canta que estoy llorando [sing that I am crying], 2019
Carlotta K. Petrina Cultural Center was once a building for commercial trade built by the Cross family, a biracial marriage that found Brownsville, TX a safe haven for its cultural and racial diversity. Later, the artist Carlotta K. Petrina made the space her home to continue her art practice. It was her will to establish her home as an arts center after her passing.
I connected to the place on my first visit through a young artist singing Puno de Tierra, a song about transversing, belonging and death. The song was an action of singing and crying; a journey to seek betterment by leaving home and the risk of dying. For the space, I gathered natural materials, newspapers, synthetic and natural fibers in a motion to interlace stories materials carry of place and my own personal narrative. I formed through models of tears, stomach knots, skins and at the scale of hearts. At the center of rooms, I placed two opposing geometrical forms as means to find them together in one space.
I connected to the place on my first visit through a young artist singing Puno de Tierra, a song about transversing, belonging and death. The song was an action of singing and crying; a journey to seek betterment by leaving home and the risk of dying. For the space, I gathered natural materials, newspapers, synthetic and natural fibers in a motion to interlace stories materials carry of place and my own personal narrative. I formed through models of tears, stomach knots, skins and at the scale of hearts. At the center of rooms, I placed two opposing geometrical forms as means to find them together in one space.
