Iâve collected documentation of this, showing the painting in its different homes. I havenât been able to find one from 528. This is the kind of moment, movement that I want to keep tracking. In some respects, this feels like a direction, a material, that I donât actually want to address, at least not directly in my thesis; perhaps Iâm shedding this from my work by writing about it, finding a space that needs expression, but not necessarily critical exploration. Even writing this now, Iâm of both minds. Can I somehow choose both? In October 2016, at the Audain Gallery at SFU, I saw Dana Claxtonâs exhibition Made to be Ready. The exhibition title upends the âready-madeâ as a cultural artifact, instead looking at the spiritual and social lives of objects as a process of resistance against colonial structures. I think this is still a challenge to consider in relation to the concept of collecting and is something to consider in terms of the collector in questionâwhat are the conditions, impulses of this individual; how are they implicated in this process? Iâm thinking of the exhibition at Studio 111, of yours and Ayumiâs 13 belongings, the space that was created. When you had to suddenly leave your home, the subtle, but still violent push that necessitated movement. The way the space that was set up with your collective belongings opened as an opportunity to draw light to this. The transgression I made, the erasure of a life. A violence I became complicit in. Iâm interested in erasure poetryâ¦ the absence, the fragment, meaning, repackaged, redistributed. Carried back and forth. Somewhere in the boxes of our archives exists a photo, or maybe itâs a film, in which I, at age three, pour the contents of one cup to another, and back again. Over time, both vessels are empty (I have this on good authority), while the contentsâorange juiceâspill over the table where I was sitting. Some time later, I began a collection of bottle caps, drawn from my walk to and from school, over a period of about a month. I collected them in an ice cream bucket, and stopped once I had reached the top. I still have this collection, and thinking back on my motives, I canât say I had a rationale for collecting them, except I was interested in the variety and repetition. It was a game. The work Iâm doing feels like it is closely aligned to both these acts, the spill being the area I am interested in, the mass of bottle caps collected, but to what aim; what does this collection mean to me? I think it signifies the 14 impulse I had, and this is why I still keep it. I see a similarity in what Iâm doing with this work, recognizing the âbeguiling singularity and differentnessâ which Baudrillard identifies as a compelling motive for collectors (10). Beyond this, the works Iâve produced have become a body, a container of memory, a residue, and an articulation of a death, an attempt to keep the house alive in myself. âTo write in poetry is to move past the comfort of a ruled discourse; in order, to move on, beyond order, the complete thought spills over to an excess and residue of language in which my âmarkedâ body dissolves into unsure relationships. â remarkedâ (Wah, Faking it 17-20.) The connections Iâm making are not always perfect, but they function as influence. The writing Iâm doing will go around them. Iâm resisting connecting the dots, but also wanting to put some legibility together. Iâm interested in the trace the shelf will leave on the site of 528. Iâll also have to take a photo of the trace that is left by the shelf, the imprint on the ground. How it is covered, what this will look like over time. Iâm thinking about Amy Malbeufâs installation at Alternator. In the corner of the gallery, a turf of grass brought over by car from her parentâs home to 15 the gallery. I want to collect brambles, material from the site of 528, maybe by the borders of the property. This also makes me think of Haruko Okanoâs foraging on the campus of UBCO during the 2016 Summer Intensive in Kelowna. She enlisted participants to collect this all and place it around her body, leaving a trace in the landscape. In December 2016, I attended the Thirst Days event at VIVO Media Arts Centre in Vancouver, the theme being "as you live here" conveyed through a number of videos addressing future imaginations of the spaces we live in, and through which opening possibilities of compassion, empathy, inclusivity. In one video, Phinder Dulai explains his research into archives and public records as a strategy to undisguise colonial structures. He talks about the interconnectedness of the migrant experience, guest settlers (sometimes uninvited, and sometimes unwelcome), stories brought and grafted on a landscape of stories thousands of years old. As part of the Summer Intensive in Kelowna in 2016, I was witness to a performance by Charles Campbell. As we sat gathered in the white-walled gallery, Charles Campbell entered the space, his head obscured by a light blue and brown patterned geodesic assemblage. Removing this and placing it on a plinth, he obtained a phone, headphones and papers, and sat at a small table, an empty chair across from him. He engaged in a conversation with someone on the other end of the phone. We were only privy to his side 16 of the conversation as he spoke and listened in calm, but intent concentration. Over the course of this interview, the subject was gradually revealed: A retired police officer recounting an incident in a neighbourhood in Jamaica where he had shot and killed a person. Charles pulled out the story through a compassionate interrogation, attempting to divine the residual effects of this moment on the officer. âHow did you feel after that?â âWas anyone in your squad injured?â The call is a recording, an echo of an earlier encounter Charles had with the individual. A person he came to know through work that eventually developed into a friendship. The conversation takes place on complicated terrain; details of the incident are carefully teased out. There is no antagonism or pressing of guilt. The exchange ends without resolution. There is no remorse or redemption for the crimes that have been committed. Charles removes the headphones, places the mask on his head and walks away. I was able to sit close, to watch him, while he was listening to the audio of the interview he had conducted earlier. Watching his face closely, reading it for a response. This physicality, his presence, was so powerful. This performance moved me to shift more of my thinking towards a performative aesthetics. As the cultural geographer Doreen Massey has written, âif time unfolds as 17 change then space unfolds as interaction; space is thus âa product of relations-between, relations that are necessarily embedded material practicesâ (63). The letters are still important, and there should be a component of this in the space, the envisioned space at the realization of the project. But moments are needed. Performed acts, the letters are residue I suppose of these times, and that is partly it. So, considering me at this moment, preparing this text, being present through the act of writing, itâs not just about the words, itâs about holding on to the connection in this moment, and then when you receive the letter, or, as is more likely the case, when you donât. Holding on to the anticipation of response, which wonât be realized. â¦ All Best, Tomas 18 Dear Karis Before leaving for a residency on Toronto Island, I took a blank notebook with me from my motherâs house. On the plane, as I started to make notes on work I wanted to explore, I realize one of the pages is not blank. Three pages in, and for 10 pages, a detailed inventory of every purchase my mother and father made in March 1983 was itemized. This inventory became the score for my performance produced during the residency. I purchased each item, or found an approximation if needed. At the final day of the workshop, I had a performance where I read the listâin Danishâand distributed the objects to the assembled audience. The inventory was a way of sharing, but also concealing. âThe home as concept evokes a stereotypical image of private confinement, a container of secrets, as in the relations between the words for home and for secret in several European languages (German Heim and Heimlich, as well as Swedish hem and hemlig)â (Borggreen and Gade, Performing Archives/archives of Performance 413). When making decisions on what to keep, and what not to keep, from our familyâs collection, and how to negotiate this with other members of my family, Iâve been preoccupied with the conflicting desires to impart information, and to honour familial privacy. It helps to think of this as two 19 separate, but related processes, with different obligations and intents. I hope that they can still speak to each other, and that there is a way to draw from the personal, internalized work, even obliquely, in a way that can be understood, but not formally made visible. It is a difficult balance to maintain, the desire to want to impart information, and to be cognizant of the desires for privacy, but this is also the tension that I want to engage with. Intimacy requires this tension, and Iâm thinking of how spaces of art and writing afford and also counter this. Iâm cognizant of my relationship, and obligation to family story. How â[r]evealing a secret often involves disclosing another personâs secret, hereby betraying a confidentiality and denying this person the right to decide whether or not to reveal a personal secretâ (Borgreen and Gade, 407). I notice this when talking to my mom about this work, and her concerns about my airing of our particular stories, her resistance to this. I feel that I'm taking liberties, translating personal, private information, or insight, into an economic exchange. To avoid providing banal, safe details, rather than delving deeper and imparting meaningful truths and conditions. I want to know how to foster an emphatic connection without fully revealing or displaying in an overt way. How to approach obliquely? Not showing, not telling, but creating the suggestion, exploring the lines in between. 20 In her presentation at the 2016 Summer Intensive, Cathy Mattes referred to the kitchen table, and the conversations she would have there with her mother, as a methodological space. I similarly think about my mom's kitchen table in Calgary, where I situate much of my âstudio practiceâ and writing for this project. Iâve had many conversations with my mother over this table, as I unfolded the project with her. We had a discussion about the mailing aspect; she is still very uncomfortable about this, and would definitely prefer me not to, while I stubbornly held on, trying to argue my case. Iâm reasonably confident that I wonât be called out by the postal service, or greatly inconvenience the carrier with these occasional letters, but at the same time, I do want to acknowledge her position. She knows that I am collecting stories for my studies. Iâve told her that I want to go through the material gathered in the bins that Iâm now facing. When we sit, itâs at the end of a long day. Sheâs helped prepare my brother for his day program, getting him dressed, his lunch prepared, waiting for the bus to pick him up. After heâs gone sheâll have done the dishes, the laundry from the night before, perhaps a quick nap and then facing the administration of the day: doctor appointments, meetings with his caregivers, conversations with my siblings, grocery shopping if thereâs time. I usually come every other day, in the early evening, enough time to share time with them both. When my brother goes to sleep, we usually 21 have an hour or so, a glass or two of wine. We talk about going through the boxes, but by that time, she is too exhausted. We make plans for another day. Perhaps the next week. She wants to go through, to sort them, but also their weight is overbearing, and she sometimes (increasingly) wants to get rid of them. Sheâs suspicious of my motivesâ¦ or more accurately, is concerned with who will see this material. How will it be displayed? I assure her that I will be careful with it, that I wonât expose anything embarrassing about our family. We will go through them together; I will make sure that anything she wants kept private stays that way. Iâve explained the project several times. Some of the words are smooth from repeated delivery, but there is still a hesitation. I have an idea, a sense of the structure, and what I want to explore, but also heavy doubt. That Iâm reaching, bending this material towards a narrative. Iâm resisting this, but also setting towards a particular path. I want to tell the story of our old house, how we came to leave it: that we were evicted, taken advantage of in a time of crisis; that a larger economic crisis of the city followed like an echo. We are now in a house that, as I say, and sheâs agreed, is more like our old house than our old house. The former carved away when the neighbouring houses made way for roads, the wild hill behind our property paved. 22 When writing the letters, I purposefully left off my mother and fatherâs names, and this was a fatal flaw in some respects, but in the end, ideal; as painful as it is to not receive, to send something that wonât make it back. It is likely they will be destroyed. I had originally thought that I would destroy them, but by happy accident, the postal system intervened. As I understand it, the collection of letters now sits in an archive in Mississauga, and will eventually be destroyed. Like the bookshelf, they are absence, erased. Iâm thinking about how certain writers find home, or create it? Or dispel it. The narrative weave that overlays landscape. The colonial project is a narrative construction, and I am interested to know how to break from it, achieve an understanding, in a bodily, rooted way, where these words come from. One way, as Daphne Marlatt makes clear, is to understand language biologically, âless a line than a web, which we spin, sound volley along. by which we are held, told, spun into larger and larger reaches of meaningâ (53). The ways I can think of words, in a biological way. What does the story taste like? Gleaned moments from a reading in Vancouver. The meal that 23 followed. The taste of rice pudding on my tongue. â¦ All Best, Tomas 24 Dear Peter, One of the two poplars outside of my motherâs house recently died. It was a long decline, the tree had been in poor health, while the one just two feet away was thriving. Jessie pointed out that the tree needed as much dirt beneath it as the circumference of the branches above. Over time, we came to realize that the new coating of asphalt and the white stones placed along the fence had choked off the water from the roots of the tree. My dadâs punchline to a joke comes to mind as Iâm writing this; âit was the Ashâs fault.â I called 311 to report it and two weeks later the tree was removed. I feel I should hold on to the stump. Not in mourning, but still a pause, a reflection of our relationship to site. In 2015, I took part in a project called Wreck City in Calgary. It was organized by a group of artists, based around a house gallery called 809. Located in the cityâs Sunnyside neighbourhood, the houses along the block were all slated for demolition. Somehow, the gallery organizers were able to convince the developers, Batistella, to give them access to all the houses to hold a pre-demotion art event. Over one hundred artists were given access to the houses and were able to transform them into wild 25 installations. I was one of the artists selected, working with the fireplace in the backyard of 809. This was around the time of our move from 528, shortly after the death of my dad. Sometime earlier, workers from The City arrived on our property and started cutting down the large spruce trees in the backyard. My mom watched, shocked, as the 60-year-old trees fell. But she stayed inside. It turns out they had made a mistake and had cut down the wrong trees, meaning instead to cut the trees in the front yard. We kept the wood for fires and as stumps to sit around the pit. At the time of the move, I brought some of this to 809 for a controlled burn, between the hours of 5:28 - 8:09 PM, a space to have a conversation about the eventual loss of spaces that we care about. The overall event was a spectacle, and I have conflicting opinions about it, but am glad for the opportunity to have had this small space for a shared mourning process. Sometime after Wreck City, another project by the same organizers took place at the King Edward School. Here an historic sandstone schoolhouse was again given over to artists to engage with. The summer prior I had been part of a residency on Toronto Island, organized by Victoria Stanton, 26 called âBetween Intimacy and Architecture.â In this performance-based workshop, the six participants learned and developed techniques to engage with site. We formed a strong bond and became a collectiveâthe 6 of heartsânamed after a performance where we made a house of cards. We worked in one of the classrooms in the King Edward School, building collaborative and independent works over many hours. Day after day, I brought material from my dadâs school. His lesson plans and administrative forms. I ripped the pages and put them in my mouth, drinking water and moistening them until they turned into a pulp. I shaped these into letters on a chalkboard, like large spitballs. The phrase read: What I am, so will you be. What you are so once was I. Iâm thinking a lot about conversations Iâve had about 809 Gallery and Wreck City. I think it is true that the focus was less about the physical houses, the material aspects of the works, than it was about the social relationship of the space, the people that were part of it. Of course, itâs closely aligned to the physical architecture, but I think the emphasis on this was wrong, and echoed in subsequent iterations of this project at The King Edward School, and the Car Wash. These projects followed the wrong trajectory, and I think got caught up in some of the more unfortunate aspects of the Wreck City ethos, of engaging in a material and process-focused practice which simultaneously, if unintentionally masked the 27 processes and implications of gentrification. I wonder if it could have been redirected to looking at the dynamics of the relationships formed, the time and labour spent; less on the shell and more of the essence. If Iâm thinking in the same way here, is there something from this that Iâm not fully addressing in this work, for 528? Am I overemphasizing the space, in its physical reality, even in the mailing of the letters, the material of the archive, the furniture, the paintings? What about the underlying conditions of exhaustion, the reticence of my mother to look at the archive, to delve in? Maybe thereâs more to that that should be explored. Iâm also thinking about ghosts, in a way, as a kind of surplus, or latency. Something stirred up, a tension, an anxiety, a resistance. Iâm thinking of what Camille Turner said during her talk as part of the 2016 Summer Intensive in Kelowna: âstep into stories â¦ experience is felt ... lost in translation when putting into language â¦ words are inadequate.â These observations, fragments that I captured in my notes, have really turned me around on my thinking about this project, but, in another way, also keeping me on the path I want to go on. Iâve been struggling with envisioning the realization of this work, and in particular knowing that the realization in many respects needs to be set now, and then carried 28 forward. So, some tinkering and adjusting can take place, but within an established aesthetic framework. Iâve been struggling with this aesthetic, which is based on the organizational strategy of my mom, of her correspondence, which she files within white binders, in plastic sleeves. I had intended to have printouts, on regular printer paper, not as a denial of aesthetics, but in close emulation of her methodology. Iâve also been resistant to adopting an aesthetic simply for the sake of aestheticâhandwritten, typed, specific fonts, etc. I realize these decisions need to be made, but at the moment Iâm hesitant. Iâm hoping the answer will present itself. Stepping into stories; the importance of embodying stories. The way Camille does this, through her performative walks, and the histories explored on sites that are actively engaged in forgetting. Words are inadequate; the presence needs to be felt. It is also true that words are inadequate, sometimes, because there arenât words that can reach a particular feeling, or condition. Language leads the reader and writer (both actual and imagined) down a particular path, like this letter, intended for a particular person, but also something like a confessional, a diary. Iâve been back at the site of 528 again recently. After a long negotiation, I was finally granted permission from the current site owners to deposit the shelf on the site for a period of time. There were a lot of caveats, largely 29 concerning any visibility that might affect the aesthetics of the site; somewhat humorous, given how overgrown the site was. In the end I was able to convince them to let me leave the uninstalled wood on the site. Furtively, I brought the constructed shelf, which they allowed. I will be picking up the shelf again soon, which will bear the imprint of the site. It will contain the language of the space. Iâve been thinking of the work of Jordan Scott and Stephen Collis who buried copies of Charles Darwinâs The Origin of the Species throughout the interior of BC for a year. Following this, the books were exhumed, co-mingling with the environment (Scott and Collis, Decomp). Our house is now gone. Torn down to make way for an ambitious development that never materialized. Now it is an empty pit. Not emptyâitâs overgrown with plant life, surrounded by fencing. I didnât ever want to see it again, but one day while driving with my sister, she took us there. Ultimately, Iâm glad she did, giving us the opportunity to see the overgrowth, the trees still standing, the gazebo visible past where the house once stood. Iâve continued, sporadically, to go through the material effects of my motherâs archive. Going through, we have sifted and amassed a large pile of detritus material, and Iâm very interested in this material in particular, which holds no value to her, but still carries some resonance, a value in 30 outline. Sifting through, we organized material into three piles: items to keep; items I wanted to hold on to; and items to discard. The discard pile was largely bills, invoices and ephemera (church newsletters, articles, and some of my homework assignments, oddly enough). Some of these undesired items I would sneak into my pile, or more rarely, into the keep pile as an indication of its kind, or if there was a particular quality to itâfor example, if it was annotated. The discard pile was quite large, and I think this gave my mom a sense of satisfaction; that we werenât just sifting through and rearranging all the materials, only to return them to a box. We discussed what to do with the material. I suggested burning it, and she agreed. I didnât mention that I planned to keep the ashes, in envelopes, and possibly mail these back to the house. I am thinking of elements, such as fire, of water, and of earth. It falls in line with my ongoing series of works that employ familial narratives, using the ephemeral and physical materials as a way to break open new meanings, glean a different understanding. Representing the discursive performing body on the page requires an enfleshed methodology, and surely, an expansion of form in academic writing. Embodied writing must be able to reflect the corporeal and material presence of the body that generated the text in performance. Emancipating the body from its erasure in academic 31 scholarship would, necessarily, affect stylistic form. (Borggreen and Gade, Performing Archives/archives of Performance 726) Through my studies I was able to meet and learn from authors such as Mark Giles and Tamas Dobozy. Both of their writings have provided me with insight into my work, in consideration of how stories about family are told. I think of the characters in their two books: Mark Gilesâ Seep (2015) and Dobozyâs The Beautician (2009); how the protagonists carry the archive, how it manifests within the academic context. Dwight, the protagonist in Seep, returns to his hometown to research and tell his origin story as part of his masterâs thesis. Dwight is a âformer archivist in the corporate library of Integrated Horizons Corp (IHC)ââformerly International Hydrocarbons, formerly Industrial Heat and Coal, and originally Prairie Mountain Light and Power (Giles, 21). How to intervene in my own text? I want to avoid stepping into what Giles describes as a âshadowy nostalgiaâ¦The W.O. Mitchell narrative, the Kinsella narrativeâ (Giles, Seep 22). Iâm trying not to tell the story. What is here is not what I want to tell. Iâve resisted going into the history found in official spaces, forensically looking for some clues. What Iâm offering up 32 instead: some small stories; veiled allusion; and crafted subtext. In The Beautician, the protagonist engages in a long negotiation with Hollo (the beautician) over the secret content of his archive, amassed during his time as a censor in Communist Hungary. The protagonist wishes to incorporate Holloâs archive into his studies, but does not recognize the implications of doing this. In the end Hollo relents, and provides him with the archivesâbut only after they have been burnedâin the form of ashes. âOf course, you tell yourself things,â he continued, âstories to redeem your betrayals.â At night, after work, early in the morning, heâd think of the writers whoâd written these books, the hours theyâd spent, the excitement and inspiration, and it felt to him like the only fitting tribute to her, the only thing those books could now realize, as if the beauty that was their aim was Adriana herself, for if they were going to be destroyed, and they were whether Hollo did it or someone else, then at least they should go to that, the very thing theyâd tried to accomplish and which their destruction would testify to â a love outside the ideology hemming them in, as if one secret could hide inside another, buried deep, the loss of those books covering up something else the regime had missed. (Dobozy, 111) I tell my mother I want to send letters to the old house, filled with the ephemera from her archive that is within each Tupperware container. 33 These letters will come back, returned to sender. Sheâs concerned that this will be an irritation to the post office, or worseâ¦ will we get in trouble? Iâm hesitant with her discomfort, and guiltily aware that Iâve already begun the process, which she soon finds out. I transcribed a text from one of our conversations, where she walked me though her collection. I sent one hundred copies of this transcript, with addressed envelopes to a conference in Montreal. I asked participants, through instructions (I wasnât able to attend in person) to comment and post these in return to the old house. In the end I received three. I didnât read them, although Iâm deeply curious to see what they say. However, there is an uncomfortable feeling that holds me back. A feeling that Iâve somehow betrayed a trust, that Iâve started down a path that will only inflict more and more discomfort on my mother. Iâm reminded of the protagonist in, The Beautician, his interrogation of Holloâs archive and of his past: the parallel of his dragging this archive through the filter of the university and the Hungarian social community. While I donât anticipate such an explosive revelation through my familyâs history, I sense a similar resistance to bringing the collection into the process of review. I question my motives. I wonder if, as in Dobozyâs story, burning these envelopes is the better decision. Iâm also thinking about Vera Frenkelâs video work, Once Near Water: Notes 34 from the Scaffolding Archive (2007). In this work, an unnamed protagonist inherits a collection of photos of scaffolding. On the instruction of the archivist who compiled this collection, she eventually destroys it. The fictional archivist of scaffolding, through her correspondence with the narrator, states: âDo what you want with this: Grieve, Reminisce, Advocate, Act.â My father was infatuated with water. The books in our collection (some that I gave him) reflected this interest in poetic and scientific forms. Water changes from liquid to steam. Water flows. I once bought my father a book on water, but like many of my interventions into that bookshelf, I don't think he even opened it. I canât say I blame him. I pulled it off the shelf recently and discovered that it doesn't have the water in itânone of the flow that delighted him in stories, or turns of phrase. He was quiet, but full of joy. You had to be able to recognize it, and wait for it. I keep going back, keep drawing from, keep drawing in. Peter, Iâm thinking of you washing books. âI like the water in itâ (Wah, Faking it 74). Iâm thinking of the water that my parents and siblings crossed to reach 35 here. The bridge my grandfather built. Iâm thinking of the many, many times that artist-run centres in Calgary have had to rescue their archives from flood damage. Divya Mehraâs exhibition at The New Gallery in 2016 was called Itâs gonna rain. It changed in concept following the sudden death of the artistâs father. After his death, the piece shifted to be a memorial to him, an architectural space to be destroyed through a gradual but unrelenting flow of water. I want to somehow acknowledge what is happening to 528. After the house is gone, how it can speak to, break open the space. Is it possible to take control away from the narration? These stories are mundane pieces. These bones, fragments, pushed and pulled together, rubbing and breaking together, shards, what do they mean? Excavation, an incomplete picture. My installation at 528 will consist of the shelf, unburied from the property. While I build this, Iâm holding questions: What is in the landscape, what is my knowledge of it? What information do I hope to receive from it? Am I in the process of erasing, or reconstituting? I am working with Jen van de Pol on what has become an ongoing investigation of presence on land, navigated through the guest book. We responded to a guest book that we discovered in Sooke, Vancouver Island. 36 We also purchased a new, empty guest book and used this to explore the landscapeâthe book became a conduit for our encounters with land. A further project may be to work with the site of the old house. A site Iâm no longer host of, and, depending on whom you ask, an uninvited, unwelcome guest. Or maybe, Iâwe, are welcome. Maybe the site can be changedâCan we invite ourselves? How far can we extend this invitation? Peter, I think of your process of burying books as a way of publishing. The books we had in our family collection reflect land, but a particular narrative, the current of my family story, how it is told. Breaking it down, pulling fragmentsâthe land, language. Not an overlay. What the words say in the mix. How it is carried. A jumble. Brittle papers carried for so long, moving from place to place to place. Reading these pages over and over, pulling into currents, ways of understanding. In the fall of 2016, I witnessed a reading of an exhibition by Tania Willard and Heather Caverhill at Presentation House Gallery in Vancouver. The exhibition, Nanitch, was drawn from a collection of photographs from the Uno Langmann Collection, and featured early photographic representations of British Columbia. At the discussion following the launch of the exhibition, participants were each provided with a text drawn from primary sources that were connected to the photographs, as well as some tidbits from contemporary scholarship. As a group, we took turns reading 37 the texts aloud, when it felt appropriate. In the end, as a group, we had stitched together an interpretation of the exhibition and our understanding of it. I also want to enact a form of stichomancy with some of the aforementioned materials. I approached this through the texts, pulling these at random from the shelves and typing on the top of the envelopes. In one of the books I found an envelope tucked in, which marked the page I drew from. The envelope is stained along the creases where the glue holds it together, but otherwise blank. Thereâs something inside that I can see when I hold it to the light: a folded paper, but I canât determine what it is. Iâm thinking of Peter von Tiesenhausenâs fence, installed in intervals on his property in Northern Alberta. Every year, a new section is added, forming a line in line with his age. It is a telling of the story of his life through material, the ongoing effort; the material deteriorates â but in a generative sense. The stories Iâve inherited, drawn from. Getting out from under the narrative, in a performative way, breaking it down to allow a new story out, a new way of telling. Where these stories crack against myself, exist and drawn in, a biological process, absorbing, digesting, fragmentary remains, where the blood still flows from it. A past evaporated. The dry brittle paper connected to biological process, brought back into caring. 38 â¦ Young wood carved & painted, will, stand tall mid dark the branches weave now, locus abandoned as a burnt out house To represent, flaunt (taunt) the would-be EVENT, whistling in the deep wood âAs it is, they lean precariously, tottering in every windâ¦destined to crash down, one by one,â while sometimes, finally, trees grow up around them. Wave trains of thought that oscillate between naming and transition. (Marlatt, Liquid (i) City xii) â¦ All Best, Tomas 39 Dear Stephen, In May I contacted the developer, the son of a friend of the family, who originally purchased the site of 528. His original intention when purchasing the site was to build a seven-unit complex on the half-acre property. The completion of the sale was aligned with the collapse of the economy, and as a result the development stalled. He later sold it to a larger developer, who over the past four years has sat on the property, awaiting more favourable conditions before realizing a development. The site has in the meantime taken on a different production, as wildlife and flora have grown on it. Over a period of months I engaged in phone and email correspondence with the current owners of the site, explaining my interest in accessing the site to install a bookshelf. After some setbacks, I was surprisingly able to gain permission to install the bookshelf. Over the past two months, this bookshelf has rested on the site, gathering knowledge from the environment. I was also able to start experimenting with the typewriter and envelopes. There have been a few happy accidents that have helped move my process forward, thankfully slowly. I had originally planned to write out a larger section of text, approximately a paragraph, but after working on one piece, 40 a typo forced me to stop at a fragment, a more poetic solution. I started writing on the envelopes, using the front of the envelopes, to include fragments of text from the books in our collection. The choice to use the business envelopes came about through a happy accident while I was at my momâs house. We were having coffee, and she went to get the mail, and when she came back she gave me an envelope, saying that this is something that I should use for my art. The envelope was addressed to S. Jonsson / Current Resident, and was sent from Hometurf Lawn Care to our old address. The envelope was addressed to our old house and had markings from the redirection. It also came in a windowed âbusiness styleâ envelope, and all of these details really felt like a breakthrough. I had started writing on smaller envelopes that I had been given, and while I liked using these and how these came to me (a gift from a friend), the windows provided an unexpected solution to how I could simultaneously include, but not fully disclose the contents, the archival detritus. The window gives a glimpse in, but still obscures and protects the contents, and our history. This tension is key to what I want to accomplish in this work. A few other synchronicities also came into play for this from my two recent trips to Vancouver Island working with Jen Van de Pol, the first being my discovery of a Danish typewriter at a thrift shop in Sooke. I left this with Jen, as I wasnât able to fit it within my luggage. When I went back the second 41 time, Jen showed me and told me about an artwork she had made while at Goddard College. She had rolled this print in a tube and had included a small branch that all participants had received while in the program. When she finally unpacked it, a few months after returning, she realized that the branch was still green and that the water had seeped through the print. She liked the effect of this on her work, and still has it installed. I knew I had to include organic matter in my envelopes as well. The window to the envelope allows this pairing to be immediately apparent. I also hope that there is a similar effect on the archival matter, that there will be mingling between the materials. Another happy coincidence was how well the format of these larger envelopes fitted within the typewriter. As a result, I decided to have a single line of text along the top, which, when pulling quotes from the books in my momâs collection, gives me a parameter to work within. As I was working on the envelopes, it occurred to me that I could approach my thesis in a similar fashion. Using a laptop instead of a typewriter, I would pull sections from my readings in an intuitive stichomancy approach (borrowing from Peter Morin) and developing from these encounters, in what would eventually form my thesis. I recall the many evenings my mom, dad and I spent in the living room. Each of us sitting in near corners of the room. We would dip into books on 42 occasion, reading selections. The 1954 edition of Funk and Wagnallâs encyclopedia was a common selection that we would draw from. Some would lead to others, in non-sequential fashion. Sometimes a word or a subject would lead to a new course. Estonian artist Jaan Toomik, while in residency in France, would visit a hill at dusk to witness the sunset. He would bring a bottle of wine to drink while watching. Once he finished the bottle, he would take a photo of the sunset. These photos each ordained the empty bottles, which would sit on the shelf of the gallery, a residue of the private performance. In my exhibition at the FINA Gallery in 2016, I adopted a similar approach. I would sit at the table, alone at night, with a bottle of wine. I poured myself a glass, and also one for my mother (not present). I would then drink, and go through the contents of a box of archival materials, recounting these as if speaking to her. This audio, the empty glass, the empty bottle, and a full glass, sat in the gallery as audio of my conversation played from within the box. A corkboard on the wall featured an assortment of these materials. Considering the aesthetic conditions of the letters, I was faced with the choice of adopting a typewriter, a handwritten, or a contemporary form using a computer. You raised the question about the aesthetic of this work. I approached this with some hesitancy, as I wanted the decision to be based 43 on more than a surface aesthetic; for there to be a meaning to it, rather than a shadowy nostalgia effect, or affect. I could see this aesthetic decision as a nod to the material reality of a lot of the correspondence in the boxes. Initially my resistance was to remain true to the current reality and conditions that were employed in our house by my mother. The emails that she would studiously copy and file in white binders, each by their sender. These letters are important, as a way of working through the development of the project. The letters have become, at least to my mind, a methodological structure. I approached each as a performance, trying to write these in the moment, and so in their build-up, formulation follows, as a search, a roundabout exploration, that hopefully leads to an accumulation, in a sense an accumulation. In a way, they are preliminary, not the artwork itself, but the way of thinking of it. Rather than send these to the house, as proposed, I shifted towards sending the material that we sifted through. My hesitancy extended to the mailing of the letters. I held onto these for some time. Iâm not sure what the hesitation is exactly, but I feel I need to step right with this, and there is still so much I need to understand about my reasoning in taking this action before I commit to it. I need to make sure I am on the right path. 44 Is there is a reason in showing this in such detail, or is leaving out perhaps better? I don't want to tell the story. I want to put together, and then take out. The stories don't belong here. I want to keep them just below the surface, knowing that they are here, âa yelping pack of possibilitiesâ (Wah, False Laws of Narrative 74). Iâm inclined to maintain the structure of my Momâs collecting processâwhite binders, each page in plastic sleeves, on wooden shelves. I have a vision of the display, in a gallery, or another institutional setting; a space that can be explored intimately. Is the craft in the form of these letters? Iâm still finding my way through them, still a bit of a contrivance. As a form of research, I want to create a document that works like a letter, but also a space for something else. As Iâm writing this, Iâm oscillating between two potential readers: you as an imagined reader, like a diary, and you yourself. Who else will read this, and what will they read into it? What criticisms, interpretations, and connections can they draw from this? I have some ideas of where I want this to lead, points I want to emphasize. Iâm preoccupied with anticipation. I think that it is a limitation of language that leads to misunderstanding, 45 misconceptions of these relations. What else could speaking mean, what else could listening mean, that doesnât necessarily constitute a language, but still a form of communication, communion. When Iâm thinking about the house, the space we lived in, what is it that is imparted? Is it a vehicle for communication, is there a way it conveys meaning, through its use? Is there some transmission that communicates? What does that space convey in support of its survival? I know itâs an external, abstract space, and I resist the dangerous urge of personification, but still there is something in the familiarity of the space, one which we occupied for so long that the rub of its borders and ourselves blur. Not just the house, but the land that we shaped, that shaped us. Itâs still there, still familiar, and also still there as a feeling. These letters, and the collecting, is part of this process. As I write, I carry forward questions, of the installation and of the letters: How will this be made accessible? Who will read these? Or will they be concealed still in their envelopes? I carry and form a mental picture of the installationâbinders on shelvesâbut in terms of their enactment, is this going to be individually activated? A performance for a larger audience? Will it be ongoing? What will happen to the letters afterwards? Iâm inclined towards burying them, or burning (or both?), but there is still a tension. I would like to hold on to them somehow, and likely will keep an archive of the letters as an electronic document. I also hope to collect them in an 46 embodied sense, to have a memory of this interaction, writing this on the fly and trying not to compose in advance. When I start this, slowing down my writing, thinking more carefully about what Iâm about to say, I force myself to speed up, to stop self-editing. Iâm trying to think of this as a performative gesture, holding a space. I think the letters are partly this space, that through the process of the writing that comes through and circles around the project. Once it starts slowing down, I think about how to lead to an ending of the moment, when presence breaks down. Therefore, if one is thinking in place and truly engaging each situation, even those of oneâs own creation - as in writing or art making - there is a requirement that you not only enter into such spaces, move around in them, examine and try to make sense of their interiorities and exteriorities, but that also, miraculously, through a combination of thought and action, you find a way out, knowing that there can be no real resolution to the questions posed, only a process of framing and reframing, which inevitably moves the investigation forward. (Becker Thinking in Place 26) How much more should I say? How am I addressing this, revealing and not revealing in the letters? For Kuhn, family secrets form narratives of identity within this 47 kinship group that are based as much on what is openly told about the family as on what is omitted. Behind family ideals such as intimacy, support, and solidarity exist a number of other stories that are only told within the family, lied about, or not mentioned at all. (Borggreen and Gade, Performing Archives/archives of Performance 12). The letters are a cleared space, associated, but not spoken. An omission and an erasure. A past evaporated. â¦ All Best, Tomas 48 Works Cited Baudrillard, Jean. âThe System of Collecting.â The Cultures of Collecting, edited by Roger Cardinal. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994. Becker, Carol. Thinking in Place: Art, Action, and Cultural Production. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2016. Borggreen, Gunhild, and Rune Gade. Performing Archives/archives of Performance, University of Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2013. Caverhill, Heather, Tania Willard, and Helga Pakasaar. Nanitch: Early Photograms of British Columbia from the Langmann Collection. Vancouver, BC, 2016. Dana Claxton: Made To Be Ready. Simon Fraser Exhibition Audain Gallery. Vancouver BC, 2016. Collis, Stephen, and Jordan Scott. Decomp. Toronto, ON: Coach House Books, 2013. Dobozy, Tamas. Siege 13. Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed Editions, 2013. Dulai, Phinder. Thirst Days: Love, intimacy and (com)passion in a geopolitical context. VIVO Media Arts Centre. Vancouver, BC, 2016. Video installation. Frenkel, Vera. Once Near Water: Notes from the Scaffolding Archive. Toronto, ON, 2008. Video. 49 Giles, W. Mark. Seep. Vancouver, BC: Anvil Press, 2016. Hollis, Matthew. Ground water. Hexham, Northumberland: Bloodaxe Books, 2004. Malbeuf, Amy. apihkêw. Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art. Kelowna, BC, 2016. Installation. Marlatt, Daphne. Readings from the Labyrinth. Edmonton, AB: NeWest Press, 1998. Marlatt, Daphne. âLiquid (i) City: Vancouver Transitional.â Second Annual Malahat Review Spring Symposium, University of Victoria, BC, February 20-22, 2014. Lecture. Massey, Doreen. For Space. Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications, 2015. Mehra, Divya. Itâs Gonna Rain. The New Gallery. Calgary, AB, 2016. Pope, Rob. Creativity: Theory, History, Practice. London: Routledge, 2010. Saul, Joanne. Writing the Roaming Subject: The Biotext in Canadian Literature. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 2006. Spry, Tami. Body, Paper, Stage: Writing and Performing Autoethnography. London: Routledge, 2016. Wah, Fred. Faking It: Poetics and Hybridity; Critical Writing 1984 - 1999. Edmonton, AB: NeWest Press, 2003. Wah, Fred, and Louis Cabri. The False Laws of Narrative: The Poetry of Fred Wah. Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2009. Wilson, Shawn. Research Is Ceremony: Indigenous Research Methods. Black Point, NS: Fernwood Publishing, 2008. 50 Figure 1 Tattoo by Dion Kaszas HOME TURF: RE-EARTHING FAMILY NARRATIVE by Tomas Jonsson B.F.A., University of Calgary, 2000 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF FINE ARTS in The College of Graduate Studies (Interdisciplinary Studies) THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA (Okanagan) April 2018 © Tomas Jonsson, 2018 ii The following individuals certify that they have read, and recommend to the College of Graduate Studies for acceptance, a thesis/dissertation entitled: HOME TURF: RE-EARTHING FAMILY NARRATIVE Submitted by Tomas Jonsson in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Master of Fine Arts. Dr. Ashok Mathur, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisor Dr. Karis Shearer, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisory Committee Member Dr. Virginie Magnat, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Supervisory Committee Member Dr. Francis Langevin Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies University Examiner iii Abstract At the same time as my fatherâs deteriorating health, the culmination of a long process of development in the neighbourhood my family had lived in for 40 years occurred. Through periodic transfers between home and hospital, we witnessed the uprooting of trees, the construction of roadways and subdividing of properties, including our own. Our house was soon marked for sale and redevelopment, and our affects moved to a new location following his passing. These materials, an archive of ephemera, photos and letters that tell the story of our family from their journey from Denmark and eventual settling in Canada, now sit in cardboard boxes and Tupperware containers. Using these personal âaffectsâ, I am engaged in a long-term performative engagement, using them as a lens to interrogate larger conditions urban development, migration, colonial histories, logics in which our history is implicated. These are teased out of the contents of the material and texts in my familyâs collection. Familial objects, gathered from my motherâs archive are mailed to our former address. As this house no longer exists, the materials are redirected, wearing the imprinted marks of the journey. iv Lay Summary: Through my studies, I have developed an artwork that utilizes personal narratives as a lens to interrogate larger settler / colonial narratives, teased out of the contents of the material and texts in my family's collection. These items are enclosed in envelopes, and mailed to our former home. As this house no longer exists, the material will be returned to the house it is sent it from, now marked with the markings of the failed journey. v Table of Contents Abstractâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦iii Lay Summaryâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦iv Table of Contentsâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦v List of Figuresâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.vi List of Supplementary Materials.......................................................vii Acknowledgementsâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦viii Dedicationâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦ix 1 Introductionâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦1 2 Chapter: Dear Virginieâ¦â¦.â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦5 3 Chapter: Dear Ashokâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..11 4 Chapter: Dear Karisâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦18 5 Chapter: Dear Peterâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦24 6 Chapter: Dear Stephenâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦39 7 Works Citedâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..48 8 Figures.â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦..â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦50 vi List of Figures Figure 1 Tattoo by Dion Kazsasâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦.â¦â¦50 vii List of Supplementary Figures Figures 1-100 Home Turf envelope sculpturesâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦ Figures 101-122 Lettersâ¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦â¦... viii Acknowledgements There are countless people I would like to thank for their care, guidance and friendship. Many of whom are named in this text, and others, while not named, are nonetheless there. ix This work is dedicated to land I have had the opportunity to be on, and to move through. 1 What is left to forget? Language has swept us all away. (Hollis, Groundwater 64) Dear Reader, Home Turf is an iteration of an ongoing artwork concerned with the Jonsson family home, located at 528 30 Ave N.E., Calgary, Alberta, from 1972 to 2013. Over a period of 10 years, and at the same time as my father's deteriorating health, a corresponding process of development in the neighbourhood culminated in our eventual departure from this home. Through periodic transfers between home and hospital, we witnessed the uprooting of trees, the construction of roadways and the subdividing of properties, including our own. Our house was soon marked for sale and redevelopment, and our effects moved to a new location following my fatherâs passing. The packing and move was understandably quick, and we're still now making our way through the material. Using these personal effects (which are also 'affects'), Iâve been involved in a long-term performative engagement, using them as a lens to interrogate larger conditions of urban development, migration, colonial historiesâlogics in which our history is implicated. These materials, an archive of ephemera, photos and letters 2 that tell the story of our family from their journey from Denmark and eventual settling in Canada, now sit in cardboard boxes and Tupperware containers. I'm using this project, part of my MFA through the University of British Columbia Okanagan (UBCO) as a way to support this effort of organization. This is a dual purpose, for my family but also for me to understand and work through my history. I'm trying to connect this violent rupture to the history of my family's trajectory of migration from Denmark to Calgary, via Montreal, and various cities in Ontario. How do I make a place for this narrative within an artistic and an academic context? Where is it at odds? These are my concerns through this work. Home Turf uses personal narratives as a lens to interrogate the overlapping conditions and logics of land use, development, and migration, in which my personal history is implicated. For my methodology I am following the concept of biotext, as identified by Joanne Saul and practiced by poets such as Robert Kroetsch, Daphne Marlatt and Fred Wah. These writers use their particular subjective locations and histories as the locus for writing that intersects with, and counters, dominant narratives that inscribe the landscape. I am interested in the tension of performative acts and material; the residual, unspoken, and informal information that resonate from the material. In pursuing this activity through strategies of 3 artistic inquiry, I am following artists such as Peter Morin, Vera Frenkel and Victoria Stanton, whose use of performative strategies to engage with and intervene in economic, colonial, and bureaucratic structures outline and unravel these structuresâ oppressive tendencies. Home Turf continues an ongoing interest I have in transposing personal family narrative into locally based sites, where the incongruity highlights historic and economic overlays and conflicts in the landscape. It also implicates my position as a descendent of immigrants entangled within a settler colonial narrative. The project comprises one hundred mobile sculptures circulated through Canada Post, Various national Postal Systems, and by hand (fig. 1-100). As part of this project, I have gathered materials from my motherâs archives, collating them in individual envelopes, and also including in each envelope natural materials from the site, such as grass, twigs and stones. Going through the books in my motherâs collection, I would draw quotes from each, typed along the top of each envelope. The envelopes are sent to 528, but as this house no longer exists other than as a street address, the materials mailed to that ghostly domain are redirected. Complementing these mailed sculptures, over the course of the year I have been writing letters (fig 101-121), which have become a method to work 4 through the development of this piece. The letters featured below are a re-alignment of these letters, reproduced as the following five chapters that trace the journey that the project took. Thank you for taking the time to follow this work. All Best, Tomas 5 Dear Virginie, When living in Toronto, I would regularly visit a labyrinth located in High Park. I would walk along the circuitous route that lay before me, carrying a question, or a thought that needed resolution. As I moved back and forth towards the centre, I would reach near places I had been before, but only by approximation. I felt this journey take place in my body, and in the environment I was moving through. The thought moved through me as I moved. As part of the 2015 Summer Intensive at the University of British Columbia, Okanagan, Dion Kazsas conducted the first iteration of the Earth Line Tattoo School. As I listened to his speaking on the school, I realized a shift in my thinking, and recognized the spiral as another, more generative path. The next day, I received a hand poke tattoo from Dion, on my left forearm, of a spiral, the concentric rings expanding out in three cycles (fig. 122). As my project developed, my writing as a performative practice has been following Fred Wahâs concept of âgarden-path sentencesâ (Wah, False Laws of Narrative xv), continually drawing out and articulating ideas into a practice. I am using the convention of generating vernacular narrative within conversation. 6 Going through this process has been a personal excavation too. Slowly, Iâve attempted to draw in more of my embodied sense of the place; to build, by gradual degrees, a knowledge of the site, imparted in even smaller degrees within the text. Perhaps this comes through as a tacit understanding, an interface that can be accessed by others through their own experience. Where Iâm living, understanding this place, what writing can tell about a place. Iâve been drawn to the poetic practice of biotext. The âbioâ in biotext âblurring the boundaries between autobiography, biography, history, fiction, and theory, and mixing prose segments in with poetry, letters, essays, and photographsâ¦ a form of writing that considers the relation between self, nation and self-narrationâ (Saul, Writing the Roaming Subject 81â102). Using literary conventions, the authors working in this way situate themselves in a complex set of relations, forces and conditions, and write routes through these. My project is a performative biotext utilizing personal archives as source material. This rupture, the loss of 528, has become a significant context for me to explore the complex intersections of the personal, social and economic values that inform a place. Going through the archive, Iâve been collecting the cast-off detritus and including these in the envelopes. On the exterior of the envelopes I include fragments of texts drawn from books in my familyâs collection. These books 7 are an assortment made up of books brought over from Denmark and those they've collected since. These fragmentary texts provide a disjointed correspondence to the material contained sealed within. Iâve been thinking of the material Iâm moving through, the mass of materials from my motherâs archive, the books we have on the shelves, the stories they tell. I want to let them speak, on the land, and also to let them exist, disseminate there. This project is an attempt at remembering, a memorialization, but also an attempt at breaking down this memory. I want to understand the borders of this, the personal, butted against the larger, impersonal, abstract forms that shape it. I find a similar approach in Tami Spryâs workâwhat she refers to as autoethnography. For Spry, this inquiry, âconcentrat[es] on the body as the site from which the story is generated, thus beginning the methodological praxis of reintegrating my body and mind into my scholarshipâ (708). In the letters that Iâve written for this project, Iâve endeavoured to situate myself in relation to 528. I see this in a similar way to what Fred Wah identifies when he âasks readers to imagine a scenario where they are reading the poem as the poet is writing itâ (Wah, False Laws xiv). My presence is less as a character in the story and more as a performed engagement, a subject that is performative and in process within the text. 8 The Ledger, a long poem by Robert Kroetsch, can be understood as a literary spatial field, not needing to be read in a linear way. Kroetschâs work is similar to that of other writers working in biotext who âemploy a range of innovative textual strategies, not merely to write about their own lives, but also to work through the experience of displacement rather than seeking simply to reflect or represent itâ (Saul, 4). Ultimately what I am doing is text-based, a way of reading a place. I want to consider how words are used, applied to a place. I want to find out what can I do with these words, this mass of documents. Iâve been thinking of Shawn Wilsonâs writing, which you introduced us to in your class through his book Research is Ceremony. Wilsonâs writing also doesnât follow a linear process, as opposed to the convention in academic writing. In his writing, he moves back and forth between different forms of writing: academic and personal letters to his children. He recognizes and is drawn by a feeling that the story he wants to tell needs to fit within the paradigm he is exploring (14). Nadine Tafoya (qtd in Wilson): âStories go in circles. They donât go in straight lines. It helps if you listen in circles because there are stories inside and between stories, and finding your way through them is as easy and as hard as finding your way homeâ (14). 9 Using a similar circular thinking, I have been formulating the imagined space of the installation. This will be in a library space, amidst local history and archives, where selected elements of my motherâs space will be installed, in the same way her house has been populated by the residual elements of the former home, the organizational structures; white binders with clear plastic sleeves containing decades of correspondence, and records. Our encounters, sitting at the living room table (built by my father), sifting through boxes of archival material. Or sitting at the kitchen table (purchased from Ikea) over coffee, talking through family matters, or on the couch, over a glass of wine, where I am able to hear her memories. How these stories come out, through innocuous conversation, suddenly opening up into potent moments; how history resurfaces. Iâm interested in the space between the spheres of the personal and the academic. When choosing to pursue this program of study, I wanted to give myself space to consider this history, to understand currents of thought and practice that have addressed similar violence. I also feel affinity for Wilsonâs observation that writing to an anonymous, abstracted reader is not satisfactory. âIn an oral tradition,â Wilson notes, âthis problem is overcome by utilizing the direct relationship between storyteller and listener. Each recognizes the otherâs role in shaping both the content and processâ (8). 10 In Wilsonâs writing, he has organized his document structure as distinct sections, differentiated by typography. For myself, Iâve decided to follow this path all the way through. Iâve been writing these letters over the course of the year. Each of these was written in a moment, a short period of concentration. Now, Iâm pulling the content of these letters together, letting them mingle and breathe a bit more. Iâm also turning them toward you, and towards Karis, Peter, Ashok and Stephen. Addressing you all in turn. In your class, we engaged in a reading of Rob Popeâs writing on creativity. He outlined the limits of language as a defining, containing structure, however necessary it is. Pope draws attention to the fact âthat the spaces ... between, signaled through typographic convention (dot dot dot), are a space where we can insert ourselves, where I can insert myself, in the textâ (168-194). â¦ All Best, Tomas 11 Dear Ashok, When we moved my mom to her new house, I noticed how important it was to set up the artwork, the furniture, and I remarked to her that it looked more like the old house than the old house did. My mom brings this up often, and I can see she really feels this. As much as she, we, loved that house, so many conditions that together created this feeling had fallen away. What I think reinforced a feeling of longing was the speed at which changes took place, and the way that they did. These are common changes, but the tempo is key. Itâs these conditions, these speeds that I want to think about. Also now, the void, not a void, the full, living space that is the vacant lot. Iâm thinking about the artworks in the house, of the painting of the Greenlandic freighter arriving with supplies. The painting was from Farmor, a wedding gift to my mom and dad. A copy of Emanuel Petersenâs original, an artist whose work we also have in our collection. My mom mentioned that Georg and Helle (my Aunt and Uncle), and their children spent some time in Greenland, and that she hoped to visit, but that the journey would have been too long. They would have had to fly to Denmark first, then there. She also mentioned that someone from Dadâs family was there, in Greenland, and as a result of the war had to stay as it was unsafe to travel. Niels (another uncle) was there too, to make money, working at 12 the radio station. I remember hearing about this, but not the other stories. This painting has travelled with my family from Denmark to Canada. Iâve collected documentation of this, showing the painting in its different homes. I havenât been able to find one from 528. This is the kind of moment, movement that I want to keep tracking. In some respects, this feels like a direction, a material, that I donât actually want to address, at least not directly in my thesis; perhaps Iâm shedding this from my work by writing about it, finding a space that needs expression, but not necessarily critical exploration. Even writing this now, Iâm of both minds. Can I somehow choose both? In October 2016, at the Audain Gallery at SFU, I saw Dana Claxtonâs exhibition Made to be Ready. The exhibition title upends the âready-madeâ as a cultural artifact, instead looking at the spiritual and social lives of objects as a process of resistance against colonial structures. I think this is still a challenge to consider in relation to the concept of collecting and is something to consider in terms of the collector in questionâwhat are the conditions, impulses of this individual; how are they implicated in this process? Iâm thinking of the exhibition at Studio 111, of yours and Ayumiâs 13 belongings, the space that was created. When you had to suddenly leave your home, the subtle, but still violent push that necessitated movement. The way the space that was set up with your collective belongings opened as an opportunity to draw light to this. The transgression I made, the erasure of a life. A violence I became complicit in. Iâm interested in erasure poetryâ¦ the absence, the fragment, meaning, repackaged, redistributed. Carried back and forth. Somewhere in the boxes of our archives exists a photo, or maybe itâs a film, in which I, at age three, pour the contents of one cup to another, and back again. Over time, both vessels are empty (I have this on good authority), while the contentsâorange juiceâspill over the table where I was sitting. Some time later, I began a collection of bottle caps, drawn from my walk to and from school, over a period of about a month. I collected them in an ice cream bucket, and stopped once I had reached the top. I still have this collection, and thinking back on my motives, I canât say I had a rationale for collecting them, except I was interested in the variety and repetition. It was a game. The work Iâm doing feels like it is closely aligned to both these acts, the spill being the area I am interested in, the mass of bottle caps collected, but to what aim; what does this collection mean to me? I think it signifies the 14 impulse I had, and this is why I still keep it. I see a similarity in what Iâm doing with this work, recognizing the âbeguiling singularity and differentnessâ which Baudrillard identifies as a compelling motive for collectors (10). Beyond this, the works Iâve produced have become a body, a container of memory, a residue, and an articulation of a death, an attempt to keep the house alive in myself. âTo write in poetry is to move past the comfort of a ruled discourse; in order, to move on, beyond order, the complete thought spills over to an excess and residue of language in which my âmarkedâ body dissolves into unsure relationships. â remarkedâ (Wah, Faking it 17-20.) The connections Iâm making are not always perfect, but they function as influence. The writing Iâm doing will go around them. Iâm resisting connecting the dots, but also wanting to put some legibility together. Iâm interested in the trace the shelf will leave on the site of 528. Iâll also have to take a photo of the trace that is left by the shelf, the imprint on the ground. How it is covered, what this will look like over time. Iâm thinking about Amy Malbeufâs installation at Alternator. In the corner of the gallery, a turf of grass brought over by car from her parentâs home to 15 the gallery. I want to collect brambles, material from the site of 528, maybe by the borders of the property. This also makes me think of Haruko Okanoâs foraging on the campus of UBCO during the 2016 Summer Intensive in Kelowna. She enlisted participants to collect this all and place it around her body, leaving a trace in the landscape. In December 2016, I attended the Thirst Days event at VIVO Media Arts Centre in Vancouver, the theme being "as you live here" conveyed through a number of videos addressing future imaginations of the spaces we live in, and through which opening possibilities of compassion, empathy, inclusivity. In one video, Phinder Dulai explains his research into archives and public records as a strategy to undisguise colonial structures. He talks about the interconnectedness of the migrant experience, guest settlers (sometimes uninvited, and sometimes unwelcome), stories brought and grafted on a landscape of stories thousands of years old. As part of the Summer Intensive in Kelowna in 2016, I was witness to a performance by Charles Campbell. As we sat gathered in the white-walled gallery, Charles Campbell entered the space, his head obscured by a light blue and brown patterned geodesic assemblage. Removing this and placing it on a plinth, he obtained a phone, headphones and papers, and sat at a small table, an empty chair across from him. He engaged in a conversation with someone on the other end of the phone. We were only privy to his side 16 of the conversation as he spoke and listened in calm, but intent concentration. Over the course of this interview, the subject was gradually revealed: A retired police officer recounting an incident in a neighbourhood in Jamaica where he had shot and killed a person. Charles pulled out the story through a compassionate interrogation, attempting to divine the residual effects of this moment on the officer. âHow did you feel after that?â âWas anyone in your squad injured?â The call is a recording, an echo of an earlier encounter Charles had with the individual. A person he came to know through work that eventually developed into a friendship. The conversation takes place on complicated terrain; details of the incident are carefully teased out. There is no antagonism or pressing of guilt. The exchange ends without resolution. There is no remorse or redemption for the crimes that have been committed. Charles removes the headphones, places the mask on his head and walks away. I was able to sit close, to watch him, while he was listening to the audio of the interview he had conducted earlier. Watching his face closely, reading it for a response. This physicality, his presence, was so powerful. This performance moved me to shift more of my thinking towards a performative aesthetics. As the cultural geographer Doreen Massey has written, âif time unfolds as 17 change then space unfolds as interaction; space is thus âa product of relations-between, relations that are necessarily embedded material practicesâ (63). The letters are still important, and there should be a component of this in the space, the envisioned space at the realization of the project. But moments are needed. Performed acts, the letters are residue I suppose of these times, and that is partly it. So, considering me at this moment, preparing this text, being present through the act of writing, itâs not just about the words, itâs about holding on to the connection in this moment, and then when you receive the letter, or, as is more likely the case, when you donât. Holding on to the anticipation of response, which wonât be realized. â¦ All Best, Tomas 18 Dear Karis Before leaving for a residency on Toronto Island, I took a blank notebook with me from my motherâs house. On the plane, as I started to make notes on work I wanted to explore, I realize one of the pages is not blank. Three pages in, and for 10 pages, a detailed inventory of every purchase my mother and father made in March 1983 was itemized. This inventory became the score for my performance produced during the residency. I purchased each item, or found an approximation if needed. At the final day of the workshop, I had a performance where I read the listâin Danishâand distributed the objects to the assembled audience. The inventory was a way of sharing, but also concealing. âThe home as concept evokes a stereotypical image of private confinement, a container of secrets, as in the relations between the words for home and for secret in several European languages (German Heim and Heimlich, as well as Swedish hem and hemlig)â (Borggreen and Gade, Performing Archives/archives of Performance 413). When making decisions on what to keep, and what not to keep, from our familyâs collection, and how to negotiate this with other members of my family, Iâve been preoccupied with the conflicting desires to impart information, and to honour familial privacy. It helps to think of this as two 19 separate, but related processes, with different obligations and intents. I hope that they can still speak to each other, and that there is a way to draw from the personal, internalized work, even obliquely, in a way that can be understood, but not formally made visible. It is a difficult balance to maintain, the desire to want to impart information, and to be cognizant of the desires for privacy, but this is also the tension that I want to engage with. Intimacy requires this tension, and Iâm thinking of how spaces of art and writing afford and also counter this. Iâm cognizant of my relationship, and obligation to family story. How â[r]evealing a secret often involves disclosing another personâs secret, hereby betraying a confidentiality and denying this person the right to decide whether or not to reveal a personal secretâ (Borgreen and Gade, 407). I notice this when talking to my mom about this work, and her concerns about my airing of our particular stories, her resistance to this. I feel that I'm taking liberties, translating personal, private information, or insight, into an economic exchange. To avoid providing banal, safe details, rather than delving deeper and imparting meaningful truths and conditions. I want to know how to foster an emphatic connection without fully revealing or displaying in an overt way. How to approach obliquely? Not showing, not telling, but creating the suggestion, exploring the lines in between. 20 In her presentation at the 2016 Summer Intensive, Cathy Mattes referred to the kitchen table, and the conversations she would have there with her mother, as a methodological space. I similarly think about my mom's kitchen table in Calgary, where I situate much of my âstudio practiceâ and writing for this project. Iâve had many conversations with my mother over this table, as I unfolded the project with her. We had a discussion about the mailing aspect; she is still very uncomfortable about this, and would definitely prefer me not to, while I stubbornly held on, trying to argue my case. Iâm reasonably confident that I wonât be called out by the postal service, or greatly inconvenience the carrier with these occasional letters, but at the same time, I do want to acknowledge her position. She knows that I am collecting stories for my studies. Iâve told her that I want to go through the material gathered in the bins that Iâm now facing. When we sit, itâs at the end of a long day. Sheâs helped prepare my brother for his day program, getting him dressed, his lunch prepared, waiting for the bus to pick him up. After heâs gone sheâll have done the dishes, the laundry from the night before, perhaps a quick nap and then facing the administration of the day: doctor appointments, meetings with his caregivers, conversations with my siblings, grocery shopping if thereâs time. I usually come every other day, in the early evening, enough time to share time with them both. When my brother goes to sleep, we usually 21 have an hour or so, a glass or two of wine. We talk about going through the boxes, but by that time, she is too exhausted. We make plans for another day. Perhaps the next week. She wants to go through, to sort them, but also their weight is overbearing, and she sometimes (increasingly) wants to get rid of them. Sheâs suspicious of my motivesâ¦ or more accurately, is concerned with who will see this material. How will it be displayed? I assure her that I will be careful with it, that I wonât expose anything embarrassing about our family. We will go through them together; I will make sure that anything she wants kept private stays that way. Iâve explained the project several times. Some of the words are smooth from repeated delivery, but there is still a hesitation. I have an idea, a sense of the structure, and what I want to explore, but also heavy doubt. That Iâm reaching, bending this material towards a narrative. Iâm resisting this, but also setting towards a particular path. I want to tell the story of our old house, how we came to leave it: that we were evicted, taken advantage of in a time of crisis; that a larger economic crisis of the city followed like an echo. We are now in a house that, as I say, and sheâs agreed, is more like our old house than our old house. The former carved away when the neighbouring houses made way for roads, the wild hill behind our property paved. 22 When writing the letters, I purposefully left off my mother and fatherâs names, and this was a fatal flaw in some respects, but in the end, ideal; as painful as it is to not receive, to send something that wonât make it back. It is likely they will be destroyed. I had originally thought that I would destroy them, but by happy accident, the postal system intervened. As I understand it, the collection of letters now sits in an archive in Mississauga, and will eventually be destroyed. Like the bookshelf, they are absence, erased. Iâm thinking about how certain writers find home, or create it? Or dispel it. The narrative weave that overlays landscape. The colonial project is a narrative construction, and I am interested to know how to break from it, achieve an understanding, in a bodily, rooted way, where these words come from. One way, as Daphne Marlatt makes clear, is to understand language biologically, âless a line than a web, which we spin, sound volley along. by which we are held, told, spun into larger and larger reaches of meaningâ (53). The ways I can think of words, in a biological way. What does the story taste like? Gleaned moments from a reading in Vancouver. The meal that 23 followed. The taste of rice pudding on my tongue. â¦ All Best, Tomas 24 Dear Peter, One of the two poplars outside of my motherâs house recently died. It was a long decline, the tree had been in poor health, while the one just two feet away was thriving. Jessie pointed out that the tree needed as much dirt beneath it as the circumference of the branches above. Over time, we came to realize that the new coating of asphalt and the white stones placed along the fence had choked off the water from the roots of the tree. My dadâs punchline to a joke comes to mind as Iâm writing this; âit was the Ashâs fault.â I called 311 to report it and two weeks later the tree was removed. I feel I should hold on to the stump. Not in mourning, but still a pause, a reflection of our relationship to site. In 2015, I took part in a project called Wreck City in Calgary. It was organized by a group of artists, based around a house gallery called 809. Located in the cityâs Sunnyside neighbourhood, the houses along the block were all slated for demolition. Somehow, the gallery organizers were able to convince the developers, Batistella, to give them access to all the houses to hold a pre-demotion art event. Over one hundred artists were given access to the houses and were able to transform them into wild 25 installations. I was one of the artists selected, working with the fireplace in the backyard of 809. This was around the time of our move from 528, shortly after the death of my dad. Sometime earlier, workers from The City arrived on our property and started cutting down the large spruce trees in the backyard. My mom watched, shocked, as the 60-year-old trees fell. But she stayed inside. It turns out they had made a mistake and had cut down the wrong trees, meaning instead to cut the trees in the front yard. We kept the wood for fires and as stumps to sit around the pit. At the time of the move, I brought some of this to 809 for a controlled burn, between the hours of 5:28 - 8:09 PM, a space to have a conversation about the eventual loss of spaces that we care about. The overall event was a spectacle, and I have conflicting opinions about it, but am glad for the opportunity to have had this small space for a shared mourning process. Sometime after Wreck City, another project by the same organizers took place at the King Edward School. Here an historic sandstone schoolhouse was again given over to artists to engage with. The summer prior I had been part of a residency on Toronto Island, organized by Victoria Stanton, 26 called âBetween Intimacy and Architecture.â In this performance-based workshop, the six participants learned and developed techniques to engage with site. We formed a strong bond and became a collectiveâthe 6 of heartsânamed after a performance where we made a house of cards. We worked in one of the classrooms in the King Edward School, building collaborative and independent works over many hours. Day after day, I brought material from my dadâs school. His lesson plans and administrative forms. I ripped the pages and put them in my mouth, drinking water and moistening them until they turned into a pulp. I shaped these into letters on a chalkboard, like large spitballs. The phrase read: What I am, so will you be. What you are so once was I. Iâm thinking a lot about conversations Iâve had about 809 Gallery and Wreck City. I think it is true that the focus was less about the physical houses, the material aspects of the works, than it was about the social relationship of the space, the people that were part of it. Of course, itâs closely aligned to the physical architecture, but I think the emphasis on this was wrong, and echoed in subsequent iterations of this project at The King Edward School, and the Car Wash. These projects followed the wrong trajectory, and I think got caught up in some of the more unfortunate aspects of the Wreck City ethos, of engaging in a material and process-focused practice which simultaneously, if unintentionally masked the 27 processes and implications of gentrification. I wonder if it could have been redirected to looking at the dynamics of the relationships formed, the time and labour spent; less on the shell and more of the essence. If Iâm thinking in the same way here, is there something from this that Iâm not fully addressing in this work, for 528? Am I overemphasizing the space, in its physical reality, even in the mailing of the letters, the material of the archive, the furniture, the paintings? What about the underlying conditions of exhaustion, the reticence of my mother to look at the archive, to delve in? Maybe thereâs more to that that should be explored. Iâm also thinking about ghosts, in a way, as a kind of surplus, or latency. Something stirred up, a tension, an anxiety, a resistance. Iâm thinking of what Camille Turner said during her talk as part of the 2016 Summer Intensive in Kelowna: âstep into stories â¦ experience is felt ... lost in translation when putting into language â¦ words are inadequate.â These observations, fragments that I captured in my notes, have really turned me around on my thinking about this project, but, in another way, also keeping me on the path I want to go on. Iâve been struggling with envisioning the realization of this work, and in particular knowing that the realization in many respects needs to be set now, and then carried 28 forward. So, some tinkering and adjusting can take place, but within an established aesthetic framework. Iâve been struggling with this aesthetic, which is based on the organizational strategy of my mom, of her correspondence, which she files within white binders, in plastic sleeves. I had intended to have printouts, on regular printer paper, not as a denial of aesthetics, but in close emulation of her methodology. Iâve also been resistant to adopting an aesthetic simply for the sake of aestheticâhandwritten, typed, specific fonts, etc. I realize these decisions need to be made, but at the moment Iâm hesitant. Iâm hoping the answer will present itself. Stepping into stories; the importance of embodying stories. The way Camille does this, through her performative walks, and the histories explored on sites that are actively engaged in forgetting. Words are inadequate; the presence needs to be felt. It is also true that words are inadequate, sometimes, because there arenât words that can reach a particular feeling, or condition. Language leads the reader and writer (both actual and imagined) down a particular path, like this letter, intended for a particular person, but also something like a confessional, a diary. Iâve been back at the site of 528 again recently. After a long negotiation, I was finally granted permission from the current site owners to deposit the shelf on the site for a period of time. There were a lot of caveats, largely 29 concerning any visibility that might affect the aesthetics of the site; somewhat humorous, given how overgrown the site was. In the end I was able to convince them to let me leave the uninstalled wood on the site. Furtively, I brought the constructed shelf, which they allowed. I will be picking up the shelf again soon, which will bear the imprint of the site. It will contain the language of the space. Iâve been thinking of the work of Jordan Scott and Stephen Collis who buried copies of Charles Darwinâs The Origin of the Species throughout the interior of BC for a year. Following this, the books were exhumed, co-mingling with the environment (Scott and Collis, Decomp). Our house is now gone. Torn down to make way for an ambitious development that never materialized. Now it is an empty pit. Not emptyâitâs overgrown with plant life, surrounded by fencing. I didnât ever want to see it again, but one day while driving with my sister, she took us there. Ultimately, Iâm glad she did, giving us the opportunity to see the overgrowth, the trees still standing, the gazebo visible past where the house once stood. Iâve continued, sporadically, to go through the material effects of my motherâs archive. Going through, we have sifted and amassed a large pile of detritus material, and Iâm very interested in this material in particular, which holds no value to her, but still carries some resonance, a value in 30 outline. Sifting through, we organized material into three piles: items to keep; items I wanted to hold on to; and items to discard. The discard pile was largely bills, invoices and ephemera (church newsletters, articles, and some of my homework assignments, oddly enough). Some of these undesired items I would sneak into my pile, or more rarely, into the keep pile as an indication of its kind, or if there was a particular quality to itâfor example, if it was annotated. The discard pile was quite large, and I think this gave my mom a sense of satisfaction; that we werenât just sifting through and rearranging all the materials, only to return them to a box. We discussed what to do with the material. I suggested burning it, and she agreed. I didnât mention that I planned to keep the ashes, in envelopes, and possibly mail these back to the house. I am thinking of elements, such as fire, of water, and of earth. It falls in line with my ongoing series of works that employ familial narratives, using the ephemeral and physical materials as a way to break open new meanings, glean a different understanding. Representing the discursive performing body on the page requires an enfleshed methodology, and surely, an expansion of form in academic writing. Embodied writing must be able to reflect the corporeal and material presence of the body that generated the text in performance. Emancipating the body from its erasure in academic 31 scholarship would, necessarily, affect stylistic form. (Borggreen and Gade, Performing Archives/archives of Performance 726) Through my studies I was able to meet and learn from authors such as Mark Giles and Tamas Dobozy. Both of their writings have provided me with insight into my work, in consideration of how stories about family are told. I think of the characters in their two books: Mark Gilesâ Seep (2015) and Dobozyâs The Beautician (2009); how the protagonists carry the archive, how it manifests within the academic context. Dwight, the protagonist in Seep, returns to his hometown to research and tell his origin story as part of his masterâs thesis. Dwight is a âformer archivist in the corporate library of Integrated Horizons Corp (IHC)ââformerly International Hydrocarbons, formerly Industrial Heat and Coal, and originally Prairie Mountain Light and Power (Giles, 21). How to intervene in my own text? I want to avoid stepping into what Giles describes as a âshadowy nostalgiaâ¦The W.O. Mitchell narrative, the Kinsella narrativeâ (Giles, Seep 22). Iâm trying not to tell the story. What is here is not what I want to tell. Iâve resisted going into the history found in official spaces, forensically looking for some clues. What Iâm offering up 32 instead: some small stories; veiled allusion; and crafted subtext. In The Beautician, the protagonist engages in a long negotiation with Hollo (the beautician) over the secret content of his archive, amassed during his time as a censor in Communist Hungary. The protagonist wishes to incorporate Holloâs archive into his studies, but does not recognize the implications of doing this. In the end Hollo relents, and provides him with the archivesâbut only after they have been burnedâin the form of ashes. âOf course, you tell yourself things,â he continued, âstories to redeem your betrayals.â At night, after work, early in the morning, heâd think of the writers whoâd written these books, the hours theyâd spent, the excitement and inspiration, and it felt to him like the only fitting tribute to her, the only thing those books could now realize, as if the beauty that was their aim was Adriana herself, for if they were going to be destroyed, and they were whether Hollo did it or someone else, then at least they should go to that, the very thing theyâd tried to accomplish and which their destruction would testify to â a love outside the ideology hemming them in, as if one secret could hide inside another, buried deep, the loss of those books covering up something else the regime had missed. (Dobozy, 111) I tell my mother I want to send letters to the old house, filled with the ephemera from her archive that is within each Tupperware container. 33 These letters will come back, returned to sender. Sheâs concerned that this will be an irritation to the post office, or worseâ¦ will we get in trouble? Iâm hesitant with her discomfort, and guiltily aware that Iâve already begun the process, which she soon finds out. I transcribed a text from one of our conversations, where she walked me though her collection. I sent one hundred copies of this transcript, with addressed envelopes to a conference in Montreal. I asked participants, through instructions (I wasnât able to attend in person) to comment and post these in return to the old house. In the end I received three. I didnât read them, although Iâm deeply curious to see what they say. However, there is an uncomfortable feeling that holds me back. A feeling that Iâve somehow betrayed a trust, that Iâve started down a path that will only inflict more and more discomfort on my mother. Iâm reminded of the protagonist in, The Beautician, his interrogation of Holloâs archive and of his past: the parallel of his dragging this archive through the filter of the university and the Hungarian social community. While I donât anticipate such an explosive revelation through my familyâs history, I sense a similar resistance to bringing the collection into the process of review. I question my motives. I wonder if, as in Dobozyâs story, burning these envelopes is the better decision. Iâm also thinking about Vera Frenkelâs video work, Once Near Water: Notes 34 from the Scaffolding Archive (2007). In this work, an unnamed protagonist inherits a collection of photos of scaffolding. On the instruction of the archivist who compiled this collection, she eventually destroys it. The fictional archivist of scaffolding, through her correspondence with the narrator, states: âDo what you want with this: Grieve, Reminisce, Advocate, Act.â My father was infatuated with water. The books in our collection (some that I gave him) reflected this interest in poetic and scientific forms. Water changes from liquid to steam. Water flows. I once bought my father a book on water, but like many of my interventions into that bookshelf, I don't think he even opened it. I canât say I blame him. I pulled it off the shelf recently and discovered that it doesn't have the water in itânone of the flow that delighted him in stories, or turns of phrase. He was quiet, but full of joy. You had to be able to recognize it, and wait for it. I keep going back, keep drawing from, keep drawing in. Peter, Iâm thinking of you washing books. âI like the water in itâ (Wah, Faking it 74). Iâm thinking of the water that my parents and siblings crossed to reach 35 here. The bridge my grandfather built. Iâm thinking of the many, many times that artist-run centres in Calgary have had to rescue their archives from flood damage. Divya Mehraâs exhibition at The New Gallery in 2016 was called Itâs gonna rain. It changed in concept following the sudden death of the artistâs father. After his death, the piece shifted to be a memorial to him, an architectural space to be destroyed through a gradual but unrelenting flow of water. I want to somehow acknowledge what is happening to 528. After the house is gone, how it can speak to, break open the space. Is it possible to take control away from the narration? These stories are mundane pieces. These bones, fragments, pushed and pulled together, rubbing and breaking together, shards, what do they mean? Excavation, an incomplete picture. My installation at 528 will consist of the shelf, unburied from the property. While I build this, Iâm holding questions: What is in the landscape, what is my knowledge of it? What information do I hope to receive from it? Am I in the process of erasing, or reconstituting? I am working with Jen van de Pol on what has become an ongoing investigation of presence on land, navigated through the guest book. We responded to a guest book that we discovered in Sooke, Vancouver Island. 36 We also purchased a new, empty guest book and used this to explore the landscapeâthe book became a conduit for our encounters with land. A further project may be to work with the site of the old house. A site Iâm no longer host of, and, depending on whom you ask, an uninvited, unwelcome guest. Or maybe, Iâwe, are welcome. Maybe the site can be changedâCan we invite ourselves? How far can we extend this invitation? Peter, I think of your process of burying books as a way of publishing. The books we had in our family collection reflect land, but a particular narrative, the current of my family story, how it is told. Breaking it down, pulling fragmentsâthe land, language. Not an overlay. What the words say in the mix. How it is carried. A jumble. Brittle papers carried for so long, moving from place to place to place. Reading these pages over and over, pulling into currents, ways of understanding. In the fall of 2016, I witnessed a reading of an exhibition by Tania Willard and Heather Caverhill at Presentation House Gallery in Vancouver. The exhibition, Nanitch, was drawn from a collection of photographs from the Uno Langmann Collection, and featured early photographic representations of British Columbia. At the discussion following the launch of the exhibition, participants were each provided with a text drawn from primary sources that were connected to the photographs, as well as some tidbits from contemporary scholarship. As a group, we took turns reading 37 the texts aloud, when it felt appropriate. In the end, as a group, we had stitched together an interpretation of the exhibition and our understanding of it. I also want to enact a form of stichomancy with some of the aforementioned materials. I approached this through the texts, pulling these at random from the shelves and typing on the top of the envelopes. In one of the books I found an envelope tucked in, which marked the page I drew from. The envelope is stained along the creases where the glue holds it together, but otherwise blank. Thereâs something inside that I can see when I hold it to the light: a folded paper, but I canât determine what it is. Iâm thinking of Peter von Tiesenhausenâs fence, installed in intervals on his property in Northern Alberta. Every year, a new section is added, forming a line in line with his age. It is a telling of the story of his life through material, the ongoing effort; the material deteriorates â but in a generative sense. The stories Iâve inherited, drawn from. Getting out from under the narrative, in a performative way, breaking it down to allow a new story out, a new way of telling. Where these stories crack against myself, exist and drawn in, a biological process, absorbing, digesting, fragmentary remains, where the blood still flows from it. A past evaporated. The dry brittle paper connected to biological process, brought back into caring. 38 â¦ Young wood carved & painted, will, stand tall mid dark the branches weave now, locus abandoned as a burnt out house To represent, flaunt (taunt) the would-be EVENT, whistling in the deep wood âAs it is, they lean precariously, tottering in every windâ¦destined to crash down, one by one,â while sometimes, finally, trees grow up around them. Wave trains of thought that oscillate between naming and transition. (Marlatt, Liquid (i) City xii) â¦ All Best, Tomas 39 Dear Stephen, In May I contacted the developer, the son of a friend of the family, who originally purchased the site of 528. His original intention when purchasing the site was to build a seven-unit complex on the half-acre property. The completion of the sale was aligned with the collapse of the economy, and as a result the development stalled. He later sold it to a larger developer, who over the past four years has sat on the property, awaiting more favourable conditions before realizing a development. The site has in the meantime taken on a different production, as wildlife and flora have grown on it. Over a period of months I engaged in phone and email correspondence with the current owners of the site, explaining my interest in accessing the site to install a bookshelf. After some setbacks, I was surprisingly able to gain permission to install the bookshelf. Over the past two months, this bookshelf has rested on the site, gathering knowledge from the environment. I was also able to start experimenting with the typewriter and envelopes. There have been a few happy accidents that have helped move my process forward, thankfully slowly. I had originally planned to write out a larger section of text, approximately a paragraph, but after working on one piece, 40 a typo forced me to stop at a fragment, a more poetic solution. I started writing on the envelopes, using the front of the envelopes, to include fragments of text from the books in our collection. The choice to use the business envelopes came about through a happy accident while I was at my momâs house. We were having coffee, and she went to get the mail, and when she came back she gave me an envelope, saying that this is something that I should use for my art. The envelope was addressed to S. Jonsson / Current Resident, and was sent from Hometurf Lawn Care to our old address. The envelope was addressed to our old house and had markings from the redirection. It also came in a windowed âbusiness styleâ envelope, and all of these details really felt like a breakthrough. I had started writing on smaller envelopes that I had been given, and while I liked using these and how these came to me (a gift from a friend), the windows provided an unexpected solution to how I could simultaneously include, but not fully disclose the contents, the archival detritus. The window gives a glimpse in, but still obscures and protects the contents, and our history. This tension is key to what I want to accomplish in this work. A few other synchronicities also came into play for this from my two recent trips to Vancouver Island working with Jen Van de Pol, the first being my discovery of a Danish typewriter at a thrift shop in Sooke. I left this with Jen, as I wasnât able to fit it within my luggage. When I went back the second 41 time, Jen showed me and told me about an artwork she had made while at Goddard College. She had rolled this print in a tube and had included a small branch that all participants had received while in the program. When she finally unpacked it, a few months after returning, she realized that the branch was still green and that the water had seeped through the print. She liked the effect of this on her work, and still has it installed. I knew I had to include organic matter in my envelopes as well. The window to the envelope allows this pairing to be immediately apparent. I also hope that there is a similar effect on the archival matter, that there will be mingling between the materials. Another happy coincidence was how well the format of these larger envelopes fitted within the typewriter. As a result, I decided to have a single line of text along the top, which, when pulling quotes from the books in my momâs collection, gives me a parameter to work within. As I was working on the envelopes, it occurred to me that I could approach my thesis in a similar fashion. Using a laptop instead of a typewriter, I would pull sections from my readings in an intuitive stichomancy approach (borrowing from Peter Morin) and developing from these encounters, in what would eventually form my thesis. I recall the many evenings my mom, dad and I spent in the living room. Each of us sitting in near corners of the room. We would dip into books on 42 occasion, reading selections. The 1954 edition of Funk and Wagnallâs encyclopedia was a common selection that we would draw from. Some would lead to others, in non-sequential fashion. Sometimes a word or a subject would lead to a new course. Estonian artist Jaan Toomik, while in residency in France, would visit a hill at dusk to witness the sunset. He would bring a bottle of wine to drink while watching. Once he finished the bottle, he would take a photo of the sunset. These photos each ordained the empty bottles, which would sit on the shelf of the gallery, a residue of the private performance. In my exhibition at the FINA Gallery in 2016, I adopted a similar approach. I would sit at the table, alone at night, with a bottle of wine. I poured myself a glass, and also one for my mother (not present). I would then drink, and go through the contents of a box of archival materials, recounting these as if speaking to her. This audio, the empty glass, the empty bottle, and a full glass, sat in the gallery as audio of my conversation played from within the box. A corkboard on the wall featured an assortment of these materials. Considering the aesthetic conditions of the letters, I was faced with the choice of adopting a typewriter, a handwritten, or a contemporary form using a computer. You raised the question about the aesthetic of this work. I approached this with some hesitancy, as I wanted the decision to be based 43 on more than a surface aesthetic; for there to be a meaning to it, rather than a shadowy nostalgia effect, or affect. I could see this aesthetic decision as a nod to the material reality of a lot of the correspondence in the boxes. Initially my resistance was to remain true to the current reality and conditions that were employed in our house by my mother. The emails that she would studiously copy and file in white binders, each by their sender. These letters are important, as a way of working through the development of the project. The letters have become, at least to my mind, a methodological structure. I approached each as a performance, trying to write these in the moment, and so in their build-up, formulation follows, as a search, a roundabout exploration, that hopefully leads to an accumulation, in a sense an accumulation. In a way, they are preliminary, not the artwork itself, but the way of thinking of it. Rather than send these to the house, as proposed, I shifted towards sending the material that we sifted through. My hesitancy extended to the mailing of the letters. I held onto these for some time. Iâm not sure what the hesitation is exactly, but I feel I need to step right with this, and there is still so much I need to understand about my reasoning in taking this action before I commit to it. I need to make sure I am on the right path. 44 Is there is a reason in showing this in such detail, or is leaving out perhaps better? I don't want to tell the story. I want to put together, and then take out. The stories don't belong here. I want to keep them just below the surface, knowing that they are here, âa yelping pack of possibilitiesâ (Wah, False Laws of Narrative 74). Iâm inclined to maintain the structure of my Momâs collecting processâwhite binders, each page in plastic sleeves, on wooden shelves. I have a vision of the display, in a gallery, or another institutional setting; a space that can be explored intimately. Is the craft in the form of these letters? Iâm still finding my way through them, still a bit of a contrivance. As a form of research, I want to create a document that works like a letter, but also a space for something else. As Iâm writing this, Iâm oscillating between two potential readers: you as an imagined reader, like a diary, and you yourself. Who else will read this, and what will they read into it? What criticisms, interpretations, and connections can they draw from this? I have some ideas of where I want this to lead, points I want to emphasize. Iâm preoccupied with anticipation. I think that it is a limitation of language that leads to misunderstanding, 45 misconceptions of these relations. What else could speaking mean, what else could listening mean, that doesnât necessarily constitute a language, but still a form of communication, communion. When Iâm thinking about the house, the space we lived in, what is it that is imparted? Is it a vehicle for communication, is there a way it conveys meaning, through its use? Is there some transmission that communicates? What does that space convey in support of its survival? I know itâs an external, abstract space, and I resist the dangerous urge of personification, but still there is something in the familiarity of the space, one which we occupied for so long that the rub of its borders and ourselves blur. Not just the house, but the land that we shaped, that shaped us. Itâs still there, still familiar, and also still there as a feeling. These letters, and the collecting, is part of this process. As I write, I carry forward questions, of the installation and of the letters: How will this be made accessible? Who will read these? Or will they be concealed still in their envelopes? I carry and form a mental picture of the installationâbinders on shelvesâbut in terms of their enactment, is this going to be individually activated? A performance for a larger audience? Will it be ongoing? What will happen to the letters afterwards? Iâm inclined towards burying them, or burning (or both?), but there is still a tension. I would like to hold on to them somehow, and likely will keep an archive of the letters as an electronic document. I also hope to collect them in an 46 embodied sense, to have a memory of this interaction, writing this on the fly and trying not to compose in advance. When I start this, slowing down my writing, thinking more carefully about what Iâm about to say, I force myself to speed up, to stop self-editing. Iâm trying to think of this as a performative gesture, holding a space. I think the letters are partly this space, that through the process of the writing that comes through and circles around the project. Once it starts slowing down, I think about how to lead to an ending of the moment, when presence breaks down. Therefore, if one is thinking in place and truly engaging each situation, even those of oneâs own creation - as in writing or art making - there is a requirement that you not only enter into such spaces, move around in them, examine and try to make sense of their interiorities and exteriorities, but that also, miraculously, through a combination of thought and action, you find a way out, knowing that there can be no real resolution to the questions posed, only a process of framing and reframing, which inevitably moves the investigation forward. (Becker Thinking in Place 26) How much more should I say? How am I addressing this, revealing and not revealing in the letters? For Kuhn, family secrets form narratives of identity within this 47 kinship group that are based as much on what is openly told about the family as on what is omitted. Behind family ideals such as intimacy, support, and solidarity exist a number of other stories that are only told within the family, lied about, or not mentioned at all. (Borggreen and Gade, Performing Archives/archives of Performance 12). The letters are a cleared space, associated, but not spoken. An omission and an erasure. A past evaporated. â¦ All Best, Tomas 48 Works Cited Baudrillard, Jean. âThe System of Collecting.â The Cultures of Collecting, edited by Roger Cardinal. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994. Becker, Carol. Thinking in Place: Art, Action, and Cultural Production. Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2016. Borggreen, Gunhild, and Rune Gade. Performing Archives/archives of Performance, University of Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 2013. Caverhill, Heather, Tania Willard, and Helga Pakasaar. Nanitch: Early Photograms of British Columbia from the Langmann Collection. Vancouver, BC, 2016. Dana Claxton: Made To Be Ready. Simon Fraser Exhibition Audain Gallery. Vancouver BC, 2016. Collis, Stephen, and Jordan Scott. Decomp. Toronto, ON: Coach House Books, 2013. Dobozy, Tamas. Siege 13. Minneapolis, MN: Milkweed Editions, 2013. Dulai, Phinder. Thirst Days: Love, intimacy and (com)passion in a geopolitical context. VIVO Media Arts Centre. Vancouver, BC, 2016. Video installation. Frenkel, Vera. Once Near Water: Notes from the Scaffolding Archive. Toronto, ON, 2008. Video. 49 Giles, W. Mark. Seep. Vancouver, BC: Anvil Press, 2016. Hollis, Matthew. Ground water. Hexham, Northumberland: Bloodaxe Books, 2004. Malbeuf, Amy. apihkêw. Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art. Kelowna, BC, 2016. Installation. Marlatt, Daphne. Readings from the Labyrinth. Edmonton, AB: NeWest Press, 1998. Marlatt, Daphne. âLiquid (i) City: Vancouver Transitional.â Second Annual Malahat Review Spring Symposium, University of Victoria, BC, February 20-22, 2014. Lecture. Massey, Doreen. For Space. Los Angeles, CA: Sage Publications, 2015. Mehra, Divya. Itâs Gonna Rain. The New Gallery. Calgary, AB, 2016. Pope, Rob. Creativity: Theory, History, Practice. London: Routledge, 2010. Saul, Joanne. Writing the Roaming Subject: The Biotext in Canadian Literature. Toronto, ON: University of Toronto Press, 2006. Spry, Tami. Body, Paper, Stage: Writing and Performing Autoethnography. London: Routledge, 2016. Wah, Fred. Faking It: Poetics and Hybridity; Critical Writing 1984 - 1999. Edmonton, AB: NeWest Press, 2003. Wah, Fred, and Louis Cabri. The False Laws of Narrative: The Poetry of Fred Wah. Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2009. Wilson, Shawn. Research Is Ceremony: Indigenous Research Methods. Black Point, NS: Fernwood Publishing, 2008. 50 Figure 1 Tattoo by Dion Kaszas July 15, 2016 Dear Ashok, Iâm back in my room that I keep at my motherâs house. Itâs late and Iâve just finished some work after visiting with mom following our drive from Kelowna to Calgary. The trip was a sudden possibility that I jumped on, and I donât know that I was entirely prepared for the emotional resonance it would take. I felt myself stretched between the context of the residency and my life here. The landscape gradually giving way over to the more familiar, the change in the colour of the water was a surprising marker. Normally I notice the foliage, changing slowly, while the mountains seem more rapid in their transition. Iâm trying to hold both spaces, at the moment it still feels possible, but I worry that once I begin the day tomorrow that it will become harder. I worry what it will be like to return, will this become a disruption? I also have a feeling of comfort, of security that this was a good decision. My conversation with my mom reinforces this. Tomorrow I plan on visiting the site of the old house. I hoped to have pictures taken then, but the forecast of thunder showers is putting this into question. My mom visited the site recently, and perhaps she, or my brother, took some, maybe these will do? They didnât cross the fence into the actual lot, which I intend to, again, however. Iâd like to spend some time on the site, maybe under the still functional gazeboâ¦ this could be a good vantage point for the images. I hope all is going well with your own move. Iâm excited to see what works youâll put on display through the âeviction exhibitionâ. Itâs late, so Iâll end here. All Best, Tomas July 15, 2016 Hi David, Greetings from Calgary! Thereâs a torrential downpour outside right now, Iâm sitting in the Subway restaurant next to the Co-op in Beddington. I walked up from my momâs place this afternoon to buy three cups. My plan was to take them to the former house at 528 30th Ave N.E. where had made arrangements to document the site. There was going to be three of us, and I had envisioned some sort of performed engagement with the cups before returning them. As it stands, plan B has become waiting out the storm. I thought Iâd return the cups afterwards, but just now thinking, that is too soon. Does more time need to pass? Or, maybe itâs enough to consider this letter as the space between. Iâm sending this letter to you by way of the old house, with receipt as evidence of our contract honoured. Best Wishes, Tomas July 15, 2016 Dear David, It was a pleasure to talk to you earlier in the week, although also wrapped in regret. I wasnât at my best, and felt I could have been more coherent in my inquiry. As it was, I felt it was a disappointing exchange, and I hope that I can be more engaging next time we can sit down and chat. I was glad to see your work, and hear more about your approach to these pieces. Iâm looking forward to reading the text annotations youâll be developing for them. I would like to spend some time with the texts you are referencing, hidden in the works themselves. My thinking around these concepts is still muddled, unformulated, weak. I admire the clarity and discipline you approach your work with. I imagine your critique of even this letter. I need to be on my toes, conscious of my approach. Recognizing that for me this is all still provisional, but that as a result it matters more to have a solid foundation. I want to think more about your ideas around land, the incredulity of land speaking. What shift would be needed to conceptualize this in a different way? I think that it is a limitation of language that leads to misunderstanding, misconceptions of these relations. What else could speaking mean, what else could listening mean, that doesnât necessarily constitute a language, but still a form of communication, communion. When Iâm thinking about the house, the space we lived in, what is it that is imparted? Is it a vehicle for communication, is there a way it conveys meaning, through its use? Is there some transmission that communicates? What does that space convey in support of its survival? I know itâs an external, abstract space, and I resist the dangerous urge of personification, but still there is something in the familiarity of the space, one which we occupied for so long that rub of its borders and ourselves blur. Not just the house, but the land that we shaped, that shaped us. Itâs still there, still familiar, and also still there as a feeling. Ok, now Iâm getting sentimental, and a little lostâ¦ this is more of a wander than a structured argument. Until next time, Tomas July 17, 2016 Dear Mom, It was so nice to sit with you and talk this evening! Itâs late evening on Sunday, and just about to go to sleep before the early flight back to Kelowna tomorrow. Iâm not quite tired yet, but am sure it will come soon, and certainly by the morning. Before I go to sleep I want to try to recollect a bit from what we talked about, about the paintings, and I hope that maybe you can let me know if I got this information right. The painting was from Farmor, her family, a copy of Emanual Petersenâs original (I forget now who made the original). They gave this to you as a wedding gift, and that later you received an original painting by Petersen, a painting of a polar bear in a snow storm (like the joke). You mentioned that Georg and Helle, and their children spent some time in Greenland while you were here, and that you hoped to visit, but that the journey would have been too long. You would have had to fly to Denmark first then thereâ¦. You also mentioned that someone from Dadâs family was there, in Greenland, and as a result of the war had to stay there as it was unsafe to travel. Niels was there too, to make money, working at the radio station. I remember hearing about this, but not the other stories. Did I get this right? Write to me and let me know. All Best, Tomas July 17, 2016 Dear Rita, Greetings from 1408! I came back to Calgary this weekend, a bit of an impromptu trip on account of some artists who were headed this way. I was torn to pull away from Kelowna for this time, and felt this stretch along the road, but ultimately glad to have come back. It meant a lot to see my mom and Kare, and to have time to be in their space together. I came home last night and spent the morning and afternoon being in the house. The weather helps, of course, itâs been raining consistently, sunny days after the Stampede, and after my departure, it seems. There hasnât been much mail, but there was one from the city, regarding the trees in the backyard, which Iâve included. Theyâre growing into the powerlines, so need to be trimmed, but doesnât look like they need to be cut down, I hope that this isnât the case at least! Let me know if you hear anything more about this, otherwise, I guess weâll see when we both get back. In light of the above, I went out to the trees, standing under, shielded from the rain. About the length of time of a cigarette (Iâm fresh out, at the moment). Water is pooling along the door to the shed, but I think still secure. No such luck at my momâsâ¦ the basement carpet is damp, again, so looking into preventative measures retroactively. Hope you are staying warm and dry on the East Coast! All Best, Tomas July 24, 2016 Dear Ashok, I hope this finds you well. Itâs late tonight, I just came back from a movie, a welcome strangeness, breaking from the intensity of the day to day of late. Even if relaxing, there is a charge to the time, so restful activities, going to the beach, having coffee, etc, still have a resonance of the time we are within. Iâm not complaining, but sometimes it is good to step outside, in order to step back in, with a sense of perspective. Iâve had some physical manifestations of this, the usual tiredness, and also headaches, so sometimes need to lay low, or more carefully navigate the social times, pacing, giving room to self-care. The bike ride back from the movie was really special, the time of night, a relatively quiet stretch of road, seeing the silhouette of the mountainsâ¦ also doing something familiar in a still unfamiliar environment helps ground me a bit more. Kevin talked about that last nightâ¦ his experience in New York, once getting into the rhythm of day to day life opens up a really potent space. Iâm thinking about the project space you are setting up at Studio 111, and thinking about the move you are coordinating in the midst of all else that is going on, and Iâm really impressed that you are able to hold all this together. I know you have a great support, and also a critical engagement, even in something so personal. Itâs something I want to learn from, and hopefully embody. Iâm thinking about what this means, for the way that you are framing the work. Iâm also trying to clarify my thinking around the subject. Of what it means to move artwork, what it means to have work in different spaces. I think about that story I mentioned, of how when we moved my mother to her new house, and how important it was to set up the artwork, the furniture, and how I remarked that it looked more like the old house than the old house did. My mom brings this up often, and I can see she really feels this. As much as she, we, loved that house, so many conditions that together created this feeling had fallen away. What I think reinforced a feeling of longing was the speed at which changes took place, and the way that they did. These are common changes, but the tempo is key. Itâs these conditions, these speeds that I want to think aboutâ¦ also now, the void, not a void, the full space that is the vacant lot, what does this kind of space mean? Iâm also thinking about the images, of the painting by Emanual Petersen, whose painting of the Greenlandic freighter arriving, painted by another (I donât have the name). and the portrait of Knud Rasmussen. Before I left, having been able to document this, with my mom, and with the images in my Farmorâs collection, showing the painting in itâs different homes. I wish I had one from 528, and maybe I do, in its absence, will it make sense to show these together? I think having the gap will make sense, more so than the third space of it, that would be too easy of a structure. I like that this idea formed here, this is the kind of moment, movement, that I want to keep tracking. All Best, Tomas July 27, 2016 Dear Clive, Itâs late here, Iâm lying in bed unable to sleep. The weather in Kelowna has started to heat up, and it carries through to the evening for a long time. I finally cracked the window, but there is a lot of ambient sound from the alley way as well. Not to mention plenty of ambient thinking, which is the real reason Iâm up. I am going to Vancouver tomorrow, but had considered revising my plans, taking into account the Kamloopa pow wow tomorrow, and the opportunity to visit Bush Galleryâ¦ Iâm arranging a screening up there, and the intuitive response would have been to just run with it, but then I did have a hotel booked, and plans to see events in Vanâ¦ now it is past the hour of making changes to reservations without penalty. I often arrive at these junctures, it seems. Iâm going to continue sleeping on this, I have other things I want to write to you about, Iâm thinking about your archives, about Paul, and to clarify thinking about this. Iâm not sure how best to step, I want to give full presence of thought to this, perhaps Vancouver can be this timeâ¦ Iâm going to make an effort to do this. More soon, Tomas July 27, 2016 Dear Peter, Iâm sitting in the Kelowna airport, waiting on a flight to Vancouver. This is an unintentional but rather common misadventure, I didnât book my bus ticket in time, or account for the long weekend, and so had to hastily switch plans. Iâm thinking about what you mentioned yesterday, at the panel discussion, about being on the land and our mediation, through vehicles, by driving, flying, how this affects this relationship. Iâm thinking through this, how much does this interfere, or inflect the relationship. Itâs cliché now to think of non-spaces, abstracted, but they are still here, places, ground under the concrete. Are there ways to hear the land from within these spaces? In the course of writing this, Iâm going through the various checkpoints and interruptions, boardings. Itâs my least favourite part of flying, the compartmentalized moments that interrupt presence: security, check in, safety demonstrations, all cynically followed through, no one pays attention. Iâm trying to hold on to ideas of places, of thinking of the dirt that youâve sent, and is now waiting for me at home, of the performance that you did for this, the burial work that you will do soon at Bush Gallery. Burial is on my mind a lot these days. My brother has finalized the writing for his tombstone, itâs been 3 years since, and itâs existed as an obligation, but one that none of us have been particularly interested in. In a way, not that different than the safety demonstration. Itâs an empty ritual. I not so secretly enjoyed it being blank, and I think in some ways he would have tooâ¦ Va Rager det dig? Still, thereâs something to it, the negotiation of tree iconography, 6, one for each of us, the mountain view, which the cemetery also looks out to, a reminder of one of his favourite views. Thatâs definitely cliché, but an enjoyable one. This trip to Vancouver was a difficult decision, and I spent the evening going back and forth whether I should carry on with it. I feel torn from the rhythm of the residency again, and missing the Pow Wow, the visit to Bush Gallery, investing in the collective energy. Iâm hoping to scale back on my impulse to escape, to always shift locations, be in a place for longer. Maintain some stillness. In the meantime, Iâm going to try to do this internally. All Best, Tomas July 29, 2016 Dear Leah, Greetings from Vancouver! I just came back from the Thirst Days event at VIVO Media Arts Centre, the theme this time being "as you live here". I was torn leaving Kelowna, and especially sad to miss yours and Cathy's performance, which has a strong resonance to what was presented here, and glad in that regard to carry it along with me. There were a number of videos addressing future imaginations of the spaces we live in, and through which opening possibilities of compassion, empathy, inclusivity. We also heard poets, including Cecily Nicholson, and these especially registered with me, and I think you would have appreciated too. Phinder Dulai wrote about his research into archives and public records, as a strategy to undisguise colonial structures. He talked about the interconnectedness of the migrant experience, guest settlers (sometimes uninvited, and sometimes unwelcome) stories brought, grafted on a landscape of stories thousands of years old. I thought a lot about the space youâre going to set up tomorrow, and excited to hear about the stories that will emerge. I also have been thinking a lot about the table space Cathy mentioned yesterday. And thinking about my mom's table, in Calgary. I'm eager to spend more time there, I think it's where I want to situate my 'studio practice'. I want to recount stories from there, but I think this will have to wait to do in person, I'd like to hear more of your stories first, and hopefully we can find time to meet and share! All Best for tomorrow! Tomas July 30, 2016 Dear Ginger, It was nice to talk to you on the phone today, and to hear about your writing! I think the topic of collecting performance art ephemera is really interesting, and Iâm glad that you are taking this on, Iâm looking forward to reading it. As mentioned, this conversation triggered some thoughts for me about the idea of object agency. It was a nice coincidence that you called when I was at the Audain Gallery at SFU, as the last time I was here was to see Dana Claxtonâs exhibition Made to be ready, an upending of the âready-madeâ as a cultural artifact, instead looking at the spiritual and social lives of objects, as a process of resistance against colonial structures. I think this is still a challenge to consider in relation to the concept of collecting, as you identified, and something to consider in terms of the collector in questionâ¦ what are the conditions, impulses of this individual, how are they implicated in this? I think looking at this critically would be great to explore, but yes, as you mentioned, maybe this warrants more than 700 words, haha. Iâm also thinking about the work that Iâm doing, these letters, and the collecting that is part of this process. Iâm still at the beginning of thinking all of this through, and there are so many things to tease out: How will this be made accessible? Who will read these? Or will they be concealed still in their envelopes? I have a mental picture of the installation already, as binders on shelves, but in terms of their enactment, is this going to be individually activated? A performance for a larger audience? Will it be ongoing? What will happen to the letters afterwards? Iâm inclined towards burying them, or burning (or both?) but there is still a tension, I would like to hold on to them somehow, and likely will keep an archive of the letters as an electronic document. I also hope to collect them in an embodied sense, to have a memory of this interaction, writing this on the fly and trying not to compose in advanceâ¦ when I start this, slowing down my writing, thinking more carefully about what Iâm about to say I force myself to speed up, to stop self-editing. Iâm trying to think of this as a performative gesture, holding a space. Once it starts slowing down, I think about how to lead to an ending of the moment, when presence breaks down. I started re-reading the letter, and I think that is a good indication. All Best, Tomas July 31, 2016 Dear Heather, Iâm writing this on the greyhound, en route back to Kelowna. It was a pleasure to see you in Vancouver, as always. Iâm looking forward to catching up again, I guess will be in Alberta next time? Iâm carrying a bit of a heavy heart leaving. Trips back and forth are becoming increasingly disruptive, I find it hard to be pulled away from places, and then to get back into the sphere of another. I normally appreciate the greyhound, rather than the more abstracted transition of flights, but Iâm not present here, Iâm back in Vancouver, and Iâm also preoccupied with Kelowna, with Calgary. Iâm thinking about the research you are engaged with, the way you explore archives, how the exhibition at Presentation House came about. The way you approached the collection. I want to read closer the writing you have produced on this, but especially interested in the anecdotal way you talk about it, Iâm thinking about your suggestion about the craft of my project, the material construction of the work. Producing something along the lines of the care and skill practiced by Tara. Iâm wondering what form this would take in my work. Iâm inclined to maintain the structure of my Momâs collecting process, white binders, each page in plastic sleeves. On wooden shelves. I have this vision of the display, in a gallery, or another institutional setting, a space that can be explored intimately. Is the craft in the form of these letters? Iâm still finding my way through them, still a bit of a contrivance. What I want is to create a document that works like a letter, but also a space for something else, as a form of research. As Iâm writing this, Iâm oscillating between two potential readers, you as an imagined reader, like a diary, and you yourself. Who else will read this, and what will they read in? What criticisms, interpretations and connections can they draw from this? I have some ideas of where I want this to lead, points I want to emphasize, Iâm preoccupied with anticipation. The sky is getting dark, I think I will end here for now. All Best, Tomas August 16, 2016 Dear Camille, It was a pleasure to see you again in Calgary, so soon after Kelowna, too soon to have a real debrief, but glad to move some ideas forward! Itâs late here, and I canât sleep. Iâve been in tension with this nagging impulse to write you versus trying to fall back under. The formation of the letter was insistent, and this time I listened. I wish I did two days earlier, after your talk, I had a similar impulse, but sleep won out then, unfortunatelyâ¦ now I canât recall what resonated from that night, the words are gone, but I hope I can recall them later. Ironically, whatâs been sticking with me tonight is what you said, and what I was able to make note of on my phone: step into stories experience is felt... lost in translation when putting into language words are inadequate These three observations, fragments, have really turned me around on my thinking of this project, but in another way, are also keeping me on the path I want to go. Iâve been struggling with envisioning the realization of this work, and in particular knowing that the realization in many respects needs to be set now, and then carried forward. So, some tinkering, and adjusting can take place, but within an established aesthetic framework. Iâve been struggling with this aesthetic, which is based on the organizational strategy of my mom, of her correspondence, which she files within white binders, in plastic sleeves. I had intended to have print outs, on regular printer paper, not as a denial of aesthetics, but in close emulation of her methodology. Iâve also been resistant to adopting an aesthetic simply for the sake of aesthetic â hand written, typed, specific fonts, etc. I realize these decisions need to be made, but at the moment Iâm hesitant. Iâm hoping the answer will present itself. But Iâm straying from what I wanted to say a bit (meandering is a hazard, or desirable outcome, with this work). Stepping into stories. The importance of embodying stories. The way you do this, through your walks, and the histories you explore, on sites that are actively engaged in forgetting. Words are inadequate, the presence needs to be felt. Also, words are inadequate, sometimes there arenât words that can reach a particular feeling, or condition. Or, language leads down a particular path, and forming thought. Like this letter, intended for you, but also something like a confessional, a diaryâ¦ Iâm thinking about Charlesâ performance still. Iâm glad I was able to sit close, to watch him, while he was listening to the audio, of the interview he had conducted earlier. Watching his face closely, reading it for a response. This physicality, his presence, was so powerful. I think this is where I need to shift more of my thinking towards of âaestheticsâ (for lack of a better word), a performative one. The letters are still important, and there should be a component of this in the space, the envisioned space at the realization of the project. But moments are needed. Performed acts, the letters are residue I suppose, of these times, and that is partly it. So, me at this moment, preparing this text, being present through the act of writing, itâs not just about the words, Itâs about holding on to the connection with you in this moment, and then when you receive the letter, or, as is more likely the case, when you donât. Holding on to the anticipation of response, which wonât be realized. I suddenly feel very sad about this. Miss you, Tomas August 16, 2016 Dear Palmer, It was nice to finally catch up yesterday, and even if we didnât get to talk much about this project, I think we touched on some key ideas, which I hope we can follow up on over dinner discussion soon! Iâm thinking a lot about our conversation about 809, and the Wreck City project. I hadnât thought of it before, but I think it is true that it was less about the physical houses, the material aspects of the works, than it was about the social relationship of the space, the people that were part of it. Of course itâs closely aligned to the physical architecture, but I think the emphasis on this was wrong, and echoed in subsequent iterations of this project; The King Edward School, and the Car Washâ¦ These followed the wrong trajectory, and I think got caught up in some of the more unfortunate aspects of the Wreck City ethos, even if unintentional, of engaging in a process and simultaneous masking of gentrification. I wonder if it could be redirected, at looking at the dynamics of the relationships formed, the time and labour spent, less on the shell and more of the essense. If Iâm thinking in the same way here, is there something from this that Iâm not fully addressing in this work, for 528? Am I overemphasizing the space, in its physical reality, even in the mailing of the lettersâ¦ or the material of the archiveâ¦ the furniture, the paintings. What about the exhaustion, the reticence to look at the archive, to delve in? Maybe thereâs more to that that should be explored. Iâm also thinking about ghosts, a kind of surplus, or latency. Something stirred up, a tension, an anxiety, a resistance. I want to be clearer when we talk next, I always feel like Iâm stumbling, and want to defer, but I think if we can find a space to work this through, I would really benefit from your insight. Iâm looking forward to this happening soon. All Best, Tomas August 23, 2016 Dear Ashok and Stephen, I hope you are both well! Iâm at my momâs right now, and she and my brother are both fast asleep, so Iâm able to sit and spend some time reflecting. At the table next to me there is an electric typewriter, which my mom had pulled out of storage for my brother to use. I thought about using it for this letter, but it is a bit too noisy for this time of night. Iâve been thinking about the suggestion you had to consider the aesthetic conditions of the letters, to adopt either a type or hand-written form, rather than by computer. The more I think of it, I think you are right that the quality to this aesthetic is important. Iâm still a bit hesitant, because I want the decision to be based on more than a surface aesthetic, for there to be a meaning to it. There is the nostalgic affect, a nod to the material reality of a lot of the correspondence in the boxes downstairs. There is also the fact that I recently found a Danish-keyed typewriter, although Iâm not sure if this coincidence is enough of a rationale to use it. Iâm thinking about possibilities of hybrid techniquesâ¦ the letter written on computer, and the envelope using type (Iâm less inclined towards hand writing, only because my hand writing is awful). I think there is also a difference in the way the medium will influence my thinkingâ¦ how slowing it down, even also handwriting, will have on the development of this text. I will explore this once everyone is awake. I also am starting to think that the letters themselves canât constitute the core of the work. They will still be an important aspect, but I want to shift my thinking of these more towards researchâ¦ like footnotes in a way, and that I want to think of a performative piece, and installation, that draws from the letters. Iâm still not sure what form this will take, but I think it will have to be some sort of spatial reconstruction. This will be a study of the space, the way it is performed, the way it shifts, is carried forward, and left behind. I also want to make sure Iâm thinking about the economic forces, the broader narratives, how these can be folded in. There are a steady number of articles in the paper about the effects of the downturn, and these really need to be drawn in, included in the envelopes perhaps? I feel I am still building the methodologyâ¦I want to leave some openness, but also make sure I am working with a core logic. Iâm going to sign off here, but in the next letter, I will aim to have a preliminary methodology outlined. All Best, Tomas December 2, 2016 Dear Dick, It was very nice to see you at the talk on Friday! I greatly appreciate your question, as well as Eric's. Both gave me a lot to consider, along with my thoughts on what I was able to say, and not say during my presentation. It was a bit of an experiment on my part, and in reflection, I'm not sure if I was able to fully convey what I wanted to, in regards to my focus on my particular familial and local relationship to Calgary. I'm trying to develop the threads of certain aspects of my practice, which is increasingly looking at personal history and experience, but still trying to maintain a critical focus. This balance is difficult for me, and I worry that I fall too often within a subjective and sentimental position. I worry also that this was the case in often through the course of my talk. The anecdotal is important to me, and I want to hold on to this as a quality, but not losing site (sight) of understanding the implications of my personal subjective experience. I do feel I am more drawn to contemporary literary - poetics especially- theory and practice, rather than art, but I still want to stay within this sphere when presenting this work. I do think there is a space for this, but in the presentation of this work, I need to take a step away, to draw out some aspects, in order to create conditions where the work can be shared and engaged with critically. I also think familial narratives are a seductive trap, a disguise, and I need to move this along to a different vantage point. I feel I need to focus more on the economics of the relations I'm looking at, as far as exchange is concerned. What are the conditions needed for this exchange to take place? where does this fit? If I put too much out, do I exclude or push away? I need to keep thinking about this, but am very curious to know more what you think. All Best, Tomas March 19, 2017 Dear Karis, Iâm very sorry that once again, Iâm unable to come to Montreal, I had very much hoped to attend the workshop on Dynamic Form: Histories, Concepts, Techniques. This along with a number of other events taking place were very appealing, and relevant to my work, and of course I would have loved to have met with you. In the end I had to take advantage of the mild weather, and open schedule to fully focus on my writing, and construction. Iâve written the developer of the site, and hoping for a positive response. In the meantime, I am going ahead on the construction of the shelves, which I will set up, either on the site, or at my Momâs house. Iâll let you know how it goes! For my thesis writing, Iâm pursuing this, as you suggested, in an automatic sense, and including this in the remainder of the letter, I will keep sending this, and, again hopefully (always hopeful) this can be eventually stitched together in some form of coherency. I like that this will still be part of the regular correspondence, and that this can form a methodological structure. My writing, as a performative practice, has been following a circular path, continually drawing out and articulating the ideas into a practice. I am using convention of vernacular narrative within conversation. While I am drawing upon theoretical and contemporary poetic work, when I write I am not immediately referencing documents. I am trying to be true to the moment, to engage in this fully, to be fully in the moment. Slowly, perhaps too slowly, I want to draw in more my embodied sense of the place, to build, by gradual degrees, a knowledge of the site, imparted in even smaller degrees within the text. Perhaps this comes through as a tacit understanding, and interface that can be accessed by others through their own experience. Also in circular thinking, Iâve come to the imagined space of the installation, where pulled elements of my motherâs space, the way the house has been populated by the residual elements of the former home, the organizational structures; white binders with clear plastic sleeves containing decades of correspondence, and records. Our encounters, sitting at the living room table (constructed by my Father), sifting through boxes of archival materialâ¦. Or sitting at the kitchen table (purchased from Ikea) over coffee, talking through family matters, or on the couch, over a glass of wine, where I am able to hear her remininences. How these stories come out, through innocuous conversation, suddenly opening up into potent moments, how history resurfaces. Her experience growing up during the occupation, a casual reference to a letter from her elementary school teacher, she was so proud of being allowed to print on double, rather than than triple lines. Suddenly a memory of running past German snipers to get to school, soldiers who didnât acknowledge the end of the conflict. Then we move on to her time at the onset of the occupation, listening late at night to the low ominous voice of a narrator on film reels, smuggled into the country and shown in secret meetings in my grandparents living room, to other members of the resistance movement. This voice still brings out uneasy associative feelings for her. The underlying tension that embodied her life during that period. She talked about seeing her parents construct bombs that would be used to destroy key infrastructures in the city. How even after the war, the grenade that was left in the drawer of the house, that reminded her of a pineapple. These new elements, stories I hadnât heard before, complementing more familiar ones, which she also recounts: coming to their door only to see it had been opened by gunshot, her mother immediately remarking âoh! We went to the wrong place, silly meâ, and then walking confidently away, not returning until the end of the war. The room, deshelvelled my grandfather, going into hiding, she didnât see him the entire time, except for one time at her birthday, when her relatives suddenly sent her outside to pick up a parcel. She didnât recognize the person dropping off a parcel, who in the end she found out was her Father, in disguise. I also think of the letters my mother has been receiving from my uncle, his recollections of living in Greenland in the 1970s, which he has been as a series of short missives. Is this a structure I could use? In some respects, this feels a direction, a material, that I donât actually want to address, at least not directly in my thesis, perhaps Iâm shedding this from my work by writing about, finding a space that needs expression, but not necessarily critical exploration. Even writing this now, Iâm of both minds, can I somehow choose both? I will write more soon, but in the meantime, appreciate your thoughts, as always. Tomas April 4, 2017 Dear Nikki, Thank you so much for your letter, I can't say enough how much I appreciate what you wrote. Yes, absolutely, it does resonate. As promised, I will keep this in confidence, the letters that I am writing are the only record I am intending to make public, but even in this, if there are any elements in my response that you prefer not included, I am happy to accommodate. In my writing, I'm striving to keep a balance between honouring the importance of privacy of my family and personal life, as well as that of who I am corresponding with. I've been thinking about this particularly in my last letter to you, which I feel overstepped this, by going further within personal terrain in my family, in ways I don't think appropriate, and as a result won't be including this. It's such a difficult balance to maintain, the desire to want to impart information, and to be cognizant of the desires for privacy, but this is also the tension that I want to engage with. I think intimacy requires this tension, and it's interesting to think of how spaces of art and writing afford and also counter this. I notice this when talking to my mom about this work, and her concerns about my airing of our particular stories, her resistance to this. I feel that I'm taking liberties, translating personal, private information, or insight, into an economic exchange. To avoid providing banal, safe details, rather than delving deeper, and imparting meaningful truths and conditions. I want to know how to foster an emphatic connection, without fully revealing, or displaying in an overt way. How to approach obliquely? Not showing, not telling, but creating the suggestion, exploring the lines in between. There's also an interesting line between what would be perceived as off-limits and an acceptable sharing of intimacy. Bank records from long closed accounts, for example, are a no go as far as my Mom is concerned, which I completely appreciate. On the other hand, I feel quite comfortable sharing my recollections of my Dad, and my memories of our past connection. Last night, while going out to buy wine, I saw the Orion constellation, which always makes me think of him, and I was thinking about this, why exactly this has such a strong affinity to my memory of him. He was moderately interested in astonomy, and I don't think this constellation had any particular significance to him, but I still associate it with him, whenever I see it. I've started writing on the envelopes, and taken your suggestion of using the front of the envelopes, to include fragment texts from the books in our collection. It occurred to me that I could approach my thesis in a similar way, pulling random, intuitive quotes from texts I am referencing, rather than conventionally researching and incorporating into the construction of my writing. In an experiment toward this aim, I came across the following text, from Jorie Graham's book of poems: Place. I was happily surprised by the resonance of the text. I've included it below. All Best, Tomas The Bird on my Railing From The still wet iron of my fire escapeâs top railing a truth is making this instant our top ... the high branches across the way, between us and the others, in their apartments, and fog Endurance Continues to be the secret of the tilled Ground we make Breath by breath. What Seed dear Lord are we we Think as we toss more of our living out Into the turning and turning, Our personal Dead cast always deeper into The general dead No matter how hard you try To keep your Own your Known own â and gnarled remembering mossing over â April 4, 2017 Dear Karis, Thank you so much for your thoughtful response to the images I sent you. Your questions are very generative towards my continued thinking on this work, and are moving me forward. The choice to use the business envelopes came about through a happy accident, while I was at my momâs house. We were having coffee, and she went to get the mail, and when she came back she gave me an envelope, saying that this is something that I should use for my art. The envelope was addressed to S. Jonsson / Current Resident, and was sent from HomeTurf Lawn Care, to our old address. The envelope was addressed to our old house, and markings from the redirection. It also came in a windowed âbusiness styleâ envelope, and all of these details really felt like a breakthrough. I had started writing on smaller envelopes that I had been given, and while I liked using these, and how these came to me (a gift from a friend), the windows provided an unexpected solution to how I could simultaneously include, but not fully disclose the contents, the archival detritus. The window gives a glimpse in, but still obscure, and protect the contents, and our history. I think this tension is key to what I want to accomplish in this work. A few other synchronicities also came into play for this, from my two recent trips to Vancouver Island, working with Jen Van de Pol. The first being my discovery of a Danish typewriter at a thrift shop in Sooke. I left this with her, as I wasnât able to fit within my luggage. When I went back the second time, Jen showed me, and told me about, an artwork she had made while at Goddard College. She had rolled this print in a tube, and had included a small branch that all participants had received while in the program. When she finally unpacked it, a few months after returning, she realized that branch was still green, and the water had seeped through the print. She liked the effect of this on her work, and still has it installed. I knew I had to include organic matter in my envelopes as well. The window to the envelope allowed this pairing to be immediately apparent. I also hope that there is a similar effect on the archival matter, that there will be mingling between the material. Another happy coincidence is how well the format of these larger envelopes fit within the typewriter. As a result, Iâve decided to have a single line of text along the top, which, when pulling quotes from the books in my momâs collection, gives me a parameter to work within. A thought that I had last night, as I was working on the envelopes, that I ought to approach my thesis in a similar fashion. Using a laptop instead of a type writer, I would pull sections from my readings in an intuitive âstichomancyâ approach (borrowing from Peter Morin) and developing from these encounters, in what would eventually form my thesis. Iâm still sitting with this idea, but some exploratory attempts have been successful, so I will continue to try. Thanks again for your encouragement, I really appreciate working out my ideas with you. All Best, Tomas April 4, 2017 Dear Ashok, Karis, Virginie, Stephen and Peter, Writing this, Iâm feeling an acute anxiety, having little to show for my progress, outside of the letters Iâve written so far, and conceptualization of the artistic work. These letters have become, at least to my mind, a methodological structure. I am trying to write these in the moment, and so in their build up, formulation follows, as a search, a roundabout exploration, that hopefully leads to an accumulation, in a sense an accumulation. The physical format of the letters is still something I am considering. In a way, they feel preliminary, not the artwork itself, but a way of thinking of it. Rather than send these to the house, as proposed, I am thinking of sending the material that I am sifting through. For this letter Iâm approaching in fragments, stitching together as I go, attempting to align my thinking of this work, and the accompanying paper, the latter a very daunting prospect! I find it appropriate to develop this in the course of a letter, drawing from the letters already written, and the research I have done. Where I need to go forward, is a further research into performance practices, I am looking work by specific artists, such as Victoria Stanton, Vera Frenkel and Jordan Abel. I am interested in their use of received materials, and how they carry this forward in their own work. For the performance and installation, I envision the construction of a bookshelf, based on the template produced by my Father, the original currently located at my motherâs house in Calgary. I want to install this on the site of our old house, now an open and undeveloped lot. I will pursue this. I have continued, sporadically, to go through the material affects of my motherâs archive, going through, we have sifted and amassed a large pile of detritus material, and Iâm very interested in this material in particular, which holds no value to her, but still carries some resonance, a value in outline. I will end this letter, itâs already long overdue. I look forward to our meeting, and your guidance. All Best, Tomas April 10, 2017 Hi Deanna, I'm sorry it's taken me so long to follow up regarding my project, but taking some time finally to sit still (relatively, I'm on the bus) and follow up. The buried history I'm referring to is I think not that different from what you described, from the response (or lack thereof) to your talk. For the past year, I've been exploring my family history, brought to light recently as a result of the ongoing sorting of our archive and ephemera, following the sudden move my mom had to make four years ago. This came about through the combination of the death of my dad, and the need to sell our old house as a result of development pressures. The packing and move was understandably quick, and we're still now making our way through the material. I'm using this project, part of my MFA through UBCO, as a way to support this effort, a dual purpose, for my family but also for me to understand and work through my history. I'm trying to connect the violent rupture to the history of my family's trajectory of migration from Denmark and their eventual settlement to Calgary, via Montreal, and Ontario. Going through the archive, I'm collecting the cast-off detritus and mailing this back to our old house (no longer standing), and collecting it again on its return. On the envelopes I'm including fragments of texts drawn from books in my mom's collection. These books are an assortment from Denmark and what they've collected since. The process has been illuminating, seeing the ways in which their relationship to land is formed, and how complex the connections are. There are a lot of publications related to Danish colonialism in Greenland, along with artworks that I've grown up with but never fully understood. For example, we have a hand drawn portrait of Knud Rasmussen, whose children I found out were my mom's playmates when she was young. Going through this is a personal excavation too, Iâm trying to process this all and situate myself. My bus trip has ended, seems a good time to stop, but would love to discuss this with you further. All Best, Tomas
Thesis/Dissertation
eng
Interdisciplinary Studies
Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
Graduate
Home turf : re-earthing family narrative
Text
Still Image