The curators for the new exhibition at Balboa Park’s Centro Cultural de la Raza were very intentional about each part of the installation, even down to the color of the paint on the walls where the art is being displayed.
“Even the walls themselves are not white. They’re not gallery white, museum white, which is kind of the norm,” said Maria Figueroa, a professor of English composition, literature, and humanities at MiraCosta College, who is also vice president of the board at Centro and co-chair of their community advisory council. “(The walls are) a soft sand, almost with a pink hue…It’s not sterile bright white. I think that was part of the praxis, as well—that we’re going to depart from these institutional, conventional, White supremacist ideas of art.”
“Indigenous Borderlands: Weaving Nepantla, ing Sacred Relations” is the second in a series of four exhibitions, which opens with a reception at 6 p.m. Friday and was funded through a $500,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. Figueroa, who co-curated this exhibit with Susy Zepeda, associate professor of Chicana/o studies at the University of California, Davis, says they wanted to focus on the connections, community, and history shared by Indigenous peoples. She took some time to talk about their focus on Indigenous knowledge and practice, and the experiences of the people in the region who continue to survive the violence of the border and the lands surrounding it. (This interview has been edited for length and clarity.)
Q: How did the idea for “Indigenous Borderlands” come together?
A: The Mellon foundation reached out to us and said, ‘We know that you’re doing a lot of really good work and we’d like to your work,’ so they funded us with a significant grant. From that, we proposed a border visions art series to align with the mission of our cultural center. This is an attempt to situate the historic connection that Chicano Mexicanos have had with our land bases, but also as a tribalized community, acknowledging that we are also on indigenous Kumeyaay territory. We’ve, historically, always had important political, cultural, sacred, and historical connections to Indigenous peoples of this area. “Indigenous Borderlands” invited artists to imagine that, and when we thought about weaving “nepantla”—a term for being “in between,” and as Chicanos/Chicanx people, we’re often in that “in between”/”nepantla” state—we saw that as an opportunity that very much wove in with this idea of having historic, sacred relations with our ancestors and with our original peoples in our original communities, in the present time. The art that you’ll see in the exhibit works to reflect that.
Q: The ideology and politics of the border are at odds with how many Indigenous communities think about, and practice, ideas of culture, time, and home. How do you define these in relationship to the attempt to separate the nations of the Kumeyaay, Mexico, and the United States?
A: That’s a good question because I think we also attribute these ideas of the border to being a violent place. One of the writers and cultural philosophers that we turn to often, who wrote about the border, was Gloria Anzaldua. She very much talks about this place of separation distinguishing “us” from “them.” I think, historically, we—as Chicanos, Latinos, Indigenous people—have seen the border as imposed by government forces to separate in a very violent way, in a very militarized way. We see that as being antithetical to the history of what our peoples have imagined to be cultural connections and community making. In a way, it has separated us, not by choice, but because of these external, governmental, political, militarized forces. For us, it’s been through art-making, through conversations and community work, and very intentional relationship-building, important for us to that that has not been our way. It has not been our way to separate ourselves, to have that dividing line that distinguishes “us” from “them.” We are one people, intercontinental. We are in this Turtle Island, the Americas, if you will. So, for us to return to that terminology, to that philosophy, that vision, that is our hope and our practice, really. Art, in and of itself; as a praxis and not just an objectified, commodified entity, but more the praxis of art making, the praxis of dialogue and discussion, creates a particular politic that embodies and tangibly lives through that resistance of separating “us” from “them.”
Q: The description of the exhibit talks about placing Indigenous knowledge and narratives of the region at the forefront of this exhibit. How would you describe what some of the indigenous narratives of the region are and what they look like?
A: I think it’s important for us to also situate the land itself. Not just the landscapes, but the land itself being the teacher, the mother, the Indigenous knowledge. In the art pieces, you will see many that are attributing, representing, centering land through mountains, volcanoes, the sculptures themselves.
We have sculpture pieces that are ceramic, so it’s present in the space. We wanted to ensure that we not just conceptualize a land place and land centered idea of Indigenous knowledge in theory, but that we also brought it into the center of the gallery. You will see that, you will experience it, and also we wanted to remind ourselves that we have representative artists from both sides of the geopolitical border represented in the art.
We have people from the various borderlands who are, perhaps, not from this particular area, per se, but who are Indigenous in the borderland, in the border landscape. They have brought in that Indigenous knowledge represented in the images and the artwork that they have depicted in their pieces. For example, we have one piece that looks at three generations of women healing, types of healing, and that practice that Indigenous people have historically had and how that is transferred and shared through intergenerational connections and practices. We have symbolism that is based on Mexica or Nahuatl cosmology and ideology that is kind of in the background, ing the more recent generation. We’re looking back to ancestral, Indigenous knowledges, so you’ll see some of that in a graphite print that we have. We have two pieces that are embroidered pieces. Embroidered pieces are also a way of communicating and storytelling. Our grandmothers, perhaps, taught us how to embroider. What story are they conveying in the process and the practice of threading through a cloth, and what is produced? What is the outcome? You’ll see a diversity of media that remind us that the Indigenous knowledge can come through these various conduits for the Indigenous knowledge making, in and of itself.
Q: What was your approach to curating this exhibition? When you talk about rooting your process in indigenous knowledge, what has this looked like in practice?
A: Susy and I are friends, we are colleagues. We call ourselves comadres, like sisters in ceremony in various Indigenous ceremonies that we have participated in together. So, I think she and I have a particular relationship that has afforded us an opportunity to really approach collaboration in a non-Western, linear, institutionalized way. By that, I mean that we’re both professors in academia, but we didn’t want to organize like academics. We wanted to really organize ourselves and collaborate in a more ceremonial way. So, she and I had a lot of conversations, we kept in touch about our lives, where we were, what are our values, reminding one another of our values. Really, what did we, as individuals, what to see in this show, and how can we bring that together as a unified vision? Even in the way that we approached inviting some of the guest artists.
We’ve been taught that we you ask someone to participate, you offer them tobacco. So, we offered them tobacco as a way of inviting them. Not cigarettes, but tobacco to acknowledge their importance, to respect the knowledge and the gift that they have, their ability to craft, as artists. They didn’t always immediately say they were going to do it, that was just the beginning. ‘This is what we want, what we’re thinking about, would you consider being part of the show?’ and then that took more conversation.
We also sent out a broader, public call and accepted several submissions. Through the curating and review of those, it took more dialogue and exchange, and sometimes pausing to think about whether a piece represented what we’re trying to do. Even in the way that the artists described their pieces and their process. For us, it wasn’t about title and significance and medium, and everything that I think the art world would want you to acknowledge in the most conventional way; but for us, having our vision be true to an Indigenous knowledge practice was more about how does this piece those sacred relations that we are attempting to bring back into this space? It took a little more time to do that carefully and intentionally.
One of our artists is Celia Herrera Rodriguez and she’s working with a Chicana art practice that is almost a practice in the flesh. So, what she’s doing with her installation is inviting the community to add to her art piece. That’s something that I think is also very much rooted in our Indigenous practices, which is that we’re not individual artists who are singularly propped up; we’re artists who are also ed and acknowledged by the community, and artists inviting the community to be part of their creation. That’s the praxis itself, so we had a workshop for three hours and about 25 people came, mostly women and a few children. They created, after Celia provided some instruction and guidance and talk. There’s discussion, there’s dialogue; there’s what we call “platicar,” which is “to talk.” That unleashes a particular energy and spirit of creativity. So, we braided thread, we braided cloth, and in the braiding itself-which is very symbolic of braiding stories, braiding energy, braiding community-there were partners who had to braid a piece. We also created other ancestral tags and those are going to be embedded into her art installation. That piece, for example, really captures the praxis, and Susy and I were very intentional and cognizant that this is the type of Indigenous knowledge that delivers the certain artwork practice that we were looking for.
Q: What kinds of conversations would you hope would come as a result of people visiting this exhibition?
A: First, I think it’s a very beautiful show. I know that can be interpretive and I’m being biased, but it’s beautiful because I see myself—as an Indigenous Chicana, as a woman, as a mother, as someone of ancestral lineage that is not of Kumeyaay territory, but of Jalisco. I see myself. I’m wrapped in this very gentle embrace of me, and I hope that when people walk in, they feel that. I hope that they see themselves, that they see their grandmother, that they see lands that their grandparents or mothers left, or that they left. That they are reminded of who they are, or that there’s a spark of curiosity to maybe look into who they are, even if they don’t know.
As a professor, I often teach about Indigenous knowledges and I’ll use language like “your ancestors, your relatives” and relatives aren’t only blood, they’re also chosen. Or, the communities that adopt us, or that we adopt. Some of my students who are undocumented, maybe left their land and haven’t been able to return because of that violent geopolitical border that says, ‘No, you cannot return because if you do, you are “illegally” doing so.’ They ask me questions like, “How do I know my ancestors?” and I often say, “Your ancestors know you. They know who you are and they’ll come, they’ll find you. They’ll let you know.” That’s what I’m hoping people will capture when they come into this space, that they will be able to be in dialogue with the way that it’s curated. To understand why the particular colors are together or why this piece is next to that piece, and that it will spark conversation. I hope that they feel like they’ve landed on sacred land…Hopefully, when they do walk into the gallery, they’re greeted by this spirit of welcome, but also that they’ve landed somewhere that is important, that is familiar, that is welcoming. That it is a beautiful space that is not violent, but healing, that is generative, that is creative, and that is beautiful.
