The Meshworks
A new way of Seeing
Design Conceptualization | Research | Data Abstraction | Illustration | Layout
Pre- Thesis StudioProject
August- November 2018
This project Western Ghats project, ‘Thresholds in Tapestries,’ is a highly intuitive, experiential and insightful journey I undertook. It opened several new areas of design research and data collection, and use of design methodologies to witness and experience the landscape. The core idea is to look at the ethos of this dynamic landscape and not to propagate ‘issues,’ but to find the extraordinary in the mundane everyday processes. It allowed me to give in to the process, not worry about outcome, and follow a path of insight and imagination. It was imperative to look at the landscape without any assumptions and preconceived notions. Working and experiencing ‘the field’ is highly rewarding. It’s an opportunity for diverse conversations, excavation of multi-cultural layers and heritage. In my practice, there is a sheer enthusiasm of building a narrative through dialogues, interviews, local and traditional knowledge. This project unfolded various nuanced ways of recording the field. Walking became an evocative method as we traversed through the landscape of the Western Ghats, drenched in its’ glorious monsoons. Several readings ranging from Henry David Thoreau, Noel Castree, Dilip da Cunha and Tim Ingold, which enlightened me, and helped me to broaden my thinking and understand the power of conceptualisation. My design intervention, ‘The Meshworks,’ is a new way of looking at the world. A world of movements where paths entwine and interweave every moment. In this world of fluidities, my intervention is a small arena of innumerable possibilities that this project has opened. It’s a way of visualising and imagining the landscape and it’s narratives that can lead the audience to witness the unknown/ unseen and mundane. The project demanded to make the work bigger and impactful, thus the complexity and dynamism of the landscape are reflected in the Meshworks.
These three months have been an extensive journey, where thought processes were nurtured and my outlook was changed. I let the project carve its’ own path, as it changed conceptually and visually, with the guided feedback of seminar panellists and my facilitators. From proposing the concept of Ephemerality, understanding and delving deep into Tim Ingold’s notion of the Meshworks, and how I derived it through my practice has been a unique journey.
And as Tim Ingold puts it “It is of the essence of life that it does not begin here or end there, or connect a point of origin with a final destination, but rather that it keeps on going, finding a way through the myriad of things that form, persist and break up in its currents. Life, in short, is a movement of opening, not of closure.” It’s a relentless journey where several paths collide and at that moment possibilities are vast.