ready to assemble, a sound-based installation

Ready to Assemble is a sound-based, interactive installation that seeks to convey the human experience of migration. When everything that was once true is thrown into question, what does one latch onto in order to survive? And what is the value of our personal experience if it’s just that, personal?

This project’s initial point of inquiry emerged at the crossroads of identity and nationality in the context of moving to New York City.

The question: “Does being away from one’s country of origin cause one to identify more with said country?” In order to answer it, I conducted a series of interviews with subjects from the artists’ home country of Peru.

Initially, the intention to capture sound and voices was an attempt to avoid the assumptions that arise from perceived racial signifiers. However, our interview subjects almost universally arrived at the conclusion that nationality is something that only exists on paper. But what about our hopes, fears, and dreams? What about our stories? 

In the project’s second phase we conducted a series of interviews with subjects across the socio-political spectrum. An eight-year-old soon-to-be child model from Kazakhstan, a sixty-year-old restaurateur from Greece, and a twenty-six year-old film producer from Peru were among the sixteen participants chosen to be featured in the final installation. The challenge then became answering the following two questions: What do all subjects ultimately share? And how do we visually represent this shared humanity?

The answer to the first question, in true Newtonian fashion, hit us over the head: Ikea. Ikea as a symbol of the mass-produced, cheap, banal reality we live in, a ready to assemble reality. Beyond the fact that our subjects all had furniture from Ikea in their homes was the idea that they all used these objects to tell their stories. Objects play the double role of representing this ready-made reality and how we’ve come to customize our personal realities. Almira still keeps that onesie her best friend gave her. Luis wants to drink a cup of tea with his deceased grandmother. George burns incense every day to remind him of Greece. Suddenly, the stories these people shared turned into dense narratives, and their humanity bubbled to the surface for all to see, or hear. These objects allowed them, in all their plywood, coated, banality, to achieve uniqueness. 

Ready to Assemble consists of a completely generic Ikea shelf, one generic object per compartment, meant to evoke a commonplace action: shopping.

What if, instead of purchasing objects, we could purchase someone’s story?And more than that, what if instructions on how to build these stories represented a significant effort toward achieving comprehension beyond language?

When we distill human beings to their essence, their voices, we’re more able to access our ultimate empathy. I didn’t receive a onesie from my best friend, my grandmother, thank god, is still alive to share a cup of tea with me, but that doesn’t mean I can’t relate to what Almira and Luis are saying. 

Because capitalism is inextricable from our everyday experiences, we chose to present excerpts from the interviews on mass-produced, Chinese-imported mp3 players hidden in the pedestals beneath each object. Users are expected to grab the airplane–inspired headphones provided, plug into each pedestal, and listen to a reality that isn’t as ready to assemble as we’re used to. Enjoy! 

Note from the author (2023)

Empecé mi proyecto de tésis cumpliendo con los requerimientos de Communication Design, la carrera que estaba acabando. Este, tenía un fuerte contenido editorial y/o tipográfico pero la química con mi asesora de tésis en el momento no cuajaba. Así, a la mitad del año decidí pasarme a la clase de Design and Technology, con un montón de alumnos que no conocía salvo Auriel Rickard, un skater boy de Hawaii. El profesor, Ernesto Klar no solo era un venezolano que vivía en el exilio y por ende, compartía tanto mi experiencia como la de mis entrevistados, sino que además, supo darme la libertad para crear algo que no era ni una página web, ni un libro necesariamente, ni una marca ni nada. Era una instalación, tenía un fuerte componente tecnológico pero también, de investigación y narrativa. Y supo guiarme al entregable final. No diría que el proyecto tiene aires de periodismo porque la veracidad nunca estuvo incluída en la búsqueda. Más bien, y para tranquilidad mía ahora que lo entiendo de lejos, siempre estuvo ligado a conocer a la personas a través de las historias que nos cuentan de ellos mismos.