Cycles of Making and Memory

This practice-led project investigates how slow, reconstructive textile practices, informed by emotional memory and intergenerational dialogue, can extend the material potential and emotional durability of overlooked materials. It considers how cyclical and reflective processes, together with light-mediated perception, may open up a more intimate and emotionally grounded understanding of sustainability. The project develops a body of textile-based sculptural light works through slow and intuitive making, engaging with cycles of making, memory, and transformation. Overlooked materials, including textile fragments, loofah fibres, yarn, and reclaimed lighting components, are reconstructed through repeated practices. Their material possibilities gradually emerge, bringing together light, shadow, texture, and layers of memory that shift from past traces to present encounters and future emotional connections. When unlit, the works exist as quiet sculptural forms that evoke fragments of memory. When illuminated, they become subtle light sources that activate emotional connections through gentle interactions between light and material. Informed by my father’s handmade practices, the project reflects on intergenerational approaches to making and material use. Acts of repair and reuse, once driven by necessity, are reconsidered within a contemporary context of overconsumption. The work engages with cycles of material transformation, making, and emotional experience. These processes reflect historical, contemporary, and emerging layers of meaning which gradually accumulate over time. Through this practice, emotional durability is understood as something that develops through sustained engagement, cyclical processes, and evolving relationships between people, materials, and memory. In this research, sustainability is understood as a relational process grounded in care, memory, and ongoing engagement with materials.

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Design

Grantor dc:publisher

Auckland University of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

2026

Author dc:creator

• Hu, Meng

Advisors dc:contributor.advisor

• Whitty, Jennifer
• Kalyanji, Jyoti

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/10292/21780

OAI record oai:identifier

https://openrepository.aut.ac.nz/server/oai/request?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=dim&identifier=oai%3Aopenrepository.aut.ac.nz%3A10292%2F21780