Cities of Days

Cities of Days was a year-long exploration of literal, imagined, and metaphorical cities, running from March 2018 - March 2019. Throughout the year, Cities of Days uncovered cities in strata: moving from literal layers of Rock, to imaginary layers of Water, and finally into experiential layers of Oil.

With Rock, Cities of Days began by investigating literal cities and the structures surrounding us. Informed by City of Quartz (Mike Davis), we situated the current city as a location of its past. Here were disparate materials coalescing into form, here was a polyglot city of prototypes and experimentation, here was LA as amalgamation.

With Water, Cities of Days moved beyond literal cities to focus on imagined ones, taking as inspiration the fictitious metropoles in Invisible Cities (Italo Calvino) and the protofeminist utopian allegory of The Book of the City of Ladies (Christine de Pizan). Imagining how things can be and striving for that futurity, we embraced the symbolism of water for its mutable nature—that it can change both itself and the rocks it passes over.

The final installment of Cities of Days brought us into the season of Oil and metaphorical cities. Imbued with the corporeality of Anaïs Nin’s Cities of the Interior, we descended into the sensuousness and mystery of the lived body. Oil was the core—those deepest and darkest, hidden, or perhaps unknown places.

Together, we drew back the curtains of our previously explored buildings, breaching their facades and venturing inside.