PUBLIC INTERACTIVE FABRIC INSTALLATION BY LEWIS MIRRETT

Chloe, a first year design student at OCAD, gets onto the subway at York Mills station at 7:45am on Wednesday, March 26th and manages to get a seat on the overcrowded subway car. She is very cramped and hardly able to move her arms, but she’s happy that she doesn’t have to stand for the 30 minute trip down to OCAD.

In a much less crowded subway car, Chloe arrives at St. Patrick station. Stepping off the subway car she glances at the time on the platform, 8:20am. She isn’t worried about being late because she loves making an entrance into an already full classroom.

As she enters the main building and heads for the stairs (she’s deathly afraid of elevators), a large banner with big bold black letters catches her eye: PUBLIC INTERACTIVE FABRIC INSTALLATION BY LEWIS MIRRETT ON DISPLAY IN THE MAIN AUDITORIUM. “Lewis Mirrett?” She thinks, “Isn’t he a contributing fashion photographer for Vogue?”

Intrigued, she heads for the auditorium dismissing the idea of even going to class all together. When she opens the doors to the auditorium, she feels a slight draft in the air, and a light breeze passes by her as she walks further inside. There is nothing else in the auditorium except for large swaths of white fabric suspended from the ceiling and three industrial-sized fans surrounding the grand display. Chloe stands there for about 2 minutes, fixated, watching the fabrics intertwining around themselves. Realizing she’s the only one in the auditorium, she begins wondering what she’s supposed to do with the giant dancing white sheets. That’s when she notices writing on the floor, as big and bold as the writing on the banner. She also notices about a dozen pairs of scissors arranged in a row. Further intrigued, Chloe begins to read the text:


PUBLIC INTERACTIVE FABRIC INSTALLATION BY LEWIS MIRRETT

TAKE A PAIR OF SCISSORS AND CUT/RIP/TEAR/TIE/KNOT THE FABRIC AS MANY TIMES AS YOU WANT HOWEVER YOU WANT. THE ONLY RULE IS IF YOU CUT AWAY A PIECE COMPLETELY, YOU HAVE TO TIE IT BACK TO THE FABRIC IN SOME WAY. ONCE YOU ARE DONE, YOU CAN STEP BACK FROM THE FABRIC AND SEE HOW WHAT YOU HAVE DONE CHANGES THE WAY THE FABRIC FLOWS AND MOVES IN THE CONTAINED SPACE.

YOU ARE INTERACTING WITH THIS ON TWO LEVELS
1) YOU ARE IMMERSED IN THE FABRIC AS YOU ARE ALTERING IT
2) YOU THEN GET TO OBSERVE HOW YOU HAVE CHANGED THE WAY IT MOVES THROUGH SPACE


Chloe decides to go right into it. She picks up a pair of scissors and runs into the display. As she runs through, swaths of white fabric sway and move around her, as she fully immerses herself in the fabric display. She begins cutting randomly and then tearing and ripping violently. She randomly knots together the strips she has cut. She gathers and folds one corner of one of the sheets and ties it to another corner of another sheet. She completely shreds one side of another sheet and ties each piece together. When she feels satisfied with what she has done, Chloe makes her way out of the display to look at her alterations. She stares at her new creation for about 5 minutes, watching the fabric twist and turn, and the new cuts and folds flap and take on different shapes as the wind whips around them. It’s at this point when she feels a tap at her shoulder, “excuse me, are you done? We’d like to have a turn now.” She turns around to see a long line up of students wanting to take part in the interactive display. She didn’t realize that she had been in there ripping, tearing, cutting, folding, and dancing for over an hour. “It’s all yours” she says as she heads for the doors leading out of the auditorium.