1. Mediated and non-mediated material properties
The students were divided into four groups with approximate 8 in each group. Every group had the task to discuss in detail the properties of each material and focus on haptic, structural, visual and auditive qualities rather that functional qualities and affordances. Each group had an empty formula where they were asked to write down the properties they felt could describe the different materials.
The aspect of mediation was brought to the attention of the students when they were put together with their partner group (Group 1a with group 1b and 2a with 2b). Here they should discuss what properties each material was given by the groups, and it became very clear how important the media (in this case silicone) is to any material appearance, but also how much of our knowledge is based on previous memory – more about that later.
One group who had ‘raw’ material gave dried leaves the following characteristics: Porous, fragile, structured, symmetric, organic, dead, skeleton – the same leaves casked into silicone was characterized by another group: Nice, transparent, detailed, weaving patterned. Here the characteristics were in the first case very much connected to the experience of touching and handling the material where the latter was connected to seeing the material. In other cases like for instance salt the highlighted properties were very similar in all four groups with words like crunchy, edgy, raw and breakable. Only one group with ‘raw’ materials referred to the iron-like taste. See the tables on the following pages for a detailed view on how different the material properties were captured.
The discussions the students had when they were brought together with their partner group were really enlightening and interesting. There were many childhood memories and bodily experiences that were told. Cake sprinkles and how they crush between your teeth and how you preserved flowers and plants in old books in your childhood were among the comments. Grandmothers were mentioned several times. In fact the groups with mediated materials referred more often to the memory of the materials than the materials themselves. It seemed like the silicone casks were preserving memories.
José van Dijck points out in her book Mediated Memories in the Digital Age that “Memory and media have both been referred to metaphorically as reservoirs, holding our past experiences and knowledge for future use” (van Dijck p. 2). She further mentions that “Media and memories… are not separate entities – the first enhancing, corrupting, extending, replacing the second – but media invariably and inherently shape our personal memories, warranting the term “mediation””. (van Dijck p.16).
In this case the test with the students showed that the direct description of the properties were stronger in the case of ‘raw’ materials where the spoken of connection to memory were strongest in the case of ‘mediated’ materials. “Mediated memories are the activities and objects we produce and appropriate by means of media technologies, for creating and re-creating a sense of past, present, and future of ourselves in relation to others” (van Dijck p.21). This raises interesting issues about the relationship between media and memories, and documenting and forgetting. When the materials are casked into the silicone it becomes a preservation of eternal life as one of the groups said, but it also represent the forgotten properties that are lost in the preserving, mediating act.
Material Research Project
