About Temporality:

Unlike most children, I moved away from home when I was fourteen years old for high school. Since beginning high school, the longest time I have spent living at my parent's home was in 2020 during the COVID-19 lockdown. During my time at home, I was confronted with existing in this space that I was unfamiliar with. Surrounding me were objects and people from my childhood but I was foreign to them. It was at this point that I became intrigued by the idea of physical space. I found it interesting to consider how spaces can remain the same physically but their practical uses and meanings can evolve. In terms of the project itself, I created three prints, each depicting a physical space in my parents' home, and I paired each print with a poem that communicated my present associations with each respective space. I decided to pair my work with poetry because I wanted the viewer to contextualize linguistically what they were presented with visually. I chose to create prints rather than a different medium because of the hands-on process of making the print block and how once you create the print block, you can create as many copies of the print as you want.

Drawing inspiration from James Baldwin, I titled my project Temporality because the word refers to time and existing within a specific time. In Giovanni’s Room Baldwin says, “Perhaps home is not a place but simply an irrevocable condition.” Home is not always where you primarily reside but can also be a place and/or a feeling that you have assigned meaning to. The idea of home being an “irrevocable condition” is what I want my writing to reflect. Baldwin is not only questioning the presentation that a home typically embodies but also offers an alternative notion where the concept of home is far more expansive than its physical form and that instead home is a permanent feeling – a temporal space.

My project primarily relates to myself but I wanted the audience to consider their relationship with the idea of home and time. There is a level of intimacy that I wanted to convey that evokes a sense of wonder within the viewer. I chose to create three prints with three accompanying poems because I wanted the audience to leave with only questions for themselves. I love seeing someone’s artwork and wanting to create, and that is how I want people to feel after viewing my project. I chose to work with the kitchen, my childhood bedroom, and the backyard; because these are the spaces that I still occupy when I visit my parents but the ways in which I engage with these spaces have changed over the years.