Cocoon

After the community builds the large Cocoon together, I ask people to make individual miniature cocoons. The miniatures are hung inside the large Cocoon.Where the large cocoon is the physical representation of the community, the miniature cocoons are the individual voices within the community. They are what people wish for the future. I ask people to choose an object, make a miniature cocoon around it, and then I interview them. I ask, “What do you wish your cocoon to become?”

Some wish to be turned into birds, or for money for food — carrots, peas, broccoli, their mother’s fried chicken, a trip to the new McDonalds. Some wish for paint to make pictures, or a mouse for their computer, or to be butterflies that hide under the bridges with the bats and listen to the river at night. A woman wishes to be re-united with her dead son and weeps quietly. A man wishes for the children he teaches to have a better life. Some see clouds full of snakes that grow wings and fly down to earth. A boy wishes a shotgun shell to be a kitten, a girl bottle caps to become a flower she can take care of at home. A 10-year-old wishes that leaves and wooden dowels turn into security from people who rob his home at night. A young man wishes for an orange car that will take him to Nebraska, a place he once saw in a magazine. A woman sprinkles her father’s cologne and mother’s face powder on the leaves she wraps in wire and wishes only for love in this world.

I will continue to post more miniature cocoons and wishes, and eventually the audio clips. More here …

All photographs by Eric Etheridge