To Catch I Count

This work is based from a poem titled, ‘To catch, I count’. I have counted and categorised each word, letter and sentence structure in to various graphs. These large scale drawings are a series of number and letter graphs that illustrate the same calculated amount that is represented in eight different ways.

The poem is about the mourning of my Baka who passed away only a few weeks prior to making this work. I’m trying to find some kind of meaning and acceptance with her loss by forming a tally-based language to cope with my sadness. Mourning is an overwhelming feeling and state of being. Counting numbers and letters undertake a similar process in how they are incomprehensible amounts of never-ending data. Numbers are a language to document change, loss, time, ourselves and the way things exist around us. Letters are a way to make words and are used to describe thoughts, needs and experiences. Tally is an abstracted form which measures the amount of 5 or less. It also can be understood as a physical shape and structure in our environment such as fences, antennas or thread patterns. This process of counting and what it means to me, has had a profound effect on me. This counting tally-language works to serve as a personal navigational tool, in which it helps me to engage with my grief by unfolding it in to various forms of expression.

Materials: White paint marker on Window glass.
Location: University of Melbourne, Foyer in (757) Stop 1 Building, Parkville Campus, Melbourne.
757 Art Project
Comissioned by head of staff, Alastair Ingham.
Curated by Sorcha Delahunty, Aislinn Faulkner, Eliza Dyball.