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Desire path 1/5 (at Traditions Hall)

Desire paths are for people who know where they are going. In some ways this is very beautiful to me. I like to think of it as choosing the alternative route. Then I wonder, is it really the alternative route when everybody is treading across it? They are created and directed for people who have decided that the ordinary path is inconvenient and their way or this found way is more efficient. I think desire paths reflect the heart of our society. We are always in a hurry. Whenever I travel to another country I realize how time oriented we are. Americans are always rushing here to there. Time is so valuable to us. Why? Is it because time is money? Or is it because we fill our schedules to the absolute max that we have no time for anything else? Even in walking across campus we chose to walk on the dirt as opposed to the path laid out before us.

I have decided to work with Leanna on the desire leaves. We are going to collect leaves from around the desire path and ask students who walk by to write their desires on it. Leanna’s test run was successful, but I still wonder if it will work. Will Florida State affiliates who are taking a short cut be willing to sacrifice their time to talk to us and write their desires on a leaf?

I also find this concept interesting because their desires are what these people are living for day-to-day. There is a proverb that says, “Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life. (Proverbs 4:23)” This is true, where your heart is, is also where your desires are. Ultimately these people are walking on this path not only because it’s a shortcut but because of their desires. Everything that person is doing that day is to work towards their hopes or desires, including the ‘meaningless’ short cut through the dirt path. To have them stop and think about what they want is really powerful to me.

Then Leanna and I are going to display the leaves in an installation. The installation is powerful because it takes all of our desires and connects us together, sort of like the desire path does. I am curious, excited, and a little nervous to see how this project will turn out!

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The desire path is something really intriguing to me. I've seen them on and off campus. They're not just for late college students. They are in our everyday surroundings. Before learning about them, the paths to me seemed to be correlated with laziness. Throughout discussion I feel that there is more to them. There was a choice to be made, a decision in which several people followed and without knowing in the beginning what would be created these bodies created their own path instead of being mainstream. The creation is the most fascinating. To go back in time to answer questions. To be able to see where it all started, when it happened and why. The desire paths leave these questions to the interpreter and allow the viewer to come up with their own story. I will be working with Ryan and Victoria on two desired paths. One large broken up into two sections and the second one close by. These paths will be decorated with found nature highlighting the paths in an earth friendly way to allow passing people to view the paths in an entirely new way.

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When we first learned about desire paths the first idea to pop into my mind was: what do people desire and think about on a daily basis. We decided to keep the target population of our art community project on FSU’s campus and around desire paths. People that take desire paths know what they want and where they are going. Some people may view them as lazy and impatient. We relish in those who make their own path and follow their own desire to get somewhere.

I really wanted to do something that actively required personalization of the project by those reacting to it. By having students write their desires on a leaf found in nature around campus while they are walking on or around a desire path incorporated these concepts. We walked up and down these paths and asked students if they had a couple moments to get involved in an art project. The amount of students that actually participated was absolutely amazing. These students wrote various desires some small, some huge, some capable and some that may be out of reach. It is the most beautiful thing to write your desire anonymously and let your community share in that common desire without being publically attached to the name and responsible for your desire.

With all the interaction with the student body we are already connecting the community together. This aspect of our project shows how, under an art platform, community and environmental consciousness can be supported. With all these collected we will make an installation to show the community all that we have in common and make a commonplace for conversation over one of the main desire paths on campus. This is to not only incorporate those who did not participate in the leaf making process but to show those who did that they are not alone in their desires.

It doesn’t take much to emphasize a community’s presence. We are all connected here at Florida State but at times we seem to be focused solely on ourselves. This project is to show that art can bring us all together to gather under/around/in desire paths that we all use to make us realize that we are one large body. We can support each other’s desires by learning about them and celebrating the beauty of individuality, knowing almost every leaf will be different but together we are all Seminoles at heart.

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Desire paths reflect the feet of the people. They reflect a subconscious dedication to paths that humans create themselves and a complete disregard for the paths designated for them. There's both a freedom and community in desire paths that often goes unnoticed, and sometimes gets paved over.

“Dedicated to the paths that humans prefer

Rather than the paths that humans create”

- https://www.reddit.com/r/DesirePath/

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Desire paths have been something that I have experienced ever since I started at FSU, I witnessed the paving over of desire paths all over campus but I never knew what they were called. Since I found out the definition: a term used in urban planning to describe those footpaths that are worn into the grass by the accumulative footfalls of people traveling over the same surface. Desire paths are informal, emergent and they seem to suggest metaphorically the “positive deviance” of a collective. This definition really spoke to me and made me think that they are more than people’s short cuts to class. They are a path that you naturally want to follow rather than the one prescribed for you by society. These desire paths represent a small thing that a lot of random people have in common, it is like a sweet secret that everyone is sharing.

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#desirepaths #desirepathsfsu #FSUdesirepaths (at Traditions Hall)

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Desire path outside of Traditions Hall #FSUdesirepaths #desirepaths #fsu #desires (at Traditions Hall)

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