Heather Trofimchuk
Heather Trofimchuk
Uniting Duality
Uniting Duality
An open book isn’t anything without a reader. As a designer, I mine the proverbial open book, namely: myself, for experiences which I can then cultivate and contextualize, via design, with an eye to serving the greater good; experiences most people prefer to keep hidden, under wraps. But experiences shared, however dark, lightens the load. Shared experiences lead to identification, and identification leads to community. Mental illness and abuse are difficult subjects to address, especially publicly, and yet my installation piece entitled “Empty Words” (2019) encouraged active participation; it poked fun at the stigma, provoked laughter, stimulated conversations. It even took on a life of its own, post-installation: The band-aids printed with the usual get-over-it quips showed up as decals on computers and notebooks. In all of my work as a designer I endeavor to bring about a change of perspective, however minuscule, using non-traditional means. Language is an important aspect of my work, enabling me to utilize barrier-breaking attributes of sarcasm, irony, and humor to serious and highly sensitive subjects.