tactile

a week ago

tomorrow, i was at the

museum of modern art (moma) in new york city.

there was so much to see,

and an above average crowd due to the monday holiday.

still, some things stood out and

are still stuck in

my mind.

upon entering one of the large rooms,

what stood out was a stationary guard

perched near a large heap of a canvas on the floor.

i don’t mean laid flat like a rug, i mean

an actual heap

folded and bent upon itself at odd angles

as if it had been dropped their by a passing giant.

the plaque on the wall read (in part):

oscar murillo

“…in addition to the paiintings

stretched and hung on the wall,

eight more paintings are unstretched and stacked on the floor.”IMG_8571crop2“viewers are invited to unfold and examine these paintings,

which are indistinguishable from the ones on the wall

in terms of quality

and were produced at the same time.”

this is called a ‘participatory installation’

and that’s what a knitting pattern is, too.

a pattern, a good one at least,

invites you

to stretch it and

to restack all its different elements

in a very ‘participatory’ way.IMG_8570cropthat’s what makes knitting alive to me.

we know that we all do it differently, and

then we welcome

each other

to get right up close and touch it,

to feel what it is that we actually love about it.

‘unfold’ 106:13 of the psalms.