Collecting Meaning examines the role of the designer as archivist.
A series of publications and artist books find significance in material culture and everyday artifacts.
This body of work (including multiple publications and a typeface design) is primarily autobiographical, looking at the narratives discovered through personal archives.
Through analog processes and tactile outcomes, the designer places value on engagement with materials and making, finding significance in the material world around us.
Collecting Meaning
Megan Irwin
With a focus on archival narrative and a series of tactile publications, the exhibition translates these intimate books into a large-scale dimensional collage.
The two walls converging in a corner were used like a spread in a book, with thoughtful distribution of the space.
A vignette of screenprints of everyday artifacts accompany a series of three publications.
A 38-foot scroll of page sequences from The Quotidian spans the full height of the wall.
Wallpaper patterns, camera rolls, and google map skies spill to the floor. These continuous images represent how our memories and stories are ever unfolding.
A series of publications draws narrative from the significance of material culture.
This artist book looks at a the imperfections found in analog photography and the significance behind the inclusion of these imperfect images in the family archive.
Collected photo lab ephemera from the 1970s-1990s is scattered throughout the book, creating an experience of discovery and narrative alongside the imagery itself.
This tactile, interactive artist book recalls memories of place with a curated collection of material culture from childhood places of origin. The cover, wrapper in a torn piece of risograph wallpaper, is screenprinted in gold letters.
Die-cut windows and interactive page sequences engage the viewer in an experience of materiality.
Artifacts of Memory is a collaborative zine that looks at the significance of everyday objects as memorials to people, places, and experiences.
