The Linking Line

About The Linking Line –

The Linking Line (TLL) is an ongoing participatory art project exploring the interplay between language, neurodiversity, and contemporary calligraphy art. Each project bridges calligraphy with paper-based practice and textile exploration.

The project emerged from my personal experiences with dyslexia, multilingualism, and the ongoing challenge of navigating language across cultures. Over time, I became weary of constant spelling mistakes and the effort to live and communicate through foreign languages — as well as the struggle to remember people's and places' names.

Although Spanish is my mother tongue, English gradually took over as my primary language, pushing Spanish into the background. During my time living in Myanmar — while learning Burmese and studying Buddhist theology — I conceived the idea of an infinite line: one without beginning or end.

I began by painting Burmese alphabet characters with Chinese ink on rice paper. Then, through the act of linking them with strokes, images began to emerge — and The Linking Line was born.

Since then, TLL has evolved into a practice-based research project, unfolding through three thematic chapters that examine names, identity, and place. These iterations — Burmese Lines, Family Lines, and Jerusalem Gate Names - YOU NAME IT — document the project's conceptual journey of the project through process and personal reflection. Each chapter is available as a downloadable PDF.

Burmese Lines

This chapter presents four artistic experiments. Samsara and The Golden Lines taking inspiration from the book of John Okell's Introduction to Burmese Script, exploring the visual of Burmese letterforms. A third experiment bridges Latin script and Burmese Pyo Pyo style poetry.

The final works in this chapter include Between the Lines, The Pillow Book, and The Scroll.

Between the Lines were transformed into printed textile cushions, merging writing with soft sculpture tactile form.

The Scroll — a 20-meter contemporary work — showcases the spectrum of TLL calligraphy styles in varied colors and alphabets.

Family Lines

Having lived in many countries, I often struggle to remember people's names and spell them correctly. My dyslexia has perhaps strengthened my visual memory over text. As TLL developed, I chose to focus on names as a central thread of research.

This chapter includes:

Padrin@ Dame un Nombre (The Given Name Project) — an interactive ecological art project linking people with fruit trees in Murcia through naming and symbolic adoption.

Family Names — developed during the pandemic while I was living at El Refugio, our family's country house near my hometown. All family members wrote their names together on a 3m x 10m canvas, reinforcing familial connection through shared mark-making.

This chapter explores lineage, memory, ecology, and collective authorship. Family Lines became a point of intersection between visual calligraphy and socially engaged art — showing how writing names together can generate unity.

The Name-Giving Project

Alegria Decklerck’s Portrait ｜ Photograph by Hall’Makwanda ｜ 2021

Padrin@ Dame Un Nombre or The Name-Giving Project is an interactive art project which aims to raise ecological awareness about the destruction of the environment in Murcia and the felling of fruit trees.

Through the project, people will have the opportunity to adopt a tree, which they give a name, and with which they can create a fictional 'family'. The object is to create personal links between trees and people. Adopters (Padrin@s) will receive a one-year renewable adoption certificate with information and beautiful photos of their adopted tree. Their names, together with the name they give to their tree, will be part of the artwork El Mural Enraizado which is based on the modern calligraphy style called the 'Linking Line'.

Jerusalem Gate Names – You Name It!

This chapter draws on toponymy — the study of how names shape our experience of space. I was especially struck by the multilingual street signs in Jerusalem's Old City, where Hebrew, Arabic, and English are layered together on ceramic tiles.

This inspired You Name It based on Jerusalem gates names, a project transforming these multilingual names into calligraphic works. The resulting images abstract the written names into fluid forms, allowing viewers to reinterpret them through their own lenses.

The title You Name It reflects on naming as a powerful act — one that defines ownership, memory, and identity. While it cannot resolve political conflict, it offers a poetic gesture toward unity and peace.