ISSUE #2: THROUGHLINES
Rain on the ocean falls differently from its terrestrial cousin. The arc is more gentle, more graceful. Because the rain knows that whatever happens in the course of its journey hurtling through fathoms of space, whenever it falls over the sea, in the end all that results is water returning to itself. This same principle is played out throughout nature (and supernature, perhaps). The themes of congruence, coherence, even inevitability, lend a certain feeling of grace and serenity. These are feelings I felt distinctly when I found myself standing in front of a Berber rug (or kilim) displayed on a wall of the museum at Jardin Majorelle, Yves Saint Laurent’s famed former estate in Marrakech. Specifically, this rug:
Berber rug at Jardin Majorelle, Marrakech, Morocco.
You see, I had seen this pattern (or something similar) several years earlier. Around 2014, the artist Jayson Musson began a series of “paintings” using the textile patterns made famous by Coogi sweaters in the early nineties hip hop scene. One of those paintings (reproduced below) was purchased by the Philadelphia Museum of Art in its permanent collection, and when it was unveiled I remember standing in front of this painting for a good twenty minutes.
Jayson Musson's "Trying to find our spot off in that light, light off in that spot" - all copyright, credit and praise to the artist.
Why was I transfixed by this particular painting? It is undoubtedly beautiful. And the references to early nineties hip hop are right up my alley. But there was something more. I think it is this: I am a child of Africa. If Africa dreams, I must respect that dream. All the sturm und drang borne from the unrequited creative freedom of African people, and all of the mud, straw, bronze, silk, gold, ivory and sweat that was in their hands, I carry that in my blood. So did the Notorious B.I.G. And so does Jayson Musson. What I was able to see in that Berber rug (and in Jayson Musson’s paintings) was just a glimpse into the centuries of creative power that bore through every obstacle to exert itself on the psyche of future generations without them even knowing it. I’m making a bold claim here, and perhaps connecting too many dots (after all, the Coogi sweater was developed by an Australian brand in the sixties). But bear with me…
A few years ago my wife shared a podcast with me about epigenetics, which is the study of how environment and behavior can change gene expressions in one’s DNA. To put it very simply, the thrust of the research in this field is about uncovering ways that our behaviors and our environments can affect the way our genes express certain characteristics (or whether they express them at all), and also how those expressions might actually be heritable. In my layman’s research on this topic I came across an article that described research about breast cancer patients and how mindfulness and meditation seemed to contribute to preserving the parts of their DNA that prevent chromosomal deterioration. There is research that also explores the opposite; in other words, it is also possible that hardship, trauma and stress can alter gene expressions in one’s DNA and can then be passed on to one’s offspring.
So my mind gets to thinking…could this also apply to something as indescribable as joy? Like, what if your ancestors, for generations and generations, cultivated a curious and profound kind of joy in a certain type of line or color or motif. And so etched into their DNA, and your DNA, was a persistent gene that recognized that “thing” and perhaps even searched achingly for that “thing” wherever it may be found. So that, unbeknownst to you, deep somewhere in the cells that make you inexplicably you is this thirsting inclination for the joy of that “thing”, which when you finally see it feels so strangely familiar that it seems to have been in your mind this whole time (which maybe it was); like a biological-cosmic deja vu. My takeaway from the movie Jurassic Park was that “life finds a way.” What if joy finds a way? What if beauty finds a way? Maybe those are all the same thing.
The Berber are a dispersed people who can be found as far north in Africa as Morocco and as far south as Niger. One thing they are well known for, even outside Africa, is their rugs. And one rug pattern in particular is distinctive of the Berber communities in Morocco, particularly those living between the western base of the Atlas mountains and the Atlantic ocean. Or so I was told. After seeing the rug pictured above at Jardin Majorelle, I set out to find a replica that I could take home with me. I ended up buying six! But my favorite one, the last one I bought, was from a huge rug shop with an old-fashioned loom where you could watch a Berber woman weaving. There, a kindly older gentleman explained that the pattern I was looking for was distinctive because it was meant to evoke the wave patterns of both the desert and the ocean. And the significance of having those two very different horizons juxtaposed, or rather intermingled, in the same motif is to remind us that life sometimes carries within its unknowable boundaries both the coarse sand and the smooth ripple; the scorching sun and the cooling rain. I’m not sure if he was just selling me a rug, but I choose to believe it. What is undeniable, even to this day as I look at the rugs I purchased hanging on the wall, is the feeling I get every time I see those undulating lines. It feels like returning home.
E
SUBSCRIBE
Sign up for news and updates