What are the Odds?

Today I was fortunate enough to see the exhibit Beijing Slivermine by artist Thomas Sauvin at the Museum of Contemporary Photography. The exhibit deals with found images that came from a recycling center in Beijing where Sauvin seemingly rescued them from certain destruction.

It was fortunate enough that the artist was in attendance for the event and he spoke to my class about developing the collection and the intentions behind it. I was struck by the importance he put on coincidences, especially the phrase "what are the odds." It was essential to him that in order to put together Beijing Silvermine, he had to move to China, meet the man from the recycling plant, buy the images, sort through them, select the few that he included in the collection, have the collection tour, and end up in Chicago today.

It just made me think about all the coincidences in my life. The summer after my sophomore year, I volunteered to help a family friend write a portion of the script for his magic show. While preparing for one of the nights, I met some of his old friends who went to a college I had never heard of. It was called Columbia College. Knowing that I had an interest in going to school in Chicago, he had his friends talk to me a bit about it. I went to visit for the first time that fall and fell in love instantly. If I hadn't done that show, I might never have heard about this school and I may never have ended up here.

It took me finding out about Columbia, applying, and getting accepted to move to Chicago.  It took moving to Chicago to start this blog and it took attending Columbia to meet some of my best friends in the entire world. It took a mixup to get my first article published and it took an night of feeling lonely to start a zine. It took Valentine's Day to start screenwriting and it took screenwriting to develop a crush. Everything in life is just a sequence of falling dominoes. Just look for the patterns. 

side note: If you're in Chicago, go check out Beijing Silvermine at the MoCP and all of the other exhibits currently displayed. It's totally worth it.

All images credited to Thomas Sauvin