Hello, I'm Lauren.
brittle flesh is a space for my personal journal and travel log. I am currently in the process of transferring my life in Portland, Oregon, to the northeast of England to become a postgraduate student in archaeological conservation. My goal for this space is to be a chronological collection of life stories and a record of travel experiences and photographs.
Why "brittle flesh"?
I first came across the term brittle flesh in a book about mummies and instantly connected with the two words. They are somewhat jarring in the way they are put together–the word flesh is not a comfortable nor beautiful one, with connotations of meat and an impersonal relationship to the body. Brittle suggests a delicacy and fragility that is so often in contradiction with the other thick and wet-sounding word. As a future conservator, I hope to make my life the protection and repair of fragile, brittle things. Put together, the words are incongruous and yet describe so much of what it is to be human; our bodies, our memories, our objects. In my mind, the term can be used to describe us as humans, just brittle flesh inhabiting the earth as best we can until we leave it. It can also describe the objects we create and the buildings we inhabit, while likewise describing our relationship to these things–the desire to maintain and contain, to fix, and to stave off disintegration in emotionally significant objects is wholly and uniquely human. Brittle flesh preserving brittle flesh, ultimately futile and yet beautiful in its sincerity.
What is conservation?
Get in touch
brittleflesh@gmail.com
instagram: @lauren_lark & @doctorsergeantpepper