![](https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/e1659b20add864c594ed5a60aeb77d927a65c4a2065d03576e65accf1452af0c/Screen-Shot-2022-10-20-at-7.47.00-PM.png)
I remember the shortlived enchantment I felt when I first learned about mood rings. It was shortlived because a more worldly kid (worldly here meaning “has a big sister”) inevitably had to break the news that mood rings tell your temperature and not your actual emotions. No matter though. I found alternate enchantment in the idea that colour could correspond to a bodily state and colour being used to reveal any data- even if it’s obvious- is undeniably a kind of everyday magic. So magical in fact, that it seems to have obscured the underlying premise of the mood ring, which, upon reflection, is something like: without me, your true emotions are ultimately unknowable.
The mood ring assumes you are a great mystery that only it can solve. Taking this claim at face value, I have to think that surely the omniscience of the mood ring doesn’t end with knowing the wearer’s feelings. In You can tell me more, I choose to believe in the mood rings’ supposed power and flatter it with a series of rituals to honour, cleanse, nurture and adorn.
You see, I think I know how I feel, but what do I really know? Mood ring will tell me. And just maybe, if I play my cards right, it could tell me even more.
Music and spoken word samples from chabad.org and steelyvibe on https://www.looperman.com/acapellas?mid=steelyvibe
Thank you to Ivan Jurakic and Sarah Kernohan from the University of Waterloo Art Gallery for the reflective material.
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Thank you to the Ontario Arts Council for supporting the exhibition of this work