Waiting for Odysseus

weaving and threads made from clayey soil sent by a distributed network across geographical divides, 2019

In Homer’s Odyssey, during Odysseus’ absence, Penelope resolves only to remarry when she has finished her weaving: each night she unravels her day’s work, as she waits for Odysseus, so as to never complete the tapestry, keeping open the differing, opposing possibilities of its future resolution.

The clayey-soil donated was made into a ceramic tapestry in the process of being made and un-made. Bringing together personal trajectories of the individuals donating the material, the ceramic threads represent these connections and histories, forming a constitutive part of the whole artwork. We are living in an
increasingly complex world, with social networks and interconnectedness across geographic boundaries or historical divides, a riot of overlapping threads.