9. what can the light tell us?
2020, Public Art Commission
Seattle Convention Center
a commission created for the new Washington State Convention Center for a 56x30ft wall at the east entrance of the building. this piece was created by taking multiple, hour-long, open faced scans at the site of the entrance before the building construction began. at the time, this spot was a sidewalk next to an open pit that received an abundance of natural light. after the building was completed, most of the direct sunlight was blocked from reaching this spot by the building itself.
this work, then, memorializes the sunlight that once saw, and recorded, the history of this specific patch of the earth, through millenia. these scans are my way of honoring this past.
along with the scans, i wrote a poem that is interspersed along the wall in the five most common languages spoken on Coast Salish territories (English, traditional Chinese, Spanish, Amarhic, and Vietnamese), along with Lushootseed
.
the poem is as follows:
i think of the history of a place,
where i can go to retrieve it
hold that history in my hand,
be reminded, or learn new
how the land used to undulate here
how the light settled so specifically there
how the people gathered,
while their laughter gathered, too
and traveled in the air
headed that way.
be reminded, or learn new
how the trees bowed at night,
their leaves and branches,
bearing witness to our gathering laughter
our stretching sadness,
rested after a long day of whispered conversations
with the wind and the soil.
and of course
be reminded of the sun -
most watchful of all observers
keenest of all archivers -
drawing pictures with our bodies
on the ground (
a shadow cast is
a mark made,
for an instant and then made again,
a tireless recording of life gone by
)
what can the sun tell us that we do not know?
what can the light tell us that we do not remember?
i think of the history of a place,
where i can go to retrieve it
the history of this land
this city
this neighborhood
this block.
the trees could tell you
about the glow of a neon sign
that painted their bodies pink and purple
in the dusk,
a beacon, blinking
by itself in the rain.
the children could tell you
about the neighbor with the kind face
who sat on her porch,
and waved to each of them, smiling,
as they came home from school,
their feet dragging under the weight
of growing up.
the light could tell you
so much we could never know -
having traveled through eons of universe
to arrive exactly, precisely
here
in this place
in this moment
to draw us through shadow
moment after brief moment -
remind us of our small place in the order of bigger things.
does the light remember all the things
that time has made us forget?
could it remind us if we asked?
does it remember silence?
the space between words, closed lips,
between bodies in repose,
between borders made and erased and
made again
uncrossable?
could it comfort us, somehow
with the simple reminder that
a certain slant of light
at a certain time of day
in a certain year
is a result
of the entirety of the universe aligning
just so
that this moment
could look exactly this color
exactly this way
for us to witness,
hold
witness
hold
the good, the bad -
the remembered
and always, the forgotten.
i think of the history of a place,
where i can go to retrieve it