“Memory Bottles” is an explorative 3D digital space where over-sized bottles contain different places that can no longer be accessible to the public in the physical world. These settings include a plain, grassy walkway behind a neighborhood before it was turned into more homes; a group campsite at a beach before it underwent construction; and a bookstore coffee shop before it closed down due to the loss in sales during the COVID-19 quarantine. The viewers will be able to “walk around” to and inside each bottle in a “sight-seeing”/“gallery” manner through its digital form. In addition, ambient sounds, music, and dialogue—that corresponds to personal experiences that have occurred in each bottle—could be heard throughout the digital space. These locations are in bottles to replicate the act of finding a message in a bottle. When finding a message in a bottle, one discovers a part of someone’s past that is now shared with the founder. It is the act of being able to share such “vulnerable” parts with strangers that appeals to me because I believe sharing emotional experiences with others helps demolish the barrier that makes others “strangers”. I also believe that by sharing these parts of ourselves to others, we accept them as a part of ourselves.
This project is inspired by the loss of loved ones and close friends, whether they have left the physical world forever or have unknowingly abandoned the “fated” string that connected us together. I revisit them through places, objects, and dialogues from my memories but also through the physical means they hold significance to. However, there are places I can no longer visit because their physical form has been destroyed or removed to create something entirely new. In response, this project allows me to “physically” preserve these locations and share them with others even though they are in a digital form. While they are presented digitally, this demonstrates the fact that the human and machine have the tendency to collide, especially when the human body becomes transported in the digital realm through their devices. Although these places pertain to my experiences alone, I believe that this project will have some sort of relevance to others in the sense that they too have locations that they can no longer visit due to economic events. The addition of dialogue also reveals that each moment of our lives (whether they were happy or not) are stepping stones for one’s journey, helping them grow as an individual. By including my experiences of regrets and self-exploration, I not only share the fact that I accept all parts of myself that define me as the individual I am today, but also hope to encourage others to find self-love and acceptance among themselves as well.
Artist Bio
Almarie-Crista Mercado is a Digital Media artist who pursued a BFA at San Jose State University. Throughout her educational career, she has obtained many tools and techniques on how to create art through softwares such as Blender, Unity, Adobe's After Effects, and PhotoShop to name a few. She finds the idea of the medium itself intriguing, because her artworks could have varying impacts and meanings due to the form they took in. Through different mediums, she constantly finds new ways of expressing herself whilst also discovering who she is as an artist. She has a growing interest in video art, 2D illustrations, and 3D models. Her artworks have always included aspects that could be of her own experiences, histories she has discovered through education, and/or ideas that were developed from her sheer curiosity and interest. The people whom she surrounds herself with have encouraged her to begin her path of becoming an artist to which they have been her driving force in creating artwork.
