Unseen/Seen: The Mapping of Joy and Pain

Unseen/Seen: The Mapping of Joy and Pain challenges conventional ways of seeing the Twin Cities. The project created the setting and the opportunity for the public to map where in Minneapolis/St. Paul they have experienced joy and pain. The project was a new, temporary work of outdoor public art that traveled to several parks in Minneapolis and St. Paul, the Walker Art Center and the Minnesota State Fair.
The project’s sculptural setting includes a unique table-like object that contains a custom map of Minneapolis-St. Paul. It is an accurate map with streets clearly labeled, so the visitors can easily orient themselves to it. Visitors were invited to map places where they have felt joy in gold and pain in dark gray. The setting itself subtly makes reference to this idea of joy and pain, for example, via gold leaf and dark gray surfaces. Using the setting/map was free and open to everyone, and participating in the mapping was entirely voluntary. Members of the project team were on hand in each location to talk with anyone interested about the project and invite them to add their experiences to the map.
Unseen/Seen: Mapping Joy and Pain was revealing, even cathartic. This project is part of a larger, ongoing body of work called The Place to Share Beauty and Fear which explores environments and objects of trauma and transformation. The trajectory of this work is toward engaging the public directly in this dialectic; in the case of Unseen/Seen it was through mapping. And while mapping was conceived as a potentially silent, rather private act in public space, the profound sharing of stories at the map itself suggests that this body of work may expand to operate more overtly within the realm of testimony, witnessing, and recording. The project’s success underscores the need for new types of spaces and public engagements that invite a larger range of human emotion and interaction.
New iterations of this work have been generated both in a gallery setting and as an online experience that can be accessed world-wide. Click through the buttons below for The Mapping of Joy and Pain Online Project, blog, and Mapping the Body of Joy and Pain Project.