Notes from a Shoebox
Photographed by Felicia Sewerinsson
If you could write a message to the future version of yourself, what would you say? Would you confess your regrets? Declare your victories? Would you explain the challenges and tribulations that lay ahead and how you navigated them with practiced fluidity, like a singular flower petal tossed in the wind?
How would you feel reading messages that proved all along that you could, you would, and you shall?
And all of these words, these appellations, that reshape the way you see yourself in the most positive light are tucked in a shoebox. A corrugated container that once held the very pair that carried you toward your destination now serves as a proverbial coffer, holding the words that guided you there.
Karimah Hassan, a London-based painter and writer, grants us an intimate look at the words she has written to herself over the years. At times, these are notes of affirmation — a verbal collage of quotes and phrases that begin as inner dialogue then morph into written poems and letters to her future and past self. On serendipitous occasions, the notecards along with found pieces of stationery and other paper surfaces that Hassan individually hand-paints make their way into a strangers hands, gifted unexpectedly. That sort of artistic offering with an impactful message has the subtle power to positively alter the trajectory of one’s day.
Hassan leaves us with this message:
“Healthy creators are like plants, they grow in cycles, they respect the seasons for noise and the seasons for quiet. They know when to prune and when to redirect resources. The plant for the future and root in the past.”
Photographed by Felicia Sewerinsson