Multi-media installation (2021)
Video, chain link fence, stone, paint, pick hammer, plastic, fibers, wire
I am fascinated by the concept of the antimonumento (anti-monument), which was created by the people of Mexico City. An anti-monument is an installation placed at the site of a demonstration. It seeks to memorialize a tragic event in the community’s history and maintain a demand for justice. I have been researching and making work about Mexico’s feminicide problem for years. Nothing I make can measure up to Mexican women’s efforts to demand justice for themselves and the victims. These protests are often led by artist collaboratives and their performative feminism is getting results. Activists all over Mexico continue to intervene and vandalize beloved monuments, forever changing their meaning in the public’s imagination.
I live two blocks away from Washington Park and I see George Washington’s statue every day. I never gave it much thought until after last year’s George Floyd/BLM uprising when I noticed the monument was enclosed by a chain link fence. In this case, the City of Chicago changed its meaning, fearing its destruction by the community. It’s an accidental anti-monument.
Where I Am, Where I’m Not is marked by the complexities of having one foot in one history and the other foot in another. I ask, “How do past and current uprisings for liberation intersect and how can anti-monuments point us to an aspirational futurism? I hope to steer our thinking towards equitable modes of intervention to shape society, and to recover knowledge that will lead us towards self-determination.
