Feeling Measurements: Fathoming and Unfathoming, 2018

Workshop in Cordage Making and Storytelling

In collaboration with Alexis Hogan and the Geography Club

Open Space, Lekwungen and W̱SÁNEĆ Territories (Victoria, BC)

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fathom: a unit of measurement derived from the span of one's outstretched arms; an ability to understand or when used in the negative (unfathomable) an inability to understand. 

storey pole (or story pole, storey rod,[1]): is a length of narrow board usually cut to the height of one storey.[6] It is used as a layout tool for any kind of repeated work in carpentry including stair-building, framing, timber framing, siding, brickwork, and setting tiles. It makes for quick, repeatable measurements without the need of otherwise calibrated measuring devices or workers skilled in using them.

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On January 27th at 4:30pm Open Space artist in residence Kerri Flannigan, co-collaborator Alexis Hogan, and curator Megan Quigley will host an invasive species cordage making workshop and discussion. During the workshop, we will queer the practice of fathoming by creating a system of marking and measuring our various responses to shared stories through knots. Participants will learn to create cordage from the invasive scotch broom, and through the combination of storytelling (prompts provided), we will fathom a series of actions and knots for collective remembering. This workshop marks the final action of the Feeling Measurements residency, the final knot in the marked rope of a number of stories, memories, and interventions. 

Anchored in the fathom as a metaphor, Feeling Measurements has become an emergent, collaborative, and inter-generational methodology of research, skill-sharing, and storytelling. Feeling Measurements asks - how do we relate to, and move through our physical, emotional, technological, and sonic environments, from intersectional queer perspectives?