In Ayse Birsel’s 5-week Deconstruction/Reconstruction course, students are asked to create a novel, modular system or “language” to describe their lives—something algorithmic and additive.
Lusha Huang’s inspiration drew from a rainbow palette of color, which she used as a metaphor of the current status of her life. Using different colored inks as the base modules, she gave each color a specific meaning: Pink represents love, for example, white represents herself, yellow represents you—the viewer.
The modules interact inside a water-filled vessel, representing the fluid and vital element of life. When different color inks were dropped into the vessel, a distinct message is formed. The message, “I love you”, for example, is represented by the droplets of white, pink, and yellow inks.
Finally, different quantities of color drops can be used to extend meaning. For example, where one drop of yellow ink means “you”, two drops mean “you” in the plural, and three mean “friends”. One drop of pink is “love”, but three drops is “family”. In this way, the language can be broadened, and the messages can become more complex.