The Other Room / El Otro Quarto

THE OTHER ROOM / EL OTRO OUARTO 2001
El FARO, Centro Cultural, Mexico DF, Mexico

Materials:Bread, coffee, flags, sugar, video, water, site, participants

Created a few weeks after 9/11 in response to racism and nationalism experienced in Mexico, especially regarding the deaths of US citizens on September 11th, this installation/performance took place on The Day of the Dead, and was sited in a public through-fare.

The performer slowly ate Deads Bread, the sweet traditional offering made on altars to ones dead family members, while sitting in a pool of cold water and watching repeating footage of the events in New York, and in Afganistan. Like the bread, she is covered with powdered sugar, resembling ash, and is labeled on her back with the derogatory word GRINGA. The passers by were offered hot coffee and breads which bore a two faced flag, one side USA, the other that of Afganistan. The intention here was to emphasis
the emotional distance in which the Mexican public had positioned themselves, and the isolation
of grief.

Category:

Film & Animation

Tags:

• Performance Art
• Arte de Accion
• Live Art
• Video Installation Art
• Shelley Cook-Contreras
• art documentation
• food art
• 9/11