Dr Matilda Arvidsson

This essay is part of the Liber Amicorum to Prof Panu Minkkinen. It explores the intersection of translation, jurisprudence, and artistic practice through the lens of Hélène Cixous’ écriture féminine. It narrates an intellectual and creative journey shared with Panu, my co-conspirer whose work (and who) is always either ”regular complex” or ”advanced complex”. The project, on which essay is based, translates a black-and-white photo of Panu into two knitting patterns, one Regular Complex and one Advanced Complex, using digital tools (KnitPro 2 and StitchFiddle). These patterns serve as a mode of translation of our joint body of work in academia. Drawing on Cixous’s theory of translation as an ongoing process between the corporeal, the aesthetic, and language, I situate knitting as an act of self-writing and becoming. The methodology of the project involves first coding the knitting patterns, then executing them, and finally documenting the process through a photographic essay. This iterative process of translation tease out the complexities of academic life and labor, where ones’ body of work is constantly being reworked, shared, and reshaped. The essay also challenges traditional notions of jurisprudential scholarship, which often privileges text over embodied practice, arguing for a jurisprudence that embraces embodied feminist methodologies and artistic practices as forms of legal inquiry. Through the essay, and by knitting the Regular Complex Panu knitting pattern that is part of the project, I materialize the intellectual and affective ties that bind academic collaborations, practicing, showing and inviting others to join a more inclusive and embodied approach to knowledge production and becoming.
Access it here.