DON FOSTER

Over the past 39 years certain elements, themes and characteristics have recurred in my work so that I recognize a certain inevitability of process and concern for numbers, grids, systems, yin/pos/neg/yang, sadness/humor, visual/verbal, chance/order, etc, the list goes on...

Each century has only one year whose number sequence may be described as PALINDROMIC - the same when read right to left as when read left to right. 1991 was such a year and the next "P" year will be 2002. This phenomenon only occurs twice in a lifetime if that lifetime straddles a millennium. In the hope that my life would encompass these two "P" years, I decided to use the eleven year interval as an umbrella for my work, naming each work individually but including all works in the PALINDROMY SERIES: 1991-2002.

Each work starts with an idea or response to a situation or thing and is first written. This title must conform by adding up to 52 letters - no more, no less, no punctuation.

J A R S F E L L E D W I T
H U N E Q U A L A S H E S
O N U N I Q U E S H E L F
A T A W I E R D A N G L E

Then each of the different letters is counted and the whole title altered, as is necessary, until there are six or eight odd numbers of letters. Only when this rule is satisfied may the letters be randomly arrangedas 8 horizontal seemingly meaningless, palindromes.

A6 B C D2 E7
F2 G1 H3 I4 J1
K L5 M N4 O1
P Q2 R2 S4 T2
U4 V W2 X Y Z

The significance of 52 is obscure and personal. There are 26 letters in the alphabet. 13 is lucky. The 8 deep by 7 wide grid became 52 after losing each corner element to become cruciform.

  F I W I F  
U S A J A S U
L E R G R E L
N A H L A H N
L E T H T E L
S N A W A N S
Q U E O E U Q
  D I E I D