I Am Because We Are: Names and their Meanings in Art and Memorials

My book has finally been published! It may actually have been available for awhile now (it has a publication date of May 27!), but I've been waiting for my copies from the publisher as proof of publication. They still haven't arrived, but I checked Amazon.com yesterday and found it. I've been looking for awhile, but oddly searching for "Rodney Love" on Amazon doesn't show my book until number 42! Such items as What Kind of Love by Rodney Crowell turn up, and I heart Rodney Slifer t-shirts. Searching in Books brings my book up at number 9. I may have missed it by not scrolling down, foolishly thinking that Rodney Love the author would come before Love & Respect: The Love She Most Desires; The Respect He Desperately Needs!

Anyway, it's available for purchase now. Quick, beat the rush! Order now for Christmas! You may want to shop around: It's about $15 cheaper through Barnes and Noble than through Amazon!


The image cut and pasted from Amazon is about the size of a postage stamp. The second one, a pre-publication mock-up, is not much better! Best go to the Amazon link to see a better image.

The book is a reworking of my MFA thesis. There is some additional material including more memorials, more artworks, some memorial rubbings, and an essay I wrote comparing two memorials (the Vietnam Veterans Memorial and the World War II memorial, both in Washington, D.C.) which wasn't part of my thesis. I'm certainly not expecting to retire on the royalties, in fact I'm sure I won't be buying lunch with the royalties, but it's nice to have a book published and out there in the world. It has images of my artworks that I made for my MFA, so they're getting out and about. I also think the linking of Victor Turner's concept of communitas with memorials is an original idea that I've not seen in the literature on memorials.

I did find on Amazon a book with the same title from 1996! The sub heading is Readings in Black Philosophy, so not treading the same paths. Madonna has also made a documentary with the same title. It comes from an African proverb, so you can guess the connection. My interest was in the links between individuals and groups.

Here's the introduction to the book (with the layout and punctuation all gone to hell!):


INTRODUCTION
When René Descartes said I think therefore I am, he had stumbled
across a profound philosophical truth. But, of course, it was not the whole
truth, and when taken alone it rings of self-sufficiency and individualism.
For a more complete understanding of the self I draw on the wisdom of
an African proverb: I am because we are. The emphasis here is on our
interdependence and connectedness. Our very existence depends upon
those around us, and the people in our lives shape who we become.
Matt Lawrence, Like a Splinter in the Mind: The Philosophy Behind the Matrix Trilogy

When I read this quote, it helped to clarify ideas that I had been working with in my art practice. I had been collecting hair and socks from people, and using those objects as metonymic representations of the donors. I was assembling groups from these individuals, with the group and the individual being equally important. I was including the names of the donors so that they were known, distinct individuals and not an anonymous mass. The donated materials were being woven, and I was creating groups that were indissolubly joined together. These woven forms were an embodiment of the metaphor of “the fabric of society.” The proverb mentioned above encapsulated the concerns that I had, and provided the title for one of the series of work that I produced for my MFA, as well as the title for two art exhibitions and this book. So, the idea that I am because we are focussed the conceptual basis for the work that I was producing, but the formal link between the series was the inclusion of the donors’ names in the weavings themselves. This led me to research memorials because, as Michael Kimmelmen suggests: “By aesthetic and social consensus, names are today a kind of reflexive memorial impulse, lists of names having come almost automatically to connote ‘memorial.’” The idea of the memorial then began to shape the work that I was making. This included the form of the installation for I Am Because We Are, and the basis for Memorial to COFA Graduates 1991 – 2006. This direction in my work demanded a deeper look at the connections between the names that I was using, the idea of the known individual within the collective, and forms of memorialisation.
These are the ideas that I am exploring in this book. The first section examines lists of names to discover the meanings that can be extracted from them. I see lists of names as symbolic groups, and explore the connections with society, and, indeed, all humanity. I then suggest that memorials and artworks bring the symbolic meanings of lists of names that are otherwise hidden by utilitarian functions closer to the surface, and therefore more easily available. I follow this with an examination of a number of memorials to see how these meanings are added to by the formal vocabulary, by the physical characteristics, of the memorials. The second section of the book looks at the three series of work that I have produced, and discusses them in relation to the work of other artists. Scattered throughout the paper will be sections that deal with various works by the French artist Christian Boltanski. He has produced many works over the years that engage with similar issues to those I have investigated in my art practice. By separating the explorations of his work into different sections, I am able to link them to the formal elements and concepts that are most relevant.