Inanimate object: The Fence (I wrote this poem last semster) 

I have witnessed the destruction some will not live to tell. The pain. The hope. The fight. I have seen both sides for centuries, both full of sorrowful struggle. Men, women, and children reaching for me but never seeing the other side. What do I represent to you? I have seen I.C.E. No, not the charming chilled cube you put in a warm drink. The kind that tears families apart, locks children in cages, and feeds off the satisfaction of total power. I see America, and I see Mexico. Two beautiful places divided...by be. Divided by differences no one can seem to solve. How can humans be so divided? Sometimes late at night I hear the whispers and breathing coming from the wind. Coming from the people. The wind weeps, “un paso mas,” one more step. People believe we can learn from history, from our past mistakes. I have witnessed the opposite. Innocent people getting sprayed with bleach, have now become cages with locks. Refugees running from whips. Please, do not let this scare you. Let this open your mind. For you could not possibly imagine all they have endured. Understand the reasons people do what they must to reach me. Find the truth, and do not just assume. One side offers the opportunities the other side could only dream of. Once they make it past me, their journey only begins.

Random words: powder, animal, absence, horizon

I look upon the horizon and feel myself becoming restless. The days go by slower as I wait for the return of my lover. His absence worries me. I feel as though I cannot be without him. I have felt alone for 246 days. To distract myself I remove the powdered foundation from my purse, and cover the mascara that laid under my eyes. I found myself crying like an animal enclosed in a trap laid out by a hunter. I let out a deep sigh, will he ever return? 

Artist Bio: Regina José Galindo was born in Guatemala City in 1974. Galindo is famous for utilizing her art to publicly highlight the 36-year civil war her country went endured. She displays her activism through body art. Her primary goal is to give her nation a way of looking forward to, hopefully, a more peaceful future. Who Can Erase the Traces? (¿Quién Puede Borrar Las Huellas?) is her most celebrated piece of work. For this piece, she walked the streets of Guatemala barefoot carrying a basin of human blood. Occasionally she would dip her feet into the basin, leaving a trail of footprints behind her. Her response to the recent news that Efran Rós Montt, a former military dictator who oversaw the most deadly phase of the nation's internal conflict, was allowed to run for president against constitutional restrictions was symbolized by the trail of footprints. Galindo embodied the war victims in this piece, absorbing their blood as her own and appropriating their suffering. The distinction between Galindo's body as object and subject was so thin in this piece that the blood covering her feet appeared to be her own.

Group Installation Project 

Installation Artist: Song Dong 

"Girls Night Out"

We took multiple shots of the installation. The first location we chose was outside. We enjoyed the way the bright contrasting colors looked against the snow. However, by the time we photographed them again, the snow had melted. We didn’t like the way they photographed in the mud, so we decided to move them to a different area. This gave us the idea to incorporate location as an element of our installation.  Every time we took pictures of them, one would always fall over. I liked how the one being knocked over gives a narrative to the picture. Each position feels intential even though many of the poses are random. In the beginning, we didn't expect our installation to come together and tell a story. However, as we were starting to put the materials together we found they began to look more lifelike in the photographs.