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As a very small child, Morgan was immersed in science. Daughter to two biologists, she learned about fungus at the dinner table, about fish over campfires, and about everything else through books. A senior Biology major and Classical Studies minor, she has continued to nurture her love of learning about the world through different avenues. She can talk equally long about the problems with modern legislation regarding Marine Protected Areas and Latin grammar. After graduation, she plans to couchsurf, teach science with the Peace Corps, and eventually go to nursing school.

Morgan McCluskey

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Nodes of Entanglement

The feelings

It’s 5pm the day after the exhibition. This past week has been a whirlwind of tangling, untangling, retying, puzzling out, panicking, listening to Mumford and Sons, and mentally preparing for the end of my college career. Yesterday afternoon was so incredibly rewarding, inspiring, and cathartic. Getting to see people interact with my piece in the way I wanted my audience to validated all the work I’ve put in this year. Seeing all my friends and some surprise family step inside my world and watch the movement of my wire animals and literally connect the dots of the web that has been swirling around in my brain for the past 9 months was unreal. I was constantly trying to covertly watch everyone as they stepped up and into my piece during the exhibition. And I loved when people came up to me and asked what a particular part meant, or how I’d come up with the idea for a project like this. At one point, there was a line waiting for the chance to step inside my project -- it was unreal. Amid all this, I think my favorite thing happened with a friend with whom I’d spent a quarter at the Hopkins Marine Station. He initially wanted me to talk him through my project, but I insisted he just go experience it. He then came rushing back and was excitedly talking about the concepts behind my thought process and the connections among coral reef organisms. In short, he got it.

I think it’s difficult to put into words the emotions that were flying through me yesterday. A part of me wants to believe that in doing TSR I found the perfect way to end senior year and cap off my Stanford career. But another part is telling me that I’ve just found another side of my intellect that I wish I’d had the chance to explore more while at Stanford. I think my feelings are changing on a hourly basis, but I know that being a part of TSR has opened my eyes and challenged me in ways that I didn’t know I needed, but that I will continue to seek after leaving Stanford.

The other part of the exhibition that I can’t quite get over was seeing my peers’ projects. Having heard their initial ideas in the fall, seeing the creative process morph into concrete projects in the winter, and then seeing the execution of so much creativity in the spring has been simultaneously a hugely growth-filled experience for me, and a process of growing admiration for the people I have the privilege of calling my friends and peers. Seeing all of our works in one place yesterday was the greatest kind of celebration of our work. In some ways, I feel like this type of collaborative creative process intertwines all of us involved in ways that we can’t really parse out of the final projects. I know the constructive input, insightful advice, brilliant ideas, and honest opinions I received throughout this year made my project better than I ever could have imagined.

The Piece

It’s big. It’s reflective. It’s (for now) tangle free. And it means something. Seeing the images and ideas that had been in my head and poorly drawn on paper fall quarter realized into a three dimensional and physical cylinder of string and wire hanging suspended and stable, is unreal. Something that hit me while I was installing it in Wallenberg was the sheer amount of time I put into bending the words, configuring the connections, tying the strings, cutting the ends, gluing the knots… the journey of physically creating the piece that is hanging now was enormously time consuming. Towards the end of this quarter when I told people about my project, I would say it was simultaneously my favorite and my least favorite thing right then. Both the bane of my existence in its seemingly infinite tangles and catches, yet also a source of immense pride in myself, this project was in no small way a labor of love. I think I not only demonstrated my love of coral reefs, of biodiversity, of ecosystem functions, of the ocean, and of the entire natural world, but I also discovered an outlet for self care. Focusing so intently on a project that was wholly my own has undoubtedly been one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve had at college.

It also makes me laugh at the naivete I began this process with, not knowing that the deceptively simple task of hanging a piece that weighs less than fifteen pounds would take months of planning and lots of help to execute. Without the support of my best friend and the kindness of the PRL TA’s, the project would not be in it’s final form as it stands. I remember in the middle of winter quarter, as I prepared to purchase the aluminum tubing from which I was planning on building the structural support system, I panicked. I didn’t know how to process the idea that I was embarking down a process of which I had no previous experience or conception of how to accomplish. Simply going into the PRL still terrifies me. I don’t exactly remember how I got myself through that afternoon of panic. But I remember the feeling of sheer terror that I was not going to be able to produce the type or quality of work that I expected and wanted from myself. I worked myself into a state where I was paralysed with fear and anxiety about how to move forward and achieve what I wanted. I’d not felt that way in a long time. Then again, this entire process pushed me so outside of my comfort zone in ways that I never imagined. And looking back, I am so happy and proud of the changes that I’ve gone through. I’ll also never forget what it was like to walk around campus with a ten foot piece of aluminum tubing: people were certainly confused to say the least.

The changes

Sometimes I’m really good at pinpointing the exact moment that pushed me out of my comfort zone and prompted a realization. In some ways I think it was that panic-filled afternoon, and in the moments after my meltdown when I told myself that this was possible, and that I was going to do it. But it also might have been the first time I hung the hoop. The first time a hoop as big as I am was hanging perfectly horizontal eight feet in the air. Magic happened in Gilbert that day. And magic continued to happen as I started tying hundreds of little knots. And untying other knots. All throughout this magical process I found a part of myself that I hadn’t previously fully explored, filled with a drive and determination to focus passionately on something that made me so happy and frustrated at the same time. It’s been a feeling that I think I’ve been chasing my whole time at Stanford, but only ever caught whiffs of during a long take home final (thank you Sue) or in the middle of a particularly interesting essay about the history of women’s medical history in ancient texts. Challenging and changing, those experiences are the reason I wanted to pursue an education from such an amazing university. And they are also the reason I have persevered in my biology degree, even when sometimes I was disheartened and discouraged. In that way, this project was the perfect kind of catharsis and validation: I am a scientist, an artist, and a lifelong learner.

The other kind of changes that this project rocked and rolled through are literal, physical changes in direction and media. At the very beginning of this journey, I remember excitedly stating in a workshop that I wanted to “fill a room with an idea.” Installation art has always fascinated and impressed me, so the chance to do something akin to an installation was a huge draw. Throughout the next few months, the idea went through a lot of changes as I scaled the project down to a manageable size given the time frame and the space it was destined for in Wallenberg. At one point it was a room with many spots for people to stand, at another it was a swing with cushion, then it became something extremely interactive in which people added their own thoughts, until finally it settled on the form it is now. Even then, as I learned how to work with the strings and manipulate the wire, small changes, both aesthetic and scientific, shifted the focus of my project. Twists or knots, dark blue or light blue, gradient or single color, mirrors, lights, fabric, Latin… all choices I made in the evolution of the piece itself. The process of its development, I believe, made it was it is today. As cliched as it may sound, this piece and I grew together: my hands were executing what my mind’s eye and heart wanted the piece to be, and what it needed to represent.

The idea

I mentioned the idea already, but I wanted to take a moment to actually think about the idea itself and about the inspiration. The realization of my inspirational moment was crucial for this project, I think, because it allowed me to strive to create a feeling as opposed to just a physical piece. The clarity with which I remember that moment on the reef, my skin vibrating with the life of the reef and soaking in all of the atmosphere of the swirling colors of life around me, gave me a goal. If I wanted this project to be successful as something that would inspire people to think about the beauty of reefs and take thoughtful steps to help with their preservation, or to just keep reefs in the back of their mind in the modern melee that is the climate crisis, I needed to not only show them something beautiful, but to bring the into that reef with me. This goal very much influence the shape of the piece, since I wanted the audience to feel like they were a part of the corals’ world. That single aspect shaped the physical form of the piece. And I think, in the moments when I lurked on the other side of Pooja’s whale and watched people’s faces light up when they stepped inside and lightly touched an organism only to have the whole web wiggle, in those moments I saw my goal realized.

More concretely, I mentioned above the various changes the idea when through during the process of this project. And like I said, I think that evolution and process of realization of the physical form of the piece makes it so much better. And since I like building meaning into everything, for me that evolution is like the processes that originally created this world of the corals that I so appreciate. Without the evolutionary process we would not be here to see the beauty in the ephemeral sunlight on the energy-harvesting zooxanthellae, or in the slow waving motion of the turquoise anemones. I would have been surprised had my project not gone through drastic and minor changes throughout the process of creation.

The process

I’ll never forget the day in class fall quarter when we talked about going knowingly into the realm of uncertainty with the certainty that we would find our way. I think it was right before we were asked for initial ideas when none of us had really thought about it. I had thought a bit about it the day before, on October 6th, and written this:

The first idea I’ve had is about ecological webs because I love connections. Between people and organisms. Because connection and communication are what makes life interesting and meaningful. Connections are the way we let people know that we care and the way we grow. Connections in nature are similarly about survival and the interdependence of the world.

The next day in section while I was brainstorming ways to present the idea to my classmates, I wrote down and underlined the one word that would eventually become the title of my project: home. From that point on, the idea snowballed into one involving string art and installations and audience interaction. The next few pages of my notebook have drawings and sketches of various representations of this idea… from the absurd to the more reasonable. Then October 21st, I drew a picture that looks eerily like my final finished piece. The details continued to evolve in the subsequent workshops, but the general idea and form stayed pretty much constant from there on out, which amazes me.

These changes and the fantastic things I was able to do would not have happened without the support and input of my peers. Workshopping ideas and listening to reactions to an idea or a part of a piece were invaluable parts of the creative process for me. It felt like a collaborative experience in which the artist was able to gauge whether he or she was on track with the goals and aims of the project. Working in the media I chose, this type of feedback was crucial, since I wanted to give my audience little background information to understand the piece. Every time I brought something into class to workshop or dragged my class up to the fourth floor of Gilbert, I was getting experiential reactions from people who knew my project and could give me feedback that was actually useful. I loved coming into section knowing that I was workshopping that day, and I lamented the two days that I missed section. I think it gave all of us a sense that we were a part of each other’s projects, that we were helping our peers realize their goals, and that our peers made our projects better than we had ever imagined.

The end

This class not only transformed my senior year, but has created meaning behind everything that I’ve learned during my study of biology at Stanford. That may sound overdramatized, but I believe that it is true. Not only was this experience cathartic, but the fundamental nature of my project and its focus on connection and interaction has helped me to realize the real beauty in my Stanford education: for four years, I have been surrounded by some of the most amazing, brilliant, caring, wonderful, passionate, driven, and inspirational people I will ever meet. And although some of those people will inevitably fall out of my life in the next week, to quote Wicked, “I have been changed for good.” The experiences, conversations, and connections I’ve made at Stanford have shaped who I am today and I am so grateful that I was able to participate in a class like TSR because it has not only preserved my sanity, but it has opened my eyes to the magic that I’ve been experiencing for four years. Knowing this, I am determined to continue spreading this magic. And I know I sound cliche and trite, but spreading happiness and love and honesty are things I truly believe in. One of the things in my life that I value most highly is open communication, and this project has helped me realize that communication keeps the world running. And that only through better communication among the human species and with the rest of the species on this planet can we hope to create a better future.

There is one last thing I would like to reflect on, and bear with me because this is an onslaught of emotions in this moment. My piece is most likely going to end up being an ephemerality. When the exhibit is taken down in Wallenberg, it will tangle. In its tangled state and without space and time to be untangled by my knowing fingers, it will be ironically homeless. It will cease to exist as it stands today. All of the hundreds of knots I tied and trimmed and glued will become nodes of entanglement with the hooks and crannies of the wire organisms.

And I’m ok with this fate.

This piece has given me so much: happiness, learning, frustration, tired fingers, long lost hours in the biology building, panic attacks, joy, and love. And in a weird way, I think there is also beauty in the knowledge of its inevitable fate. Because if I really think about it, that’s what the entire piece is about. It’s about the fragility of the connections that make life interesting. It strives to make the experience of the interactions more impressive than the interactions themselves. It’s difficult to see unless you know what you’re looking at, and impossible to photograph without focusing on something else. And though I will keep the words, it’s going to disappear.