Finishing date: September 2021. Styling and photographed by Natalia Salazar in February 2022.
I
About the photo shoot: Here’s the doctoral defense dress, photographed after I had had a couple of months to recuperate after the big event I made it for. Worn together with my great grandmother’s amethyst ring and my great grandfather’s top hat and cane. Hair sculpted and face made up by Natalia Salazar. Dress designed by me, made from Järbo Lin.
Photographed together with an old, crooked oak and against the wall of the 19th century barn at Skarpnäcks Gård. The defense dress photographs falling into place with the narrative of my thesis: One of its findings was that forest owners attach multiple layers of meaning to old trees and historic buildings and ruins, motivating both management and supporting identity. Connecting place, plants and personal history.
II
And how it came into being: I’m not claiming to be unique. I believe all of us had a tough time during the long long months of 2020 and 2021. In different ways. Loneliness, or not enough alone time. Worries about health. Worries about the state of the world. Being far away from family, not able to see them. Being geographically close to friends, but not able to see them either.
I know everyone has a hard time finishing their PhDs. Everyone’s behind, unsure of their contribution, having to pull things together last minute.
It’s just. Having to do both, at the same time. I find it hard to explain to people. How impossible and surreal it felt.
And then I got a cold, just before midsummer 2021. Two weeks before an important thesis deadline.
My brain didn’t work, no well-balanced words were going to come out of it.
My hands worked, though. A week lost to coughing and sneezing, but I also knitted a dress. Linen. Burgundy. I thought I could wear it at my defense. At the time, it felt like it might not happen. Finishing was rough, to the very end. But at least I didn’t have to worry about the outfit.
III
And I did wear it at the defense in October 2021, and at the party after. Paired with my burgundy rose heels and the gold earrings from Burkina Faso.
It took me more than a year to muster up the energy to go through the photographs from that day, though. My camera was handed between Natalia, dad, Hannes, Theo and probably more people I don’t know – but I could not look at the photographs that they took.
The day went well, the opponent and committee said some nice things, and I was awarded the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. But just the exhaustion, the intense presence during the defense, now a blur, but also the feeling of not being quite there for all the other things. I didn’t want to be reminded of it. I was afraid of feeling overwhelming regret, of not having been able to enjoy these events that should have been celebrations, elation.
Around my one year anniversary in Bergen, I finally sat down with the defense photographs. The dress is great. I look tired, yes, but also happy. And! So many people around me, looking so happy for me. And at the party: Like they are enjoying themselves.
It does not change the way I remember that time, not really. But there is a sort of relief in the realisation that other people have other memories, that they enjoyed it, were happy for me. That is also part of what is true.
Katja Malmborg 