How I began my work with Toilet paper

In 2014 in Chicago, I went to the wedding of a family friend where the officiant shared the Bible verse: “A cord of three is not easily broken.” He elaborated that marriage is hard; life is hard; divorce rates are high; people are imperfect, but a cord of three is not easily broken. Looking at the bride and groom, you could see the love between them. It was tangible, so thick you could cut it with a knife. It was God that formed their third strand and bound them together.

The metaphor of the cord of three showed me something brilliant and blinding, something I’d never seen before. I wanted that light and beauty in my life. I needed it. That was the day I began my relationship with Jesus. Soon after that, I got my second concussion, forcing me to leave Chicago and go back to Georgia. 

I ended up at art school because it seemed like the only door I had left to open. I didn’t want to be an artist. In 2017, my third year at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Atlanta, I had a professor that cared more about the development of students than the products they delivered. She saw me on an unsustainable path focused only on success, so she pulled me from the project I was working on at the time (meticulously carving a book), and challenged me to do something different: have fun making art. I organized a paint fight with friends. My favorite part of the fight was captured in a low-quality video clip where you could hear the sounds of running and laughter and screams. The sounds of fun. Sounds I had not heard or made in years. The professor challenged me to take that piece and bring it to the rest of my work. I took the book carving project and ripped it up, then twisted, braided, and re-twisted the scraps.

This process brought to mind a prison break MythBusters episode I’d seen years before. I remembered the fascination I’d had with a myth about the strength of toilet paper rope. I decided to try it. It was the beginning of my journey with toilet paper.

As I experimented, the cords of three metaphor kept coming back to me, so I used it. I twisted strands into groupings of three and watched toilet paper become rope that was not just strong, but that had a beautiful material quality to it. I began to see parallels between this rope and myself. Both previously weak, and headed for an unfavorable end. Both transformed with cords of three. Both now strong, with a new purpose and beauty in life.