Dreaming has often been seen as an act done in solitude. But what happens when we tie and cast our net of dreams together? This collaborative knot tying activity allows us to reflect on the hopes that we and others have for our futures and see different visions intertwine. As we continue building this world together, how do we notice which dreams are most powerful in the collective eye? How do we celebrate the dreams coming to fruition, as well as stop to notice and support those that may be left behind?
My work is influenced by what I hope participants to experience in the co-creation process. For Intertwined Dreamscape, I wanted to illuminate the reality that we do not dream alone, thus I designed the final piece to be centered around the collaborative process of dreaming together. The process involved participants reflecting and imbuing their hopes into the plywood “buckles”, then learned how to tie the bull hitch knot to manifest these hopes into the community dreaming net. The various buckle designs are inspired by when we look up at the light that comes through trees and when we look down and notice the forms that show up in rock pools.
Intertwined Dreamscape after the 3 hour Sounds of the Diaspora Festival
The Sounds of the Diaspora Festival: An Ode to Joy is about community coming together to celebrate joy and foster new relationships. Intertwined Dreamscape is a popup workshop debuted at this event, centered on bringing together different voices to weave into a united tapestry of ideas for our collective future. The goal of the activity is to allow one another to not only notice how we are constructing our lives individually, but also together. The prompt participants reflected on while drawing on the buckles was: What dreams do you hold for your community?
Wooden “buckles” are inspired by shapes found in natures (a rock pool I saw in Nahant, light coming through overlapping trees)
Participants imbuing their dreams for their community into the “buckles”
Teaching a participant how to tie in their “buckle” via the bull hitch knot
I was invited to bring Intertwined Dreams to the Peace Institute’s largest fundraising event of the year: the Mother’s Day Walk for Peace, a beloved Boston tradition honoring the lives of our loved ones who have been murdered.
For this event’s dreamscape, I reframed the reflection prompt to center families, especially mothers, who have lost loved ones to society’s cycles of violence:
What are the hopes and dreams for the mothers in your community?
Participants engaging with the activity were of diverse backgrounds and experiences.
