By Written I Mean Made is a performance that uses fragments of a written dialogue encountered in a folder of ephemera held by the Jersey Archive. The folder is part of a collection of material, letters, newspaper and magazine clippings, anti-propaganda, diary entries, lists, recipes, identity documents, draft writings, drawings, photographic negatives and photographic prints, gifted to and now preserved at the archive, by a resident of the island of Jersey. This resident acquired the material shortly after the death of Marcel Moore and sometime after the death of Claude Cahun. Marcel Moore and Claude Cahun moved to the island at some point before World War II. Before they lived on Jersey, Marcel Moore and Claude Cahun lived in Paris. Between World War I and World War II, Marcel Moore and Claude Cahun were occasionally involved with the Surrealist movement. Marcel Moore and Claude Cahun were lovers. As well as being Marcel Moore and Claude Cahun, Marcel Moore and Claude Cahun were also Suzanne Alberte Malherbe and Lucy Renée Mathilde Schwob. Suzanne Alberte Malherbe and Lucy Renée Mathilde Schwob were stepsisters. They lived in a large house beside the sea. Or Clare, Robin, Matilda and Marnie lived and Marcel and Claude. Madonna, Mary and Peter lived in a large house. And others lived beside the sea.

—Marnie Slater, December 2019.