I wanted to delve deeper into intimacy, vulnerability, and metaphors of shelter from The Poetics of Space and how these ideas could enrich my practice.
- Intimacy and Vulnerability
Bachelard’s reflection on the nest as a space of intimacy and care invites a focus on its fragility and strength. In my practice, I can consider fragility and care as well as the tactility of the nests and how that experience can touch viewers.
Fragility and Care: Highlight the delicate balance between the structural integrity of your nests and their inherent vulnerability. The wire material could be bent, stretched, or interwoven in ways that suggest resilience and susceptibility to collapse. This could echo the precariousness of home and its shared labour.
Haptic Experience: Emphasize tactility in the nests, encouraging viewers to sense the material’s vulnerability. Shadows, already a feature in my work, could play into this by casting ephemeral, fleeting impressions that mimic fragility.
For example, explore:
Combining brittle materials (like twigs or paper) with durable wire to emphasize contrasts.
Creating nest forms that appear incomplete or “damaged” evokes the precariousness of safety and care.
Inviting viewers to handle or interact with smaller-scale nests to highlight the fragility of touch.
2. Metaphors of Shelter
Bachelard’s notion of the nest as a microcosm of the universe ties beautifully into your work. It suggests that each nest contains its own care, labour, and survival story.
Communal Shelter: The sociable weaver nests you focus on exemplify collective effort and shared responsibility. Can I metaphorically link these nests to human ideas of interdependence, community, and the fragility of shared spaces?
Shelter as Memory: Explore how a nest, like a home, carries traces of its making—each material layer can symbolize history, labour, and the passage of time.
Practical ideas:
Construct nests that layer different materials, each representing a “memory” or stage in its creation.
Introduce text or symbols into the nests—like fragmented poetry or narratives—suggesting the stories sheltered within.
Use shadow play to evoke the tension between shelter (a defined, secure space) and openness (the exposure and fragility of the nest).
Would you like help exploring these concepts concerning your artistic materials, exhibition strategies, or poetic elements?
Curating Bachelardian Spaces
Can place the focus on themes of shelter, vulnerability, and memory in an exhibition:
Small, Intimate Viewing Spaces: Design cocoon-like exhibition areas, inviting viewers into a metaphorical nest.
Height Variations: Suspend nests at varying heights to evoke different perspectives (a bird’s-eye view versus ground-level vulnerability).
Soundscapes: Use audio recordings of birds, rustling wind, or whispers to evoke intimacy and animate the environment as a living space.
Shadow Walks: Create pathways where viewers can move through projected shadows, becoming part of the metaphorical shelter
Considering the making: contemplations
This idea of porousness—of something both holding and releasing—could be a powerful thread in how I develop the wire work. The wire nests already have an openness that resists the idea of complete enclosure, and that tension between safety and exposure could be deepened through material, exhibition, and even writing.
Porousness & The Flow of Time
The nests could be seen as holding traces of presence rather than fully enclosing or protecting. They don’t shut out the world but remain receptive to it.
In this sense, they might act like vessels for memory—fragments of experience passing through, much like wind or light filtering in and out of their structures.
The gaps could be read as a reminder that shelter is never absolute and that home is as much about movement and transition as it is about stability.
A Nest in the Making
If the nests are never fully closed forms, they remain in a state of becoming.
This could mirror how birds continuously repair and reshape their nests—there is no definitive ‘finished’ point, only ongoing adaptation.
Could the wire nests be displayed in a way that emphasizes this process? Maybe showing them in different stages of formation or even integrating elements that suggest disintegration or rebuilding?
Writing & Poetic Responses
Viewing the nest as a metaphor for my process? The act of making itself as a kind of nesting?
A poetic text could reflect the experience of pressing, shaping, and leaving spaces open—mirroring how birds construct their nests through repeated gestures.
Can you consider developing a short poetic piece that intertwines with my practice? It could accompany your work in an exhibition or even as part of an Instagram post.
This theme feels rich with potential—how do I imagine pushing it further?
Chat GPT suggestion:
Hands move, looping.
A slow forming. A breath.
Not finished, not fixed—held only in the moment of making.
Each bend, a hesitation.
Each loop, a pause.
Not a house, not a cage—just a resting place, for now.
Wire does not hold still.
It remembers the press of fingers, the soft force of shaping.
A nest does not last, but in the making—
something lingers.
I shared a social media post (same post on Facebook and IG) about this space the nest has taken me to. Below are my posts and comments/interactions. I also made a short video for my new Youtube channel. I wanted to explore how a short video will tell my story.
