Memories are something that is gathered in your mind, tidied up and let go eventually. I would like to introduce an exhibition that beautifully expresses this process. Baksohada is a book artist and designer who shows a variety of works using books and paper. The title of the exhibition is ‘A Store That Sells Memories.’
“I give my joy to you today.”
Some memoriesvanish with objects but some remain in your mind even without objects. My hands busily working with objects come to pause, while I think that I had a good day with many beautiful people and I restore my memories for the moment. I put the medium of memories in a box. And I decide to let it go. – From a writer’s note
We usually say that there is a memory storeroom in our mind. We put the names of categories, such as good memories and bad memories, and store each of them in a different quarter of our mind. We sometimes open up a drawer to view them, or we sometimes go through a difficult time as some unintended memories randomly pop out. The writer has embodied our mind using small paper boxes and some tiny boxes.
If you open up the tiny boxes, our memories are embodied in a more concrete way.
Our memories are actually an assortment of tiny pieces of moments. Buttons dropped from your favorite clothes, a dice from the board games you played with your friends when you were young, a train ticket from your trip… the reason why we keep them is because of the emotions and feelings buried in that moment. We want to grasp and keep the moments in any way. However, the pieces of memories collected in the tiny box silently stay still without life, just like a stuffed butterfly.
Baksohada has expressed the storage of memory that we keep so ardently in a sensible but realistic way. The boxes of mind that have now become our attachments show us they are difficult to discard. But after having looked into our mind, we realize the true nature of our memories. The moments that we once believed the ‘reality’ are just like petals that became dry and crumbled without life.
Probably, we need such a process. We find a memory storage space within us… we open a drawer in our mind, take out boxes, face the emotions within them and discard it; and even at the moment that we ‘let go’ of it, in that place, there would be some room to breathe and a place we could find’composure’ rather than just a void. To catch our breath to have a fresh start again: this might be something that we need to do now.
Here, let us look at one of the writer’s memory boxes in detail. It is a box that any one of us would definitely have: a memory box about enemies, people we don’t like.
“It is said that people come to hate the ones who are like them. Their self can be projected through them so that hatred is revealed more clearly. If you have someone you don’t like, that is to see yourself. And thus, you need to reflect on yourself first.”
– Baksohada
A memory box of hatred is hidden deep in the mind. The moment you realize that everything – the box that seems big within a box, people, hatred – is nothing more than just pieces of paper and a tiny box, and then when coming out of the box, the true forgiveness begins. The true forgiveness is, as in the writer’s note above, to reflect on your mind and see what is in you. Then, it must be let go.
If you have discovered yourself sitting in a box of your mind today, bravely come out of the box and look into your mind from the viewpoint of the world. Let go of the memories of the past and take the dashing steps to the world. That would be the most clever way to live in the moment.
