Placemats @ HASTAC 2023 – Fashioning Circuits

In June 2023, we brought our Placemats project to the bi-annual meeting of HASTAC, the Humanities, Arts, Sciences, Technology Alliance and Collaboratory, hosted at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, New York.

The theme of the conference was “Critical Making + Social Justice,” and it seemed like the perfect place to hand make data visualizations connected to our recent shared experience.

What We Did

Approximately two weeks prior to the event, we circulated a form collecting keywords about how people felt during the ongoing COVID-19 health crisis. This method requires some pretty extensive data cleanup, but we were able to narrow it down to the top 9 keywords.

At the event, we set up three tabletop looms, each of which had 3 of the top keywords. Sections of the warp on each loom were labeled with keywords and participants wove the weft on the words with which they identified for their own experience of COVID. If someone had other ideas or experiences they wanted to highlight, they were invited to write those keywords on pieces of bias tape that could be woven or tied into the textile.

Three tabletop simple looms sit on a conference table. There is a bin of yarn, pairs of scissors, and rows of bias tape are also on the table.

Reactions

The looms were set up in a conference room for the duration of the conference and we found that the room filled different roles at various times. During panel sessions, the weaving project provided a quiet respite from the hustle and bustle of the conference. During common times like lunch, the looms became more of a social hub, with folks sitting around eating lunch, weaving, and chatting. The conference table became akin to the kitchen tables of our homes where womxn and other folks gather to do the work of the domestic and digital, while sharing experiences, forming connections, and so forth.

A non binary person with short dark hair and glasses sits with their back to the camera, weaving on th eloom. — Quiet Weaving Time

Many women of different ages and races sit around the table smiling, eating, and weaving. — Quiet Weaving Time

Pulling it All Together

Near the end of the penultimate day, Kim Knight gathered up the looms and used her hotel room as HQ to assemble the final placemat for HASTAC 2023, which then want on display in the media arts show on the last day of the conference.

a red pouch with hearts holds paint pens. It sits on a hotel room desk alongside shrink tube, a heat gun, a glue stick, scissors, pliers, and other miscellaneous supplies. — Hotel Room Assembly Station

The three finished looms with weaving on each. — Hotel Room Assembly Station

The three pieces of textile have been combined into one placemat. The edges of the placemat have beads indicating the keywords for each set of warp strings. A paper tag lists the name, date, and location where this placemat was created. — The assembled placemat on display at the media arts show, including keywords on wooden beads and a tag showing the event name, place, and dates.

The Placemats Project was conceptualized by members of Fashioning Circuis, with Kim Knight, Atanur Andic, and Kasif Rahman taking point to bring it to fruition.

Thanks so much to Chris Alen Sula and the entire HASTAC conference team for making Placemats a part of HASTAC 2023!