Appologie For Understanding
Needlepoint on Fabric
7.8x7.8 in. (20x20 cm) ea.
2014

Appologie for Understanding is inspired by an essay titled “Three Questions on Six Times Two” by Deleuze about the French filmmaker Jean-Luc Godard, where he claims that “the key thing is Godard’s use of ‘AND’,” and this is important because our thought is modeled on the verb to be—“IS”. The Sky “IS” blue. The mountain “IS” high. But the use of the conjunction “AND” sets things free. “AND” isn’t a specific conjunction or relation, it brings in all relations. There are as many relations as “AND”. It doesn’t just upset relations, it upsets being, the verb and so on…” Appologie for Understanding uses textiles to fabricate letter patterns. The conjunctions “and,” “as,” and “like” are presented using identical embroidered compositions. A set of consonantal phonemes—such as “th” and “jh” in English, and “gh” and “kh” as the roman equivalent of Farsi letters—are embroidered in another piece, teasing out slippages in written language through various phonetic (mis)pronunciations which fail both native and non-native speakers. If meaning and reference function by a set of relational patterns among language-users, Appologie for Understanding unweaves these patterns in the conventional systems of references between the visual and the textual.