These Are My Prayer Flags is a project focusing on using art in creating relationships through the idea of gifting: where the connection created by a gift is worth more than the commercial value of the gift itself. I spent time and collaborated with classmates and teachers, documented these interactions, and then gave each participant with an artwork created specifically for them in honor of their time given to me. An artist book detailing these interactions/process is forthcoming. (Spring 2010 – ongoing.)

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How can art be used to develop relationships between people? This is definitely a question with a much less easily defined answer, but I thought the act of gifting held a critical point. The idea of the gift, of course, is that (with any luck) the connection created by a gift is worth more than the commercial value of the item itself.

So, to begin with, I invited twelve of my classmates and professors to spend time with me and perhaps share their thoughts on art and community, and in honor of their gift of time and advice, I would create an artwork to give them.

One of the few ways I can pass on this experience though is to explain how each person’s gift relates to the time we spent together.

Kaitlin invited me to her house and made dinner for me, and so her gift is a handmade paper folded book with illustrations from our time together.

Mel’s gift relates to a conversation that we had during our time together – that no matter how feminine one presents oneself (or doesn’t), there’s a negative stereotype associated with it. I made her a series of embroidery hoops embedded in handmade paper with these stereotypes sorted according to how feminine they are.

When Mimi and I spent time together, one of the things I really took to heart was her explaining the word “kismet,” as in “fate” or something meant to be—in relation to embracing every possible opportunity.

Haley and I had a lengthy and enthusiastic conversation together, but part of our discussion was how her work relates to translucency and things hidden. Her gift is a handmade paper screen with a morse code message punched into it.

Eden and I had spent a fair amount of time together by this point anyway, partially because we share an interest in anti-nuclear weaponry activism. His painting includes text from “Sadako and the Thousand Paper Cranes” along with a paper crane—an anti-nuclear peace symbol.

Steve’s gift: a toolbelt with all tools and the belt itself made of handmade paper. Steve’s thesis project utilizes comics drawn on paper made to look like building/construction materials.

Colleen and I spent time together talking about the gallery she created for fellow students and emerging artists, but we also had a reoccurring joke about corn and unicorns. When I made this sheet of paper I knew it was destined for greatness.

Maggie and I met at her Total Ocean Recall booth at NFO XPO and talked about the importance of the oceans and the environment in her work. Her gift was a handmade paper flexagon with cyanotype imagery.

Don graciously took me to a gamelan concert, where we talked about the stories of other cultures and other people. His gift was a set of stories told to me by strangers on wooden plaques inspired by the aesthetics of the gamelan instruments.

When Jeff and I met, we talked of the relationship between politics and art. A favorite of both of ours are the situationist/anarchist influenced riots in 1968 in France. One of the grafitti slogans from these protests was “under the pavement, a beach!”

Jana and I met and had coffee and she gave me advice on creating home in a new environment, something that Jana addresses often in her work. Her gift was a flexagon with floorplans I had created with the text “home is where I want to be but I guess I’m already there.”

Trisha was the last person I met with and she made us dinner. We ate on the rooftop of her building—one of the first times I really felt like Chicago was my home. Trisha had talked about the importance of fun in life, and so her gift was a set of handmade paper kites.

I also gave each participant a “deed of gift”, a faux official document to record the passing of ownership of the gift itself.

Then we had a gifting/potluck party at my house in order to give out these gifts and bring together those able to attend (the others I later held individual meetings with).

Finally, I’m now creating a book that details these experiences a bit more, as well as be able to more easily share the project with others.

Overall the hope was, of course, that in knowing each of us would contribute to this meeting with a sense of generosity would create a different environment than simply hanging out or having an interview. Even though its goal was less tangible and harder to define than being able to check off a list of where I’ve gone or how many things I put up, I consider this experiment a resounding success.