A while back, I sent you an email outlining my curiosity with memory. I wrote —
Memory is something I love to obsess over. What is memory, if not an amalgamation of our lived experience? As if it could be that easy - as if it were a deposit we could visit at will. An old photo album, pictures with yellowed corners. A master transcript of every conversation. Shortly after we met, Andrew told me that he wished he could just download every memory in his head to a USB drive and I could upload it to my brain. There's just so much I want you to know.
I aimed to formalize this curiosity together. Push the boundaries of what we’ve been told, of what we think we know, of the narratives we’ve outlined of the lives we live. I’m humbled by the community we’ve gathered here, inspired by your vulnerability and willingness to create together.
Our mission, taken from the original Memory Collective —
to explore the nature of memory, specifically the act and art of remembering: how we do (and don't) put back together those fragments and shards, those fleeting images and lasting impressions, that reside in our memories. We wanted to test and try memory. What would happen, we wondered, if you were asked to become the assembler of someone else's memory, literally re-membering a memory that is not, in any way, your own?
Initially, volunteers submit a memory fragment, which was then anonymously forwarded to another participant in the project to “re-member.” Each Tuesday, this newsletter will publish a remembrance and the corresponding memory fragment.
See what it dredges up for you. Maybe you’ll remember something for the first time in a long time, or this will inspire you to want to remember. Together, let us question the stories we are told, the narratives we inherit. As always, thank you for reading.
Frazer Hadfield remember’s Alexandra Jamison’s Memory:
We’d build a city on the green carpet. The sofa cushions inexplicably became rolling hills, and there was always a train. The same carefully planed pale wooden blocks deployed to their usual positions - a fire station, a cathedral. Long afternoons where the sun played battle with the slatted blinds, and there was shortbread in the oven. Or sometimes cheese on toast with apple. There were names carved in trees, and carrots pulled from the patch - But when I decided it was time, he was always in the room with me, building.
Alexandra Jamison’s Memory:
