Way back in 2019 I completed work on the latest iteration of my Correspondence collage series. One of the collages featured the word “MERCY.” in the composition. The text was pulled from an article published in an ‘80s LIFE magazine about a man stranded in the Alaskan wilderness. Unfortunately, despite his best efforts, the man died before rescuers could find him but he kept a journal detailing his harrowing fight for survival. That single word was pulled from the context of the man’s journal and his plea to God for mercy.
Other than being impressed by glimpses of the man’s story, I didn’t think much of it at the time. As is so often the case, I am primarily guided by how compositional elements come together visually in my work and I liked the way the text looked and how its juxtaposition with the other design elements lent itself to lots of free association.
That piece garnered more attention than some of the others in the series and I found myself thinking more and more about the word mercy. I had the visual element of it stuck in my mind and, as an Interdiscipliniarian double majoring in English Lit and History I was growing increasingly interested in its etymology.
The first definition listed in the Oxford English Dictionary defines mercy as, “compassion or forgiveness shown towards someone whom it is within one’s power to punish or harm.” Its roots are in 12th century latin and evolved from ideas about thanks, grace, reward, punishment, pity, favor, and wares, or merchandise. I filed away the meaning and its historical roots in my mind while still contemplating the visual idea of the word removed from its original context.
I was also interested in removing it from another context. Though I grew up with evangelical attachments to the word mercy, I wondered what it would be like to contemplate mercy outside of that culture. How do people outside of a religious upbringing think about mercy? How may they articulate what mercy means? Furthermore, how are “wares” associated with experiencing mercy?
Many of the projects I begin are started with notions. Or to put it another way, I begin visually and materially exploring and obsessing over ideas before I know what their significance is. I started writing the word mercy in my journals and I photocopied the original piece I used in the Correspondence collage. Every morning for several weeks I was cutting out the word mercy from the photocopies. I also started incorporating the pieces into new works.
I was having brief tactile experiences with the word while also experiencing the need for it in my personal life. The need was twofold. I needed mercy from others and I knew I needed to extend it to people that I didn’t want to.
Simultaneously my collage work was beginning to leave the world of flat surfaces. I started making small wooden collage cubes that could be rolled like dice so that each time they landed, a new collage was visible. I also messed around with using them in sculpture. I was really enjoying the tactile experience of glueing and sanding and holding the dice. Everyone who encountered them had a visceral reaction to how they looked and felt. More and more I wanted to explore objects as canvases and it was during this time that the convergence of my contemplation of mercy and living in the moment of a tactile experience merged.
I began making rough concept sketches in my journals for a mercy “brand”. I had a lot of ideas but I knew that I needed to collaborate with other artists that had tools I didn’t have for making the concepts reality. As someone who primarily works alone, beginning to collaborate with other artists was something I wasn’t sure was going to work. But thankfully I found the right people.
I took two approaches. With one artist I went into great detail on the aesthetic I was after and how it related to my study of the word mercy. With the other artist I purposely didn't tell him anything other than the name of the new brand. I didn’t show him any other work or give him any clues. I just affirmed his style, his work, his sensibilities, and asked him to do his “thing” with the brand name. The results from both artists and working with them was deeply rewarding and full of surprises.
Mercy Tactiles Co. is in the production stages of printing and stitching soft goods that reflect my interest in the word mercy, in how we experience mercy on a tactile level, and how we should be mindful of the moment we are in. While the designs seek to invite contemplation of life, death, grace, and agency there is no single articulated meaning behind the works. Like most of my work, I am interested in exploration and seeing how other people interact with the artifacts of design. Mercy Tactiles Co. is a new way for me to do that.