Twists, Knots & Holes

I've always had in interest in collections and the effect of repetition. Inspired by finding the bobble hat and rosette collections I began looking for other collections, in some instances collections that occur in public. Collections that aren't always obvious. A collection of people for example, united by a common belief or interest. A public protest, maybe. This got we thinking about football again and the taxonomy of a football crowd. A collection of people united by their support for their team.

"Collections are constructions or compositions, "the ultimate term in the series that marks the collection is the 'self,' the articulation of the collectors own 'identity'."

Susan Stewart

This train of thought brought me full circle back to the bobble hats for some reason. Then i started about how the texture and colours of them, and how great they were. Then I thought of scarves. I began to collect images of football scarves, and collections of football scarves when they are held aloft at matches to create a sea of fabric, almost merging into one.

This jolted me into realizing how common place football scarves are at matches and how much part of the furniture they are. They are everywhere at matches, I'd become so used to them, I'd started to not even notice them anymore. They display team colours, team slogans, and you also get 'half and half' scarves, which are made for almost every match. They have one half dedicated to one team, one half to the other and usually the date and competition.

I started to think about the purpose of these scarves. I came to the conclusion they in essence have to purposes, they are either designed as a memory, something to collect, to mark an occasion (a match) or a show of identity (this is my team) when held aloft.

"ARTICULATION OF THE COLLECTORS IDENTITY"

This considered, I now consider the scarf, in particular the football scarf, as

"A universal vehicle to display information."

14/3/2011