Altar'd

Thesis Studio 2

Thesis Faculty

Nancy Valladares

by Derrius Rahman

Loretta Wolozin

Project Summary

Summary image

Altar’d inscribes and continues a tradition of care through the act of archiving and sharing Black and Brown Queer testimonies. Through a process of interviews and ritual-based gatherings, testimonies and 3D-scanned personal objects are gathered to be presented in the form of a short film. Accompanying this film is an installation that allows participants to approach an altar, whose centerpiece is a collective garden constructed at the aforementioned gathering. Through its presence, it invokes the theme of a necessary maintenance that arrives, both in our physical and emotional bodies. Adorned in the likeness of so many altars that exist presently, the installation becomes a living, breathing testament to the ways in which we take care of ourselves and why we do so.

Themes/Topics of project archiving ritual social/cultural identity (gender, race, ethnicity) queerness

Audience(s) / Community(ies)

Black and Brown queer folks actively contribute to the archive and the project centers their stories. Participation in the view is open to the general public.

Process

Ultimately, Altar’d came from a series of ideas and explorations with technology and its ability to document and affirm Black and Brown Queer existence. The first phase was planned using a software called ArteSteps which saw the use of personal objects juxtaposed with the narratives of care in a large scale space where the idea was that participants could leave a message after hearing someone else’s. This grew and changed as I began to reach out to my Black and Brown Queer friends, eventually culminating in a mock-up through Figma exploring how I could display story and object. “You can’t Figma an Altar” was the incendiary phrase to push me into building a physical altar and meeting the necessary practitioners to help me along the way. Final stages consisted of refining the installation design and layout as well as hosting a dinner party that served as the keystone for generating the center of the altar and providing space for ceremony and the scanning of objects.

Left:Tech setup for the final installation. A projector is pointed into a frame using back projection to display the film. The front of the frame hosts the altar and is decorated in the fashion of one.

Right, Top: Steps in the process. Participants are reached out to and either in person at a dinner party or digitally they scan their objects of care into 3D meshes.

Right, Bottom: Scanning process from the dinner party

Middle, Bottom: Planting process from the dinner party.

Left:Still from first video version, using text and image

Top Left: First version of the project in ArteSteps. This version imaged a interactive screen with booths to leave a message

Top Center: Prototype altar, with wrap made of the composite 3D mesh images

Top Right: Installation mock-up with planned flow diagram

Bottom Left: Figma version of the project with interactive objects

Outcome

The in person dinner party which led to the content in the installation was a key moment in ensuring the success of the pop-up show installation. Through collaboration and connection, the dinner party set a tone of acceptance and excitement for this work that carried through in the installation. The installation invited many people in and despite hardships around space and constraints, the experience generated an overwhelming positive response. I felt beyond grateful for the interaction and the participation and being able to hold space for those in my community. I think the staging was particularly successful in achieving a certain warmness and sacredness. Above all else, I’m excited to see where this work goes and honored to have had folks contribute both in testimony and experiencing the installation in person.

Above: In person experience of the film and altar. Participants are immersed in the space, listening and contemplating.