Re-reading the notes from the first curatorial conversation Carol and I had, I stated:
“I want to make an exhibition that touches the viewer and brings the presence of absence to them. Stirring their emotion.” The three exhibitions did this but the third iteration, Every Day for a Year, also created a powerful immersive experience.
The use of the film She Wanders/Wonders projected from the floor entirely filling the back wall of the space and allowing the film to play across the surface of the porcelain envelopes combined with the soundtrack played quite loud and having the two rooms lit by one powerful spotlight created an immersive and contemplative atmosphere. The film was looped with 10 seconds of white light. People stayed watching the film play over and over. Feedback referred to the meditative, dreamy, hypnotic, in-between space people felt the work took them too. One person felt the pace of walking and the deliberate placing of the feet of the glass dress-clad woman added to this hypnotic, ritual quality.
The envelopes seeming to act as small monitors or screens picking up the films movement and imagery playing across them, both animated them and paradoxically emphasised the stillness of these 186 objects. Carol had cried as she laid them out, placing them against the folded cardboard corners (another form of envelope she had suggested to act as stands for them) moved by the repetition and experiencing the volume of 186 fragile yet strong objects that held both Chris’ name and my own – “memorial markers” was the term she used to describe them.
Davina Kirkpatrick- presence of absence 