Romance Series: Writing Lines, A Labor of Love
Paper, archival pen and highlighter, wooden frames
2022-ongoing
A handwritten data visualization, I embody Kindle Popular Highlights from romance novels by writing and highlighting them the number of times that people highlighted them on Kindle. A passage in a Kindle e-book becomes a Popular Highlight after a certain number of people independently highlight the same passage. Popular Highlights show up as underlined text along with the number of people who highlighted that passage. These highlighted passages are not the sort of thing that people would broadcast. They aren’t something people are saving to return to later or posting on Goodreads. Not having to perform through a persona allows people to express their empathy and vulnerability. Since 2010, I have collected Kindle Popular Highlights from romance novels into a database. Each time I write a highlight, I imagine what someone might have been feeling when they highlighted it. One piece in this series had as few as 4 highlighters and the page was mostly empty. At the other extreme, some Popular Highlights were highlighted by hundreds to thousands of people anonymously. For the largest piece, I wrote and highlighted the same highlight 1158 times, which took 10 full 22x30" pages.
*****
This series includes pieces featuring the following Kindle Popular Highlights from romance novels:
"Sometimes the fractures in two souls became the very hinges that held them together." - 1158 highlighters, 10 pages
"Sometimes you have to love something before it becomes lovable." - 226 highlighters, 2 pages
"The trick was forgetting about what she had lost and learning to go on with what she had left."- 703 highlighters, 8 pages
"Never remember his mistakes but always remember your own." - 137 highlighters, 2 pages
"She had bought her autonomy with a good amount of loneliness." - 174 highlighters, 2 pages
"She'd used up all the tender words she had." - 4 highlighters, 1 page
"The desire to act always seemed strongest in people with a great emptiness to fill." - 40 highlighters, 1 page
"It was never because you wanted more, it was because you wanted everything." - 145 highlighters, 2 pages
