The project named 'Meshwork' focuses on pluralistically revitalizing the complex interactions and intersections between human, technology, and environment by using the concepts of 'thread' and 'trace' as metaphors. It is based on transforming the archaeology of weaving and computer technologies and the cartography of the environments they create into a narrative form.
For about three years, I have been studying on the history and cultural memory impacts of handcraft practices, particularly weaving, as well as networks and the effects of contemporary hardware and software technologies. As a convergence point of the research I have conducted during the process, I place 'thread' at the center of this study. This is because the concept of 'thread' encompasses many meanings related to the recording of environment, technology, and memory. In its broadest usage, a thread is a kind of filament suspended among points in three dimensional space or entwined with other threads. This material has been used for centuries in various handcraft practices such as knitting, knotting, weaving, and stitching to record social memory. However, 'thread' in computing refers to the smallest unit of execution of a program. Each thread shares its memory space with the relevant process. And all computing technologies and machines are operated within environments created by software and the networks between them. Not surprisingly, the term 'thread' can also metaphorically be used to denote interconnected parts of something, like thoughts or a conversation, as if they were threaded together. When threads embody , they transform into traces and, furthermore, surfaces, i.e., environments as Ingold mentions. In short, they produce interconnectivity, generating environments: texts or records storing memory, underground or overground infrastructures, internet networks, etc.
The environments created by the threads encountered in every aspect of life encompass us. However, this is not a place with defined boundaries; it's an environment where various connections are completely intertwined. Within this intermingling zone this network of interwoven lines there is no inside or outside, only spans and passages. However, throughout history, imperial powers have attempted to invade the settled world by creating networks of connections on the earth's surface. On the contrary, these connections are essentially lines of occupation. They are often straight and orderly, intersecting only at power nodes. As they traverse the terrain, they tend to cut through established lines of settlement, such as highways, railways, property boundaries or, network protocols . But occupation lines not only establish connections; they also divide the occupied area into regional blocs. This fragmentation has also occurred in related fields such as access, travel, where journeys have been replaced by destination oriented transportation, cartography where sketches have been replaced by route planning, and textuality where storytelling has been replaced by preconceived narrative structures. It has also transformed our understanding of place: once a mesh of multiple and intertwined movements, minds, and threads, a place is now seen as a node in a static network of connections.
Therefore, I planned to structure this project as a multi-layered storytelling on an environment that reverses this understanding: a narrative fabric consisting of non-linear narratives and a porous environment created by the threads and traces they leave behind. In doing so, I intend to trace both material or seen threads—such as the historical transformation of thread—and immaterial or unseen threads—like internet networks, textuality, and communication—and the traces they create—earthly traces, mental and archaeological traces. Here, I envision each element of the story as a moment of ongoing activity. That is to say, all subjects of the project are characterized by their relations with what they produce, what is currently alongside them, and what follows them in the world, at the point where action and reaction converge. Here, the meaning of 'relation' should be understood not as a connection between pre-positioned entities but as a path traced in the landscape of lived experience. It's not so much a convergence of points in a network as it is a network of interwoven traces.
Whereas “meshwork,” from which the installation takes its title, refers not to a network of connections but to interwoven lines of growth and movement that are in constant flux. This perspective, framed by anthropologist Timothy Ingold, suggests that things emerge through life processes and that the focus on processes of life and creation foregrounds interconnected flows over fixed locations. Meshwork highlights the entanglement and fluidity of evolving systems, from ancient weaving practices to the complex infrastructures of modern technologies. Spanning physical structures and digital networks, it unveils the shifting dynamics of connectivity, memory, and power.