Like the “temperature blankets”, where the yearly temperature fluctuations are translated into knitted or crocheted “maps”, my meditation blanket depicts my “inner weather”: I choose the color I am crocheting according to the dominant emotion I’m experiencing. The blanket is a meditation tool in two regards. I use it as an object to lie on or wrap myself in, while I meditate, but I also use crocheting as a meditation exercise. Crocheting provides, what is called in meditation a “moving target”, a repetitive, soothing movement that helps focus one’s attention. It also provides a concrete support to exercise a technique called RAIN (Recognize, Allow, Investigate, Nurture) training the acceptance of emotions.
In many ways, this project is therapeutic: recording one’s emotional patterns over a long period of time helps gaining self-knowledge and considering the richness of one’s inner life. Through this project, I practice patience and humility; I reclaim control over time, shifting my focus to a time flow that is not that of sickness. In a way, the Meditation Blanket recalls what artist Michelle Grabner defines as “maintenance art”. This means making art from a place that’s close, that’s guided by the pressure of circumstances, that’s pushed out by the body, in a visceral rather than a cerebral way.
