My work focuses on my identity as a Mexican Salvadorian through my family’s bodies as well as my own and having a connection to the Earth. It is more human than we think and it requires just as much help and love to survive. We are all living, breathing beings that can experience change and pain throughout our journey of life. The pain that is inflicted on migrant bodies reflects the pain of the Earth. We can’t abandon it, we have to try to fix it together.

I record my acne and my dark skin, as well as my mother’s scars. Even though my siblings and I don’t look exactly like her, we gained the important features of being a loving and caring person. I tell the story of the journey my mother’s body has gone through physically and spiritually. I record our culture, our food, and the religion that my mom practiced, and the influence they had on me growing up.

Throughout my childhood, I had little exposure to the importance of my heritage, or the land my parents came from. I want to embrace the life my hard-working immigrant mother has risked her life for, coming to a country that made it clear that it doesn’t want anybody that is not white, rich, or a man. I seek to compare the importance of my relationship with my own body, as well as my brother and mother, along with our connection to the earth.