PAST AS FUTURE, FOUND IN TRANSLATION: THE DROWNED WORLD BY JG BALLARD INTERPRETATION DRAWING #6: THE DROWNED WORDS Translation happens all the time. Using knowledge, experience and character, all that enters the brain and the mind is remade, is interpreted, translated; the mind constructs an image of the world outside the body in order to understand, to provide a basis for response and to create. Language is a code. When words are the mode of communication, each individual uniquely remakes, interprets, translates and, de-codes words. In his 1962 book, The Drowned World, JG Ballard created a vision of a future post-catastrophic, surreal world based on his knowledge, contemporary to his time. He drew on scientific research, his experience, perception and imagination. His vision is a translation. The copy of Ballard’s book that I was given as one of the participants in Mapping The Drowned World was in English, my second language. Following my interest in chance and systems as determinants of my creative process, I picked ten consecutive words which I didn’t understand and used a dictionary to translate in order to learn their meaning. In 2013 I developed Found In Translation (FIT) Alphabet (derived from small details of my performance drawing, A Room Without a View) in which each detail represents the 26 letters of the English alphabet. Using this pictorial system I coded Ballard’s words into drawings, constructing a surreal world of my own. The Drowned Words is a suite of ten digital photo-collages accompanied by instructions for the viewer which explain how to read the words encoded in the individual collages. The images are built with details from my drawings and fragments of photographs documenting the reality which surrounds me; the world of my time. GW
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