or: periphron penelopeia

weaving of thoughts in doing the work of Penelope

November 30, 2010

Spinning the Beginning

Penelope was the wife of Odysseus. She had to wait almost twenty years for his return from the Trojan war. Suitors pressed the queen to choose one of them for marriage. But Penelope postponed the decision. First she wanted to weave a shroud for her father-in-law. And she wove day by day but secretely loosened the work by night.

A famous picture from a so called skyphos found in the town of Chiusi shows her pondering in front of her loom. There we see winged figures on a fabric with decorated borders. Most scientist have stated that it is not possible to do this kind of work on such primitive tool. Well, I want to prove this wrong. And all the more I want to prove that weaving is one of the first digital technologies requiring a lot of reflections in arithmetic and the logic of spatial construction.
Some work is already done. And most of this work was done in public. Penelope has taken shape and place in Munic in October 2006. An exhibition gave an account of some classical sculpture reconstruction and there I started with the reconstruction of the weaving process. Actually I am weaving at home and want to share the process with others.

This blog will give some account of the weaving that is already done and of new projects and thoughts that emerge from the work.