Emergent associations
The task of marrying two objects or finding an offspring generated new associations and conversations because the designers were asked to argue for why they married two objects and chose a particular object to be the pair’s offspring. The video shows designers explaining what attracts or repels two objects. Some of the interpretations about objects were based on descriptive associations (Sam’s video of sensing objects) and might seem quite stereotypical. Other participants had cultural, historical, or emotional associations (Rita’s video of the nutcracker). The new associations emerged in the moment-to-moment interaction between the designers and the objects. The exploration process enabled the designers to explore the different ways they interpret objects and the enlarged possible associations of objects.
Findings
We used the exercise with designers to generate discussions about the relationship of the human to the object, which can be understood differently through the exercise. Making an object family tree opened the way for descriptive, physical, and culturally dependent associations of objects, which are often unspoken or taken for granted when working with objects. Initially, the designers hesitated in touching the objects and getting started with physical explorations. The hesitation subsided quickly when they were asked to rely on their first impression about an object. The process rapidly led to multiple ways of exploring objects. The exercise encouraged spontaneity and quick associations as it forced the designers to find new connections between objects in an unconventional and rapid way.
Different ways to explore the objects
The ways in which the designers selected and built the family trees revealed each person’s idiosyncratic ways of exploring objects. Dora made associations with style and human characteristics. Rita used a lot of touching and aesthetic tactility, but also the shape and form of an object were important traits. Sam used tactile sensing and told a narrative about the objects. He was sensual, fast with associations, and tried to test what the object could do. In the video, Sam uses several aspects (touch, materiality, memory) to make an interpretation. He looked at both similarities and differences of objects and traits of materiality.
The Object Family Tree is an exercise developed to sensitise performers to objects and to develop stories based on object qualities. In the exercise, the participants use all their senses to find associations that the objects bring about. Making an object family tree requires a varied collection of readymade objects with different properties and functions. The objects should (ideally) stem from different decades and cultures, be made of different materials, and be of different shapes. The exercise is done in pairs and the task is to create a family tree of mundane objects.
Three Object Family Trees
The designers created three family trees in pairs, which each told a different story. The difference in the storytelling stemmed from the people who made the family tree. People’s idiosyncratic ways of perceiving the material world and social relationships affected how they chose an object and what objects they chose. The focus of the Family Tree exercise was on the interpretation of the object. Through marrying objects, we learned how differently people respond and react to objects.
The plastic and hygge family tree: This family line started from natural materials and wooden objects, which are about hygge, and ended in a plastic generation of objects. There was a striking difference between the old and the new generation of objects, even though they shared traits of colours, shape, and form. The family tree encapsulated a story about how Rita and Tanya perceived changes in society and their reflection of the ‘new generations’ that are made of plastic.
There were two exceptions that stood out in the family line: the nutcracker and the plastic toy rod. The nutcracker was described as ‘quite a powerful character’, which came out of two sensitive characters: a gentle brush and a Japanese paper doll. The plastic rod stood out because it has a weird oblong shape compared with its round parents. However, the rod could be traced back to its great-great-grandparent, a wooden brush, which had a similar oblong shape. These emotional and sensual responses revealed not only that it was a materially streamlined family tree, but also that it included greater insights about the object characters.
- Find one object that will marry another object and explain why they marry each other: is it their functionality, their materiality, what they are made of, their history, their cultural traits, what they are attracted to or something that differs between them?
- After marrying two objects, find an offspring that the two objects will have. What the parents are, without being gender-specific, creates the offspring. Object characteristics and properties can change over the generations. The object family tree can have swings in generations, for example, one generation could consist of certain kinds of 1950s things and the new generation could be made of plastic. Conversations about why two objects have a specific offspring is at the core.
- Continue in the same manner by marrying the offspring with another object.
- Generate five to ten generations of married objects and their offspring.
- Present your family tree to other pairs/group members by showing and telling how the family tree evolved.
The posh and intellectual family tree: Objects in the posh and intellectual family line were charged with more human characteristics than in the plastic and hygge family tree. Most of the objects (a scarf, a sock, a high heel, a clock, and glasses) were things worn on the human body, which brought human associations to the designers. The scarf triggered a conversation about chic-style fashion. The scarf was seen as someone with class and sophistication. The sophistication became a key characteristic that Dora and myself came back to again in the new generations. The glassy, sophisticated, and posh watch was attracted to the similarly stylish glasses, as well as the intellectual side of the glasses. When making this family tree, the human responses to objects were far more interpretive. The human associations to style and human characteristics became the main drivers of the choice of objects.
Teaching method
The exercise has been used by European object theatre practitioners in teaching and in their research process to develop a performance. Sean Myatt has further developed the exercise in his own practice. In his words, ‘It is about connection, timelines, history, relationship and trends, and how those trends change’ (Myatt 2020). For Myatt, the exercise is about learning about the relationships that human-beings have with objects. The Family Tree exercise can help an object theatre practitioner to develop a narrative, a story, by exploring human relationships to things. People’s descriptive associations of an object play a key role: it is plastic, it is round, it is red, and so forth. Those are expanded with cultural associations: it is a toy, it is for children, it is a wheel, and it looks like it came from the 1960s. All these associations will charge the object with new meanings.
The tactile kitchen family tree: The third family line started with two bulky and static objects: the chair and the kettle. All the objects in this family tree, except the chair and the shoehorn, ended up being kitchen utilities (a kettle, a pasta ladle, and a colander). The pasta ladle and the colander both held hot pasta in the kitchen. The shoehorn had a very similar form and shape to one of the parents and shared the material traits and the texture of both parents. In this family tree, Sam responded to the objects through generational differences (from inactive to functional objects) and through subtle tactile sensing of objects based on forms and material traits (colour, materiality, texture, quality).
