My identity in 5 objects
Imagine you have to make a list of the 5 things that better represent who you are. What would you choose?
I´ve always been fascinated by the concept of identity: the traits that make you uniquely you. The basic aspects of your identity are mostly stablished when you are a child, and they usually remain with you unless you make a conscious effort to change them.
Some features of your identity are out of your control, like the place where you grew up, your family, your native language, or your sexual orientation; and some things you might change over time if you feel your preferred identity differs from the one you grew up with. You might convert to a different religion (or stop being religious altogether), change your citizenship, your career, your politics, or your chosen community.
The other day, I was reading a book about human cognition, and how it works (the little we know about it, because our brains remain a mystery). In one of the chapters, the author tells he participated in an experiment in which he had to look at a photo of himself, one of a friend, and one of a stranger. His brain reacted very differently before each picture. The clearest and strongest reaction was when he looked at his own photo, while his brain barely reacted when he saw the stranger´s portrait.
While preparing for the experiment, the scientists explained that we have a mental list of all the things we see as connected to our identity: faces, names, or objects. I was intrigued by this idea and, later that same day, I was having dinner with my brother and his boyfriend, and I told them about this mental list of objects we see connected to our identity.
My brother then told us that the first assignment during his master´s in photography had been choosing five images that represented him. I love these kind of playful thought exercises, and reflecting on my own identity, so I of course started making my own list right away.
I decided to share it here, and encourage you to make your own. If nothing comes to mind right away, it can help to ask someone who knows you well. You can ask them what kind of things they associate with you: hobbies, activities, objects...it can be anything that you love, that you do often or that is a big part of your life in some way.
Here is my list:
1. An olive tree
I grew up in Córdoba, in southern Spain, an area where olive oil is one of the main local industries. My childhood home is surrounded by olive trees, and olive oil is an essential part of our gastronomy— we cook everything with it, and I especially love the smell of raw olive oil. Olive trees represent my landscape and my daily diet, two of the most fundamental features of a childhood identity.
However, I didn´t realize how essential olive trees where in my identity until I moved abroad. Olive trees are specifically grown in the Mediterranean, mostly in Spain, Italy, Greece, and Turkey, but they´re very scarce in most other parts of the world. While living in other countries, seeing an olive tree is pretty rare.
On the very few occasions when I´ve seen an olive tree outside of Spain, I´ve always had a strong emotional reaction. In my mind and memories, olive trees represent my home, and seeing one so far away is like having a piece of myself right there with me.
2. A book
If someone were to ask me what is my most priced possession, I would answer “my books” without a second thought. I have been a voracious reader since I was a child, and, for me, money spent on books is never wasted. I love going to book stores in every city I visit, and I have been an active library user in every place where I´ve lived.
I read every day, both fiction and non-fiction. It´s true that these days I read more eBooks and audio books than physical books (I don´t have enough space to keep all the books I read in my house), but a physical book - the shape, the paper, the design, the smell - is one of my favorite objects in the entire world.
It´s not only that I read often, or that I like books. One of the main purposes of my life is learning: discovering, connecting and teaching knowledge. Books are a huge aspect of this purpose, and that makes them feel like an inextricable part of who I am.
3. A work of art
I wanted to include something that represented “art”. It was a tough choice between The Birth of Venus and the David by Michelangelo, because both artworks have played a key role in my initial interest in art, but I finally chose the painting by Renaissance artist Andrea Botticelli.
I settled on this painting in particular because I remember seeing it in a book when I was in elementary school, and being totally captivated by it. I think is one of the first times I was interested in art, and, a few years later, I decided to study art history in college.
Art is the first identity I truly chose for myself. I started a different degree, one I chose for the wrong reasons, and switching degrees was the first step I took to create my own path.
I find art to be the single most inexplicable thing ever created by humans, and the most fascinating. It represents mystery, beauty, pleasure, meaning, purpose, knowledge, spirituality, culture, and wisdom. Over time, I have been able to realize that the thing that really pulls me in is not specifically art, but anything that is symbolic. Nevertheless, art is still the perfect embodiment of my fascination, and the main object of my research and personal reflections for the past 16 years.
4. Luggage
A lot of people enjoy travelling, and do it often, but my intention in choosing this object is not saying that travelling is a part of my identity, but more that I am a nomadic person.
I like travelling as much as anyone else, but I rather live in other places than being a tourist. I am yet to find a place where I want to stay for the rest of my life. When I was younger, I thought it would happen eventually, but I am not so sure anymore. Maybe I´ll keep moving from place to place for the rest of my life.
I don´t want to live in just one place forever, I want to experience different places, cultures, and ways of thinking. Why stay in just one location when the world is so vast and wonderful? Most people feel safer and happier having one home, one community, one set of friends, but not me—I want to contain multitudes.
When there are so many interesting people, so many different landscapes, architecture styles, foods and traditions, why confine yourself to just one type of anything?
You can do a little bit of that travelling for a few days, but it´s just not the same. Being a tourist is a pretty superficial experience of a place, while every place where you live, irremediably expands who you are, your vision of the world and what is possible in life.
5. A piece of ochre
This the most recent piece added to my identity list, as in the last three or four years, but it´s become a very big piece. My research of pigments started about six years ago, but I wasn´t so focused on ochre then. At the beginning, I had a more general interest in color (I still do), but when I started thinking about getting a PhD about pigments, I became laser focused on ochre over other pigments.
Ochre became the answer to all my questions about color. It is the first pigment ever used by modern humans (and other hominins and animals), it is at the origin of symbolic behavior, and most of the characteristics that made us who we are today. It is intertwined with human evolution in such a way, that we wouldn´t be who we are today without this simple lump of colored earth.
Ochre´s place in my identity is twofold: it´s at the center of my intellectual research, questions and reflections about art, cognition, archeology and history. At the same time, it also means something deeper that it´s hard to describe with words — a visceral link to an ancient sacred material.
It is not a coincidence that the Bible and other religions explain our origins with red clay. Our connection with this extraordinary material is embedded in many mythologies, maybe because we can sense it has a significant role in our history and evolution. I half joke with my family that I must be the descendant of a shaman who made rock art in prehistory, and that´s why it feels so especial to me. I mean, it could be. Why not?