Friday, December 22, 2017

Mexico City 2017

Randall Garrett / Mexico City / 2017

HIGH ABOVE


America, I fly high above your earth and looking down see the aspirations you hold. And still I feel inside me the anxieties coursing through your veins, your fastidious application of the law, the desires behind your fear to connect with yourself. I hope you can begin to see the humanity of those you purport to represent, and that your systems of justice mean nothing until they do.

A little satisfaction for that brother on the street, looking for nothing other than an opportunity to participate in your narrative, or at least a value meal to quench his appetite. A reliable journey to the woman in the chair trying to flag down the bus driver as he rolls past her stop without concern.

A moment to catch their breath and feel the heart beating inside for those in pursuit of a piece of the American pie. And a sense of belonging to that dreamer chasing her elusive future in a land that offers with one hand while taking away with the other.

America, take a moment and look inside. Your sickness has no other cure, and your potential no other means than to grow up and throw off the chains with which you bind yourself. I wonder of the next time I look down from this sky, if the clouds will grow more dark, or will they begin to disperse.

  



FRUTAS (LOVE COME DOWN)
I want to feel my love come down.
Me gusta todo tipo de frutas.
I want to feel my love come down.
Manzana, platano, mandarina.
I want to feel my love come down.
Naranja, zarzamora, mamey.
Rain on me.
Jaja... cacahuates.
Rain on me.

EN XOLA
En Xola, a blue eyed cat, she roams the street.
The bumps in the walk, comida corrida at your feet.
En Xola, un sonrisa, un chiste, y algun chicharones.
El mesero, el pescadero, y el pulquetero,
Tres hombres sin miedo.
En Xola, the borrachos lay passed out on the streets
In the most beautiful postures,
like Caravaggio's friends in contrapposto.
En Xola.


UN ELEPHANTE


Sunday morning the day begins. They sit at the table con un té caliente. Remnants of the party from the night before hang in the garage, talismans of child heroes and battles waged, piles of cake, leftover tacos, plastic cups of tequila, now empty.
 Images of the party in full swing, Marta, the hostess, en el baño taking a hit from her bong as the children outside sing a birthday song. "Un elephante", she says as she blows the smoke out the window and onto the street, then taking another hit she exhales, "dos elephantes".


A child swings at the Minnie Mouse piñata as the smoke drifts out and along la calle, the Siamese cat with blue eyes trotting along la banqueta, joining others under the half moon as they begin to call out hauntingly.

Upstairs, en casa trampa, he gets up from the bed, his lover buried under blankets in the darkness, and stumbles naked into el baño to pee. Standing there in the half light of sleep, he follows the stream as it hits the water and hears a strange moaning outside, as though of a woman's voice divided into a chorus of three, wailing in an ethereal and sad discourse.


The next morning, as they sit at the table drinking té caliente, she says, "have you ever heard la Llorona, the weeping woman who wanders the streets at night?" He paused, holding the tea, as downstairs a voice softly sings "un elephante...".

CROSSING THE RIVER
Crossing the bridge on the bus, I saw the river I waded in as a child, and beyond that, the bluffs on which I climbed. I knew this was goodbye, and the magic I once felt there was not gone, because it was not located in a place, but that I carried it inside myself.
And I knew that magic is expansive, that it cannot be contained or limited by the perspectives of anyone: family, friends, or those in authority. The creative act is liberating, without restraint and absolutely free, and with it comes the responsibility to achieve new levels of awareness.

I have shown them, the lives of the family I was born from and grew into all that I can of freedom of spirit and how to shine in times of darkness and now I leave them free to find their own way. And I go out into the world, to create furiously, to give and receive freely in love and devotion, and to meet my destiny and the magic that awaits me with new beginnings.




COLUMBUS DAY
What is the process of letting go of cultural idols, but one of growing up? What, if not the realization of one's own ignorance? Is it an act of courage to recognize the falsities of what you were taught, or just a necessity that the chains of limitation may drop away? Or the possibility to see from another's perspective? Whatever it is, let them go, when the image they portray no longer serves you. To see the reality, the chaos and destruction behind the mask of history. And in the doing, to see yourself (and others) more clearly.

 

AMERICA

America, dónde está tu sombra? It is here, in all of the places where you don't see. In the back alley apartments, in steaming kitchens, walking in the desert heat, handling the food on your own table. Come, find the apparition, make friends with your shadow, or it will become the monster of your dreams, the unconscious dread and violence of your waking life. Dreamer, it is time. Awake.

MEXICO CITY SUITE 

Works created on the streets of Mexico City in response to the energies of each space. Some of the locations of the itenerant studios included: Plaza de Arcangel San Miguel, Calle Jesus y Maria (outside the Ex Convento), Plaza Garibaldi, Templo de Nuestro Señora de Belén, and Bosque Chapultepec.


(all works spray enamel, ink, fumage, and frottage on paper)

   
"Sin Titulo (Dreamer)" (2017)
22 x 16-1/2 in. (frame)
   

       "Sin Titulo (Aparición)" (2017)
22 x 16-1/2 in. (frame)



"Sin Titulo (Mamey)" (2017)
15 x 12 in. (frame)


  
"Sin Titulo XVII (Confesor)" (2017)
15 x 12 in. (frame)

"Sin Titulo (Sancta Peccatis)" (2017)

15 x 12 in. (frame)


   
"Sin Titulo (Dos Caminos)" (2017)
15 x 12 in. (frame)

"Sin Titulo (Virgen)" (2017)
15 x 12 in. (frame)
   
"Sin Titulo (Nearing Shore)" (2017)

15 x 12 in. (frame)


   
"Sin Titulo (Ourobouros)" (2017)
15 x 12 in. (frame)

"Sin Titulo (Pussybar)" (2017)

15 x 12 in. (frame)



"Sin Titulo (Scar)" (2017)
15 x 12 in. (frame)

No comments: