Suzii
@ephemeraarchive
Suzii
The duality of life and decay
By nature, nostalgia carries the bittersweet tension of loss and beauty, mortality and memory. The very impermanence of moments, objects, and sensations gives them resonance. In this way, nostalgia is deeply philosophical—it reminds the artist and observer alike of the temporal nature of existence.
Today, researchers describe nostalgia as a frequent, primarily positive, context-specific bittersweet emotion that combines elements of happiness and sadness with a sense of yearning and loss.
Brené Brown • Atlas of the Heart: Mapping Meaningful Connection and the Language of Human Experience
Defines nostalgia as:
Longing to return to a place to which one feels emotionally bound or recalls as being better than the present in some way.
nostalgia appears to be a longing for a place but is actually a yearning for a different time—the time of our childhood, the slower rhythms of our dreams. In a broader sense, nostalgia is a rebellion against the modern idea of time, the time of history and progress. The nostalgic desires to obliterate history and turn it into private or collective ... See more
Nostalgia | Svetlana Boym
The dictionary definition of nostalgia is a “pleasure and sadness that is caused by remembering something from the past and wishing that you could experience it again”.
Lauren Cochrane • Our obsession with nostalgia is driving a trend revival spiral
time is non-linear
time is particularly non-linear, as evolution happens more in a spiral than in a straight line. time repeats itself, seeds are recycled, ideas are birthed, created & reused again and again. nothing is original, everything is evolved. the concept of nostalgia illustrates this beautifully. how can we feel so comforted, drawn to
... See moreNostalgia is not just about memory, it’s a portal between past, present & future. it carries both the sweetness of remembering and the ache of impermanence.
The act of remembering as creation
Memory is inherently constructive. When you recall a fleeting feeling, an object, or a moment, you are not just accessing the past—you are rebuilding it in the present. Every act of remembering is an interpretation, a re-sculpting of time, creating new meaning each time.
on nostalgia
nostalgia is really important to me because I’ve seen firsthand what a decaying memory can do to a person. My grandmother suffered from a brain aneurysm and she had a stroke and she’s been hospitalized ever since and her memory is slowly decaying away at first she couldn’t recognize or comprehend any of what was going on. She couldn’t a
... See more