Memory is never fixed. It changes shape as time passes, becoming layered, fading in places, and forming again in ways we don’t always notice. When we think of someone, it is often not the person themselves that returns first but the traces they left behind. A single phrase, a small object, or a fleeting gesture can hold more weight than the memory of the moment itself.

Physical traces hold on to what cannot be seen, and in the end, memory leaves its own trace of someone who is no longer present.

Traces of Memory invites the viewer to sit with their own sense of longing. It asks how we preserve and rebuild our memories and how fragments held by different people can come together to shape an imagined figure. We gathered these “memories of memories” and created an artist book that allows a new family to emerge from these pieces. The pedestal that the book sits on connects the viewer to this compound family, and allows them to feel a physical presence of the people that the book contains. The book and pedestal together become a small bridge between the viewer and someone they have never met, turning intangible memories into something that can be held in the hands and interacted with.

Through this project, we wanted to create an opportunity to reflect on how we hold others inside our minds and how we quietly reshape them over time. By exploring the emotional distance between memory and trace, as well as the blurred space between presence and absence, we hope viewers will reconsider their perception of the people around them and notice the quiet empathy that forms in between.