Queering My Diary: A Feminist Exploration of Self
Jennifer Hammond
2018

CONCEPT: My bookwork is an exploration of the formation of my queer feminist identity, and how it feels as though it has always been apart of me in some way. It was inspired partially by the notion of non-linear time, and how experience re-informs one’s past, future, and present self. This bookwork represents me coming to understand my past, future, and present self, not as separate entities, but as moving parts that reshape themselves and the meaning I make from them.

FORM: I wanted to work with poetry, as poetry and writing in general is what I have turned to in my life to engage with my many thoughts and questions. I thought the somewhat disorganized or “mashed” aspect of collage would convey a non-linear understanding of self.  I decided to make a collage on corkboard, that would fold open, upon unwinding the yarn, and the attached poem. I felt this would put the “reader” in a mindset that is open to the ideas I was trying to portray. I liked the idea of the physical opening of the book to be a laborious and involved process, just as my feminist and queer identity formation has been. 

CONTENT: The content of the collage is pages from my favourite books, quotes, text messages with friends, journal entries, and poems I have written. I picked pieces that demonstrated the thought process I have relied on in my life – of self reflection, and asking questions – as I felt they explored my relationship, experience, and development of a feminist thought process. Further, as a feminist art piece, some of the collage contents trace moments of my coming out process as queer. The piece itself, is queer or feminist, in that it challenges normative ways of thinking, in this case, about time and identity. At times it feels that a feminist identity is a “before” and “after” process, but I hope that this piece represents that queer and feminist ways of thinking, of asking questions, have always been a part of me, in some way, no matter how small.