Three fabrics unite this work: the Covid-19 pandemic, the cry of poverty and the possibility of a breast cancer for my mother.
First fabric: The pandemic
The Covid pandemic has affected all of humanity. Considering ourselves exempt from this reality, as we do so many times in Colombia, has been impossible. This pandemic has taken us back to the primitive way of crouching and caring for each other within our clans. It has laid bare the political and social realities of each country. And in the specific case of Colombia, this crisis has exposed the precariousness in which the most vulnerable citizens of our country live.
Second fabric: The cry of poverty
While we all take care of our family nucleus and try to keep our physical and emotional bodies healthy, the fight is different for people living on the street. Poverty becomes landscape, the silence of the people is broken and their lament rises in every corner of the city. You can no longer live isolated from the socio-economic reality of the country. Each of the fundamental rights signed by Colombia before the United Nations has been violated.
Third fabric: The possibility of a breast cancer for my mother
Due to high likelihood of my mother having breast cancer, we got locked up as a family in a mode of intensive coexistence. After several surgeries that had left her weak, imagining the possibility of being able to infect her with Covid due to a lack of care on our part was both unacceptable and terrifying. My mother's financial contribution to her household was knitting, sewing, embroidery, basting, and interior design. This art work is a tribute to her tenacity and her ingenuity, which inspired my creativity and allowed it to be fertile ground. The cross stitch (her signature stitch) was the one I chose to embroider this work. It is a decree of gratitude and a reminder that embroidery can unite in love whatever difference. Today my mother's hands caress her grandson. She is cancer free.
This work has therefore been developed in the following context: embracing the love of my home, taking care of my mother and listening to the heartbreaking laments of my Colombian family begging to satisfy their basic needs. The same basic needs that we all share but that are so easy to forget when taken for granted.
"Homeless State" is made up of five parts.
First part: it consists of 10 interventions on paper. The base is a dismembered surgical mask embroidered on paper and refers directly to the Covid, to the embroidery and to all the immaterial that rests at this juncture and that we still cannot comprehend. I chose the color of the threads thinking about the color-scheme of the mask.
Second part: it is made up of 15 interventions on paper. Fifteen words and sentences that allude to the basic needs of every human being. These are: Housing, basic sanitation, security, education, freedom, clean water, clothing, health coverage, peace, fun, rest, emotional support, decent and paid work, appropriate food, electric power service. Each word or phrase is intervened with golden thread; I refer to the ancient papyri in which gold and black ink was used to highlight and embellish official documents. Somehow, to make more elegant something that really should happen without so many protocols. From this premise, I have also chosen the typography.
Third part: it consists of 9 laments written with my hand. I do not intervene them with threads. I do not beautify them. I do not mock them. I do not exaggerate them. I offer reality as it is presented.
- Good night, neighbor.
- The days don't end.
- Father, mother, I'm not asking for your help for anything bad, please!
- Last night we had to sleep on the street, neighbors!
- Please neighbors...
- It's to pay for a room.
- I'm not asking for help for anything bad.
- Neighbor, neighbor, father, mother, help!
- I don't have money to eat.
- My family is hungry.
- Family, we are in a homeless state.
Fourth part: I get fully into the sentence "Family, we are in a homeless state". I make a spreadsheet where I repeat the sentence with each personal pronoun, including the personal pronouns used in Colombia: like Usted and Sumercé1. I wrote it from start to finish; focused, trying to feel every word of that lament of the father of the family who hummed the plea for help. I do not intervene with threads.
- I'm in a homeless state.
- You are in a homeless state.
- Usted, Sumercé, are in a homeless state.
- She, he's in a homeless state.
- We, we are in a homeless state.
- Ustedes are in a homeless state.
- They, they are in a homeless state.
Fifth part: I begin by referring to article 25 of the declaration of fundamental rights signed by Colombia before the United Nations. I focus on the verb "have" and from there I play with words that I get from the definition of each of the verbs. Each word leads us to another until we reach once again the statement that all citizens of any territory should have the same rights and duties. All this is intervened with gold thread and I used a wooden font, with which many of the legal documents are written today. I wrote each definition in my handwriting, alluding to the fact that these "merits" pertain to human beings and should not remain uniquely and beautifully recorded on paper. This part consists of 6 interventions on paper:
- Article 25
- To have
- To fix
- To restore
- To merit
- “To be or to become worthy of something” printed on the entire bill of rights.
[1] Modern Spanish has a distinction in its second-person pronouns that has no equivalent in modern English. The most basic is the difference between tú (vos in areas with voseo) and usted: tú or vos is the "familiar" form, and usted, derived from the third-person form "your grace" (vuestra merced), is the "polite" form. The appropriate usage of those forms is fundamental to interpersonal communication. Source: Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_personal_pronouns
Work composed of 41 interventions and text on paper.
Place: Bogotá, Colombia.
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