Lyndsey Ogle Projects

Original concept behind Thinking of You

Thinking of You simply asks will people pause in their busy days to send a selfless thought out towards someone else. With technology at our finger tips, the effort required to express consideration, has dwindled to mere nothingness.  We can walk and text, talk and post on Facebook, hang out with one friend while being only half-present because we are communicating with someone else or are absorbed in the lights and sounds around us.  What does it take to force us to stop and really communicate?  What does that even mean?

Positioned at a busy corner during the morning commute and armed with nothing but a camera and a large cardboard sign reading, “Think of Someone Today,” I will offer up a large painting that has been cut into postcard size pieces to passers by.  The back of each piece is pre-stamped and inscribed with the message, “Thinking of You.”  

This intervention brings up a couple of questions - Will people stop?  Will they take a card and, in the age of speed dial and crackberry contact lists, will they know anyone’s address by heart.

The original concept was to engage with participants directly.  Instead I observed their behavior discretely.  While it successfully allowed me to watch individuals organic reactions, it did not fully serve to answer my questions.

In future incarnations, participants will be asked to omit their names from the cards. and instead I will take a photo of them and their piece and place it on this website.  When the recipients find a card in the mail, it will bare this url and hopefully, they will follow it and discover just who was thinking of them.  At that time they will be invited to post their own photo showcasing themselves with their pieces.  

In a perfect world all the sections of the painting will make their way back together through the magic of the internet, showing that as much as technology has a way of breaking us apart, it can pull us back together again.