Packaged Narrative Project - "Memento Vivere"

Following the idea of bringing back my childhood, the packaging (the box) was built in wood using the design of The Little Prince’s imaginary box. I chose this reference because I used to have this book when I was a child and I strongly feel attached with its message. The concept of the box containing a sheep that you can’t see extremely relies to the way that I perceive my childhood. (“L’essentiel est invisible pour le youx”) I see my childhood as that part of me that I find more pure and essential in every aspect. It is that period in everybody’s life where we are extremely naive and without fear show the essence of our soul. 

During the process of the box I found important to show a floor plan of my house in Cuba, so I could bring the viewer closer to my memories and the place where most of the experience happened. I also wanted to create a surprise effect by having two compartments inside the box, where in the first one you could only see the zin, and in the second one you would encounter the floor plan with the objects. I see my box, objects, and zin as a journey back to the beginning. The objects were crayons, africanas (a type of cookie that was part of my childhood), and stamps. The zin (postcards) doesn’t have stamps on it, so I was wisely advised to use stamps as one of my objects. I really liked this idea and made ten Cuban stamps and ten American stamps to represent the­ two homes in my life.  

After so much thinking of a title, I chose to name it “Memento Vivre” because my box represents memories of a lifetime that, although sometimes was hard, it was full of joy and life. I think it functions as a way of reminding us how easy life can turn out to be if we just take things like kids do. It is way to push everybody to meditate about their childhood and make up with that kid inside you. It is a way to look at things in another perspective and encourage yourself to embrace life and its essence. 

Zin Project - "Memento Vivere"

Process of the Zin 

The main idea or concept behind my zin was to create a collection of memories of my childhood. In my case, the zin is build up by twenty postcards with printed pictures of drawings that I made when I was a child. The drawings are a reflection of my psyche back then, and along with the writing illustrate the narrative. The writings on the back of the postcards are passages of things that my mind has kept of my childhood in Cuba. It is a way to talk to myself and remember the person that I was when I was a kid. The things that I experienced and the way that I received them, the bad, the good, everything becomes a conversation with my other I. The postcards show both sides in one, the person that I was in the past and the person that I am in the present. Since I’m Cuban, of course, the writing had to be in Spanish, it couldn’t have been written in a better way. This project has awakened things that I thought I had forgotten, but that instead remain in my subconscious. It’s bizarre the way that the mind works sometimes.