< wind music > by Mieko Shiomi, 1963
Hi everyone,
Welcome to the first seasonal update from Laurel World in the year 2023.
As usual, time has passed since I last wrote! Yes, late in 2022 … I remember composing this gift guide while it was snowing.
Since then, as maybe you noticed, I moved this newsletter to Substack. Life is for the living! So here I am, typing this evening with a candle flickering nearby, listening to The Well-Tuned Piano. Not much has changed, really! Rest assured, you can still access my old transmissions at email.laurel.world.
Thank you for accompanying me on this journey …
In this letter:
Person → System
I’m traveling to Europe & other events
I’m starting a new transmission!
1 of 3.
Person → System
A few months ago, I changed my social media bio to:
“Laurel is a highly interactive system in which economy and clarity of expression are essential.”
This line was lifted directly from the Laurel Manual, a thoughtful guide for using the “Laurel” email program created for the Xerox Alto, 1981.
It feels peaceful to me … being a system … somehow. I feel less pressured to be any one version of myself at all times.
Artists have been becoming systems for a long time now.
In 1965, the poet John Giorno became “Giorno Poetry Systems” (GPS) to advance poetry. His entire artistic practice became funding his poet friends to bring their work ambiently into other mediums.
Curiously enough, many of my friends also consider themselves as systems.
It’s easy for designers, since creating a company by default allows one to seem larger than actuality. Design also goes hand-in-hand with commerce. The Seoul-based Min Guhong has a one-man, “parasitic” company called “Min Guhong Manufacturing.” In an interview a few years ago, Guhong shares with me:
“You might not be able to tell from this interview, but I am actually a very shy and sensitive person. That is, I am easily pleased or upset by others’ opinions towards me. This used to be a burden. But by standing behind the facade of my company, I am able to separate my life from my work and become somewhat indifferent to what other people say.”
It’s not difficult to become an environment. In fact, designer David Reinfurt published a helpful guide, “HOW TO: Make a One-Person Firm Seem Like a Giant Corporation” in 2001, around when he established his own company ORG, which is often confused for a company much larger.
A new friend of mine, a poet Jesse, understands themselves as a system, too. They shared that their “entire chorus of multiple selves” was speaking together in unison to me when we chatted. In the past, they used to feel strange when they acted very differently in different environments. Now as a system, they understand they’re simply “handing the mic” to the most competent self in the room for the occasion and environment at hand.
My friend Austin also uses the pronouns “they/them” because they similarly identify as a multitude, as they wrote:
“At the end of my reply I signed off using my initials AWS, a moniker I often use rather than my given name Austin. A few days later I received a confused reply from my collaborator to be. Whether in sincerity or jest they addressed me as Amazon Web Service, and requested clarity on who they were speaking to. I appreciated the interaction, because being mistaken for the largest provider of cloud computing and storage is a confusion I’m well prepared to explore. … I find it comforting that I am an ecosystem, a fleeting, highly differentiated community of cells, minerals, organisms, and energy. ‘They’ fits my orientation, and it’s a pleasant quark of the language that the term which blurs a dualism invites in a multitude.”
I realize I’ve been systematizing myself for a while now, too.
Early in my career, I created “Beautiful Company,” my design practice. In characteristic designer fashion, it was fun to play multiple roles within my company even though I was only “one person.” I also enjoyed the multiple readings of the name “Beautiful Company” — 1) Company as in Corporation, and 2) Company as in People, or “the company we keep” …
I have been publishing small entries to the website honoring my own home, Firefly Sanctuary, for a year or so now. There came a time I changed everything from first person singular “I” to first person plural “We,” and somehow it made everything more harmonious.
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Laurel: Speaking of community, there was a point at which I changed the voice of the website from a perspective of “I” to “we.”
I’ve had different people stay here while I'm away for different amounts of time. That's one of my favorite things because then they can really appreciate it as a kind of healing place for themselves. So it felt more true to use “we” when speaking about the Firefly Sanctuary. It’s a playful use of language that somehow feels true, even though I literally did most of these things alone.
Conversation with Elan about Firefly Sanctuary
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2 of 3.
I’m traveling to Europe & other events!
A few things on the docket this summer:
July 28, Beacon — I’m hosting a kite-making workshop for teens at DIA Beacon!
August 6, Amsterdam (EUROPE) — I’ll co-host a relaxing Are.na Meetup
August 11, Copenhagen (EUROPE) — I’m truly honored to speak at Naive Yearly
August 19, NYC — I’ll present at the symposium for Interact
August 30, Worldwide — Last day of this year’s Internet Onion season
And previously:
Since last summer, I’ve been the director and shopkeeper of the Are.na Gift Shop.
It’s been an honor to bring to life:
a Book — Fall 2022, by me, Webb Allen, Ayami Konishi, et al … Conversation, Item
a Shirt — Winter 2023, by Damon Zucconi … Conversation, Item
a Seed Packet — Spring 2023, by Companion–Platform … Conversation, Item
Last weekend, we hosted a “seed drop” event at Index with an inaugural planting of the fava bean seed. As I was speaking to some people at the event, I realized this gift is more like a “prompt.” It invites you to plant it, to take part in a whole experience …
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Laurel: By the way, I appreciate your email signatures and sign-offs, and how you often include additional photos at the very bottom of your emails.
Lexi: Sharing photos is something we’ve started doing more recently. Calvin and I are always taking photographs of things we see out on walks, runs, bike rides, or backpacking trips to share with one another. When we share these photos in our emails, it feels like this opportunity for a certain connectedness. Minutiae and small details sustain our creative practices and feel like nutrients to us. Email signatures are not spaces that should be taken for granted—they are beautiful spaces for adding in this special and vital detail.
Calvin: Also, to give credit on our email signatures, we worked very closely with an ikebana artist named John Rogers on a website that’s still in development.
In all of our exchanges with him, even if he was simply sending one word answers to our questions, he would also share a small image from an observation and then write extensively about that observation. It always felt like a gift! To receive this abundance at the bottom of the email has been very inspiring to us.
Even in a quick email or exchange, it’s a fantastic opportunity to always share more than what’s being asked for. It’s about finding all these opportunities and access points to share what we’re experiencing in our lives. We’re always striving to find places to squeeze in a little bit more — a bit of whimsy, ornamentation, or flourish!
Conversation with Lexi, Calvin, & Meg
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(If you’re curious about the Are.na Gift Shop project at large, you can learn more on pages 88–94 of my portfolio. I’m so thankful to Cab Broskoski, Meg Miller, and Daniel Pianetti for working with me at Are.na.)
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Cab: Where does your impulse to organize come from?
Damon: It’s less an impulse to organize and more an impulse to locate productive structures that I could work within. I’ve always had this sense that if you build a container for something, you will make things to fill it. What I frequently do is try to figure out different containers. A website is a container. For the most part, the reason I make artwork is to put it on a website [laughs].
Laurel: What’s the benefit to making your containers of found materials (like Atlas or Strata) public?
Damon: Mostly, it will contextualize the artwork I’m making, if other people have an interest. I think it’s generous and useful. I like to see that anything created is part of a larger conversation. And if someone “wears their references on their sleeve,” it becomes easy to find points of entry into that conversation.
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3 of 3.
I’m starting a publication called “Another Day in the Dome”
I’ve been dreaming about starting a regular transmission for a while now.
This “Laurel’s Letter” has been fun, but it only makes sense for me to do fairly infrequently. I’d like to publish in an ongoing way, calmly & usefully. I’m also excited to share both inside and outside of my own head, my own “dome” — while remembering this larger “dome” we all share — planet Earth, our home.
Allow me to introduce “Another Day in the Dome” — a publication currently expressed as a new Substack, which you are welcome to subscribe.
Dome to dome,
Laurel
This is Laurel’s “Letter” newsletter, which is seasonal in format.
You can experience its archives at email.laurel.world.
Thank you for receiving this transmission!