This was the image of students protesting in Paris, May 1968 which inspired Amandine Alessandra to begin her experimentation with human letters. It was when I decided to revisit this image in Massin’s Letter and Image, that I realized there was a very active movement happening among us right now, a movement that could really use Amandine’s medium to emphasize the words of the protest at a human scale.

So this morning, we set out at noon as planned to “Occupy with Type” at Duarte Square in New York City.

We performed the words occupy, listen, reason, react, revise and solve, in that order in front of a crowd of protestors and media. I decided on using verbs only to show that the movement was protesting for action. There has been so much criticism towards the movement and its demands that I didn’t want to add to it by introducing words that were too confusing. I felt the six-lettered words really reduced all the slogans and chants down to what the protestors wanted to see happen.

As someone organizing the performance and being a part of it as a human letter at the same time, the experience was extremely overwhelming for me. We initially were just rehearsing, but as many cameras clicked and a crowd started to form, we quickly had to proceed with our performance. It was difficult to determine where the “stage” ended and audience began. While standing still as a letter, people weaved in and out in front of us, bombarding us with their queries. For the most part, we attracted a lot of attention and the crowd reactions were great, and it was especially warming when someone would repeat the word we formed out loud, acknowledging that they had deciphered it in its challenging legibility. They enjoyed the spectacle but I have yet to decide whether or not the medium was effective in communicating a message. I felt we may have been limited by only 6 people and 6 letters, as the more people participate, the more refined and clear the words could be.

A big thank you to Andrey, Barbara, Katya, Phil and Victor for coming out and helping making this possible! And thanks to two friendly strangers, Misty and Dan, who we managed to find on the spot. And of course to the wonderful Amandine for devising such a fun way to perform letters. This extremely impulsive project came about as I was writing a profile on Amandine for Imprint. Just as I was sending this to my editor, I decided the OWS third month anniversary would be a perfect opportunity to try her wearable lettering out. I had to gather volunteers and sew boleros in only two days, but I’m so glad we pulled it off as it was a rewarding and worthwhile experience.