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Actos invisibles para sostener el universo: RojoNegro en la Bienal de Venecia — Transcript

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0:03INBAL Conversations. The Venice
0:09Biennale was founded in 1895 as an
0:11international art exhibition. It is
0:16currently one of the most recognized
0:18and prestigious cultural organizations
0:20in the world. I am Fernanda Quiroz, and
0:24today the collective Rojongegro joins
0:27us to talk about their installation at
0:29the Mexico Pavilion at the 60th edition
0:31of the Venice Biennale. Welcome to
0:42another episode. of INBAL conversations
0:46, the podcast of the National Institute
0:48of Fine Arts and Literature. Today we
0:51are at the Museo Tamayo Arte
0:53Contemporáneo, and with me is the
0:54collective Rojongegro, composed of
0:56María Sosa and Noé Martínez. To
0:59start, I would like to talk a bit about
1:01what we can see in the Mexico Pavilion
1:03with your work. Upon entering, these
1:07elements are salt, clay, body, video,
1:09and audio. And well, first I would like
1:13to know, María, what we can find in
1:16these symbols.
1:17>> Sure, thank you very much. Thank you so
1:19much for being here. Well, the pavilion
1:22is a collection of signs and symbols
1:25that stem from extensive research into
1:28the original cultures of our country,
1:31and it is also a constant
1:33experimentation of how those cultures
1:35and that knowledge are not only alive
1:38and present in our communities, but
1:41also alive and present in our bodies.
1:46And how we have unlearned Western
1:48knowledge to incorporate this ancestral
1:50knowledge, and it has worked for us to
1:53solve contemporary problems. Regarding
1:58the materials, what we see in the
2:00pavilion first is that you are greeted
2:02by four paintings made with natural
2:05pigments, tobacco, and plants from the
2:07forest of Cherán, which is very
2:09important for us and for the whole
2:12country. Then, there are two giant
2:16speech scrolls found, taken from a
2:18Mesoamerican seal, possibly Teotihuacan
2:21. On top of these speech scrolls, made
2:26of salt and clay, are some bird-shaped
2:28vessels; there are 13, and hanging in
2:30the middle of the installation are two
2:33video performances where we are
2:35performing pre-Hispanic figures, taking
2:37the postures of pre-Hispanic figures.
2:42And there is also a sound piece
2:44designed by Alberto Rubí, which is a
2:47collection of different ethnographic
2:51sounds, our own mixes, sounds of nature
2:54, and, well, all the materials are
2:57basically in dialogue with each other
3:00to create an atmosphere, right? All the
3:05materials also have a reminiscence of
3:07the body and the connection of our body
3:09with the earth, right? For example,
3:13salt, which is an element that we share
3:16with the earth. Our tears and our sweat
3:20are salt. Clay, too, across cultures—
3:25not just ours, which considers the body
3:28a vessel—but throughout various
3:30cultures, clay is related to the body,
3:33to the very matter of the body, to the
3:35flesh, to the tonacayo. So it is also a
3:39reminiscence of the body, and the
3:42plants at the entrance, the tobacco, is
3:45an element of protection for Noé’s
3:47culture, from the Huasteca region. The
3:51tobacco plant is used to protect
3:53against bad energies, "bad airs," but
3:55also against animals that can be
3:57poisonous. And we were interested in
4:01placing the plants from the Cherán
4:03forest, because it is precisely a
4:05forest that is being protected by the
4:07Cherán community. the symbol of the
4:09word. We thought about it a lot from
4:11the perspective of a conversation. We
4:13thought a lot about calling for
4:15listening and speaking in a more
4:18equitable, more timely, slower way,
4:20more in a sense of profound
4:22reconnection. Swapping speaking for
4:25listening: in our case, the entire
4:27development process for the project is
4:30very collective. There are many voices,
4:33many bodies, many emotions, many wills.
4:35Coming to an agreement—we are a duo
4:38—so it is already a consensus of two
4:40people that I think is well worth it.
4:43Sometimes, getting two artists with
4:45different research focuses to agree is
4:47a bit of what this symbol of the word
4:50is calling for, particularly when they
4:52are two voices meeting and two video
4:54performances—or rather, one video
4:57performance with two screens facing
4:59each other; it speaks of the need to
5:01see the other, the need to be
5:03accompanied on a path. It’s about the
5:07need to think in terms of collectivity,
5:10and not a collectivity as an appearance
5:13, as a discourse that is already
5:15present within many political and
5:17artistic imaginaries, but in a
5:19collectivity that is truly embodied,
5:22where voices can suddenly even become
5:25diffuse and the boundaries of
5:27authorship are blurred because thought
5:29is permeating them. The convergence of
5:33concepts or things we need to say with
5:35the people we write with, with the
5:37people we collaborate with, is very
5:39deep, and that fabric, I believe, is
5:41important. And I think when it is
5:44expressed like this in the pavilion, it
5:46is because it is one of the pillars
5:49that builds our artistic practice: how
5:51to learn to listen to each other, learn
5:53to speak, but ensuring that neither act
5:55—neither listening nor mentioning or
5:58denouncing—is above the other. Well,
6:07it also seems to me that in your
6:09project, both materials from ancestral
6:11Mexico and modern Mexico engage in a
6:13dialogue, and the work already suggests
6:15that the entrance to the pavilion is a
6:17threshold into another space-time order
6:19. What does this new space-time order
6:22mean, and how is it constructed upon
6:24entering the Mexico pavilion at the
6:26Biennale with your work? It is
6:29definitely a challenge for us as
6:31artists to revitalize a way of
6:32representing a territory or a country,
6:35right? It’s a biennale that has been
6:38around for many years; it’s the 61st
6:39edition, if I’m not mistaken. So,
6:41talking about country pavilions speaks
6:43of reinventing, reconstructing, and
6:45deconstructing the term "national,"
6:48right? Of what nationalisms and
6:50identities actually are. To begin with,
6:53we thought a lot about what it means to
6:55represent a country so plural, so
6:57multicultural; a city like the one we
6:59live in is only a fragment of an
7:00territory that is far too large. The
7:03representations and the problems faced
7:06by each region of the territory are
7:08quite different. From the north of the
7:11country to the peninsula, the gulf, to
7:12the central-west. We ourselves grew up
7:15and started out as artists in Morelia
7:17and then we came here. And the problems
7:20, the forms, and the cultural scenes
7:22are very different at a distance of
7:24four hours by car. So, there is a task
7:27that requires a lot, a lot, a lot of
7:29time, a lot, a lot of awareness, and a
7:31lot of participation from artists,
7:33collaborators from the entire cultural
7:36scene, and the public itself, to start
7:38recognizing and reconnecting or
7:40awakening all those threads or those
7:42layers that build a communication
7:44between what we call an ancient Mexico
7:47and a present-day Mexico, because I
7:49believe that this continuity of time is
7:51not interrupted. It is not interrupted.
7:55Many of our notions, many of our ways
7:57of how we communicate with our dead,
7:59many of the ways in which many
8:01indigenous peoples understand—we
8:03understand—nature, the natural
8:04elements, are present and are currently
8:07asking us questions because I believe
8:09it is necessary to listen, right? It is
8:14right inside of us; it is still like a
8:16kind of archaeology of our own body.
8:19Just as the center of Mexico City has a
8:21pre-Hispanic layer, a colonial layer, a
8:24contemporary layer, a layer of Mexican
8:27modernism, I believe our bodies, our
8:29consciousnesses have those same layers.
8:32Now, facing that scenario, facing
8:34everything I am mentioning, what work
8:36is pertinent to create? How are we
8:38going to propose that? And specifically
8:40, what decisions are we going to make
8:42regarding the space. It has been, once
8:45again, I repeat, a conversation among
8:47many; María and I at one point, and
8:49then many more collaborators who have
8:51been joining our project. The idea of
9:01creating an atmosphere, a place, a
9:04space for reflection, for reconnection,
9:07for thinking among ourselves, but also
9:10about ourselves, our relationship with
9:13the land, our relationship with others,
9:16was very important to us in creating
9:19the pavilion. In a way, the first
9:23question we asked ourselves when we
9:24were invited to participate in the call
9:26for entries was: what do we want to say
9:28? What do we want to tell Mexico, and
9:31what do we want to tell the world about
9:34Mexico? And so, regarding that first
9:37question, right? What resonated for
9:40Noé and for me was: what if we stop
9:43for a moment? Right? What if we thought
9:46things through more often? What if we
9:49looked at the implications of each one
9:52of our decisions? How our decisions,
9:56those of all the people present in this
10:00world, how all our decisions affect
10:03others, right? For better and for worse
10:06. And precisely how things affect
10:10others for the better. That was what we
10:13wanted to tell the world about Mexico,
10:15right? There are a ton of decisions,
10:17which is why it's called "Invisible
10:18Acts to Sustain the Universe." There
10:21are a ton of decisions that various
10:23people have taken to preserve, to care
10:26for, and to keep our cultures alive;
10:28and not just our cultures as a cultural
10:31expression, but as a way of thinking
10:33and understanding the world, which is
10:36so important for the disastrous
10:38ecological and social moment we are
10:40living through, right? So, what happens
10:44if a decision is made thinking about
10:46looking at things in the long term, and
10:49how we are going to affect the
10:51relationships of others? Compared to if
10:55we make a decision thinking in the
10:57short term, for a quick and immediate
10:59satisfaction, or a quick and immediate
11:02need, or to resolve a quick and
11:04immediate fear, right? So, based on
11:08that, we decided we wanted to build a
11:10pavilion where the people who entered
11:13would feel affected, in a good way, in
11:15their bodies; not just in their minds,
11:18not just visually, not just through
11:20what the eyes perceive, because we
11:22consume that every day, right? Every
11:25day we are completely consuming
11:28endorphins on Instagram, on social
11:30networks, and so on. And we wanted
11:32something that would allow for a
11:33connection with the body, which is why
11:35we chose the sound, and why we chose
11:36the materials. When you enter the
11:38pavilion, the body begins to dialogue
11:40with the materials. And when you enter
11:43the pavilion, the atmosphere changes
11:45because you are also listening to the
11:47sound, the very particular sounds that
11:49make up the pavilion and that are
11:51composing themselves with the materials
11:54and composing themselves with the
11:56bodies you see present there, right?
12:01invalid conversations. Adding to what
12:11you both just said, we live in a world
12:13of constant information. As you were
12:16saying, María, we have free endorphins
12:18all the time. Our brains are already
12:20shutting down so as not to generate
12:22those natural endorphins, which are now
12:24being given to us by a black mirror,
12:26right? However, you reclaim, as you
12:29rightly said, rest, slowness, and
12:31precisely grief, being able to feel
12:34from a political stance. Why can
12:37stopping be such a powerful political
12:40and decolonial stance? I think that
12:47just stopping, slowness, and grief are
12:49activities that go against or are
12:51outside the capitalist agenda. They are
12:55activities that reconnect us inward,
12:58that seek introspection, but they don't
13:01produce anything or consume anything,
13:03which are the activities we are
13:05supposedly doing as human beings or
13:08should be doing, right? What happens
13:11when you stop and do something as
13:13simple as "do I consume this or not,"
13:15thinking twice about things? I think
13:18there is also a possibility of finding
13:20long-term thinking in that slowness,
13:22and I believe that long-term thinking
13:24is also outside the capitalist agenda.
13:27Much of the narrative and symbolic
13:30territory is thought that is rushing.
13:33How do we face an ecological struggle?
13:36If you look at it in the short term, it
13:38is totally devastating because you feel
13:40that day after day plastic is being
13:42consumed, the sea is being polluted,
13:44everything is happening in the worst
13:46way. When you think about it in the
13:48long or medium term, you can find
13:50solutions. It is true that everything
13:52is moving at a speed, isn't it? Energy
13:55is being consumed every day, the planet
13:57is being ecologically devastated, but
13:59many of the answers require a medium or
14:01long term, and I think stopping can
14:03allow us to glimpse a little bit of
14:04that long term. I think that, in that
14:08sense, it is a stance far removed from
14:10the capitalist agenda, in the broadest
14:13sense of the term, and it is a stance
14:15that has to do with the creation of
14:17images, with the symbolic negotiation
14:19that art performs, the cultural
14:21negotiations that take place in a
14:23scenario as grand as the Venice
14:25Biennale, but also in the museums of
14:28Mexico, where there is that same
14:30negotiation of pausing, waiting,
14:32understanding an exhibition, reading
14:34the texts, giving it a second pass, a
14:37second look, everything. I believe
14:39there is an empowerment of the gaze in
14:41stopping. I believe we all, everyone,
14:44everyone, have a latent power in how we
14:46decide to look, what we decide to look
14:48at, and what we decide to listen to. I
14:51think that is already a very great
14:53power. The artist has it too, but the
14:56artist also speaks out in a museum in
14:58Mexico City, sometimes having 3,000,
15:00even 5,000 people over a weekend, where
15:03the artist puts forth an object, an
15:05idea, and is there with those 3,000
15:07gazes. I think when we walk and think
15:11and act so quickly, there is wasted
15:14potential, there is potential for
15:16looking, for creating connections, for
15:18creating knowledge, and for empowering
15:21the actions we take every day as people
15:24, right? It is a way of building and
15:28mediating what we do have. We have the
15:31gaze, we have the way of thinking, we
15:33have the way of connecting, the way of
15:36dialoguing, and those are incredibly
15:38powerful even in terms of the creation
15:40of citizenship, digital citizenship, or
15:42citizenship in terms of the use of
15:44everything common to the collective.
15:47But I think long-term thinking does
15:50generate those possibilities, it can
15:52build, it is a way of generating
15:54alternatives to what is consuming us,
15:57to what we believe has no solution.
16:00Because those solutions are sometimes
16:02on a smaller scale, but also over a
16:04longer time, and for that reason more
16:06gradual, but also more difficult to
16:08sustain because it implies constancy,
16:10right? We just finished a project that
16:13will continue for a few months in
16:15Venice, and it is, what questions might
16:17there be there? What would our
16:19consistency as artists be? Is it
16:22coherent or not with what we have done,
16:24with how we have acted? And these are
16:26questions that never have a complete
16:28answer, that are a construction of the
16:30artist's entire career. We would
16:32sometimes think, how ecological can art
16:35be? Right? You want to talk about a
16:37project that speaks about ecology, but
16:39you generate tremendous packaging,
16:41tremendous transport, and a tremendous
16:43expenditure of energy and cranes
16:45loading many things, right? So, where
16:47is the balance? Where do you actually
16:50do what is necessary? Where do you not
16:52overproduce? Right? Where do you
16:53produce just enough? And it's an
16:56eternal laboratory; it is a moment to
16:58ask ourselves those questions, thinking
17:00about testing them, thinking about
17:02activating something, right?
17:07>> When we started to form our political
17:08views, we heard a lot about the idea
17:10that it is urgent, and we live in an
17:11urgency, right? Really, all the issues
17:15happening to us are urgent, aren't they
17:17? Thinking long-term, thinking slowly,
17:20does not mean denying the urgency of
17:23things; it means thinking that it will
17:27not be, I mean, the solution will not
17:30be quick. It won't be...no. Faced with
17:33an urgent problem we have, one must
17:36react, but that reaction must be
17:38long-term, it must be constant, it must
17:42be, uh, disciplined in a sense, right?
17:45It has to be sustained. Uh, I mean
17:47disciplined in the sense of being
17:49sustained. So, faced with the urgent
17:53problems we are having as a society, as
17:57a world, as a species, clearly we have
18:00predetermined reactions that are urgent
18:04. We do this and we urgently react in
18:08this way, but we are not considering
18:11that often those urgent reactions, in
18:14the tenor that the system itself has
18:17taught us, can trigger the opposite
18:19effects of what we initially sought,
18:22right? I mean, faced with a search for
18:27peace, if one reacts urgently with war,
18:29well, it won't lead to peace, right?
18:34But if one thinks better about building
18:37long-term, what would be the solution
18:40to generating peace? Right? Which one?
18:43Which one would there be, perhaps,
18:45multiple other ways to generate it? But
18:49, uh, I think that precisely yes: faced
18:51with the urgent things the world is
18:54presenting us with, we need a time to
18:56pause to think if, perhaps not entirely
18:59long-term, but yes, maybe we should
19:01start with a medium term on what
19:03implications the decisions we make
19:05regarding that urgency will have, right
19:08? We are a generation where utopia
19:13seems to be a fairy tale, right?
19:18We’re from a generation where
19:20you’re just not allowed to talk about
19:23that because it’s naive, and in a
19:26sense, yes, it can be naive, but in
19:28terms of thinking about deliberate,
19:31thoughtful, and long-term planning, you
19:34can create small pieces of
19:36micro-utopias, and that’s what
19:38we’ve seen. What interested us most
19:43is that the system, faced with these
19:45huge social problems we have as
19:47humanity, tells us that if you don't
19:50have an urgent, immediate answer,
19:52things will continue as they are and
19:55nothing can be done. There’s a lack
19:59of hope and a lack of empowerment that
20:01depresses us socially, that has
20:03depressed us personally, where you feel
20:06defeated and like you can't lift a
20:08finger. And that is precisely what we
20:12are most interested in saying: that’s
20:14not true. All the time, we always have
20:18responsibility, we always have power.
20:22Right now, in this moment, we have the
20:24power to say this to, who knows,
20:27whoever wants to listen, but we go
20:29through the streets and have the power
20:32to drive a car, to terrify people or
20:35not, to write something online and make
20:38someone feel good or make them feel
20:41terrible. All our decisions have power
20:45and all our decisions affect our
20:47immediate environment, and then, who
20:50knows with social media, who knows
20:52beyond the immediate, right? That’s
20:56what we were very interested in:
20:58thinking about stopping, recognizing
21:00the power we actually have, taking it,
21:02and seeing how, in the long term, we
21:04can truly build a better future.
21:09invalid conversations.
21:13>> What is there? What do we have? We have
21:15the senses to be able to look at a work
21:17of art. Everyone who has had the
21:19opportunity to see your work at the
21:21Venice Biennale has the chance to use
21:23their senses to pause a bit, to feel,
21:25to smell, and to listen to everything
21:27that integrates and everything you want
21:29to communicate. In this sense, on the
21:33vessels, I managed to see in some
21:36photographs only a few phrases, eh,
21:38which I think also relates to how you
21:41use words, from the comma to these
21:44phrases I saw, among them: fragments,
21:47trance, reconnection, summoning the
21:50bird of the heart. I would like to know
21:54why only parts of those phrases or
21:56words can be seen, and what is the use
21:59of the word in your work?
22:01>> For us, it was important that the words
22:04build a presence. Thinking about how
22:07language is a presence beyond just a
22:09form of communication of equivalents.
22:12That is to say, we understand a word as
22:13meaning or signifier. It is part of how
22:16we construct the entire process from a
22:18ritual logic. In our indigenous peoples
22:21, there are almost always two ritual
22:23moments, one public and one private.
22:26For us, much of the production of the
22:28work in the pavilion is the private
22:30ritual. Writing on the vessels was part
22:33of that private ritual. The texts on
22:36the vessels are part of a record we
22:38kept day-to-day of the entire stage
22:40laboratory and the rehearsals done for
22:42the video performances. So, the words
22:46are connected, but they are connected
22:48as an essence, as a presence that must
22:50be there. Showing the words in
22:53fragments within the installation is
22:55seeking just that. It is seeking, or
22:57stating, that there is a hidden part
23:00and one that is revealed; it is a
23:02constant. If everything is visible,
23:05then what is hidden loses a certain
23:07value. If everything is hidden, then
23:10you kill a piece of knowledge. There is
23:11an equilibrium. It is about speaking of
23:13that balance. One thing calls for the
23:15other. Speaking of a pavilion that is a
23:18necessity, a mourning for the dead in
23:20Mexican territory, also calls us to
23:22think, well, what is life? What are we
23:25defending now as life? There is a
23:28hidden part, a private part, but also a
23:30public part and a visible part. And
23:33what remains there is a presence; it is
23:36also about approaching language, matter
23:39, and words as wills in themselves, as
23:42a negotiation. Evidently, we are the
23:46ones writing the words, but they are
23:48also emerging as a will of their own.
23:52When we are working with the body, we
23:55are summoning, allowing our body to be
23:58a vessel where memories, traumas, and
24:00desires pass through—ones that are
24:03not necessarily those framed by our
24:06existence or our moment in the present.
24:10There are memories from the past, there
24:12are generational traumas, and all of
24:14that is demanding to come out in words,
24:17and it is a negotiation with our
24:19conscious and subconscious parts, and
24:21that is where that duality lies, that
24:23balance between opposites, and so that
24:26balance for us is a presence. When you
24:29see things as presence, matter as
24:32presence, natural events as presence,
24:34then I believe the human being stops
24:37being at the peak of a pyramid and
24:39everything becomes more horizontal; and
24:42then we think again, long-term and
24:45slowly, twice about whether it is worth
24:48cutting down a tree or not, if it is
24:50worth extracting something or not. I
24:55think, precisely, the words stem from a
24:58private ritual that Noé and I had, and
25:00also in the company of Mariana
25:03Villalobos, who was the one who trained
25:05and directed us. And then, at the
25:09moment of recording, well, that's
25:11another moment, because even though it
25:14is, it becomes a kind of offering of
25:16sweat and, precisely, salt, right? And
25:19of effort and exhaustion. We compared
25:22it a lot to the idea of a ritual
25:24procession, didn't we? We still have
25:27many processions in our country where
25:29the energy of those walking is offered,
25:32right? Or energy is offered during the
25:35dance; energy is offered to the earth.
25:38So these words in some way, as you
25:40rightly pointed out, are fragments
25:42because we are building the entire
25:44pavilion through fragments, right? Uh,
25:49many of the things we have living to
25:51this day from our ancestral knowledge,
25:53from pre-Hispanic knowledge, remain
25:56present, but many others were left in
25:58fragments lost in vessels or, well, in
26:01fragments perhaps not lost, but asleep,
26:03right? So, our own bodies are fragments
26:07, right? Our identities are fragments;
26:11likewise, our stories are fragmentary.
26:15There isn't really anything that is
26:18pure. And we are interested precisely
26:22in working from that, from the idea
26:24that it is possible to build with the
26:27material, regardless of its state,
26:29right? It is possible to reassemble, it
26:33is possible to reconstruct what is
26:35broken. And art is one of the greatest
26:39functions it has had throughout
26:41humanity, regardless of the contexts.
26:44It has glued back what is broken
26:46because it glues the human spirit. To
27:00close this conversation, I would like
27:02to talk about this. In global art
27:05circuits, there is a constant risk of
27:08reducing the ancestral, the
27:10pre-Hispanic, to a simple identity
27:12decoration. How have you stayed away
27:16from that risk to turn the ritual into
27:19a true political and healing stance?
27:23This question has been going around in
27:26our heads a lot, because in every
27:28interview they ask us: "How do you
27:30avoid the risk of exoticization?" And
27:34it goes around in our heads a lot, and
27:37it's very interesting, because the idea
27:40of exoticization, the idea of the
27:42folkloric, the idea of, yes, well, of
27:45what is, yes, exotic, that in itself
27:48already marks a problem. I mean, what
27:51is exotic? Well, the exotic is that
27:54which is strange, right? That which
27:56goes outside the norm. So, that has two
27:59implications. One, that whoever looks
28:03at the exotic is the norm, and what is
28:05looked at as exotic is what is not the
28:08norm, right? So, exoticization marks
28:12how epistemic, visual, and aesthetic
28:16colonization continue to operate, right
28:20? Because Western canons, the imposed
28:24canons, are understood as the norm, as
28:26universal, and what falls outside those
28:29canons is understood as exotic, when it
28:32could just as well be the other way
28:34around, right? In an interview I said,
28:38why aren't European artists asked this,
28:41right? When they can be just as exotic,
28:45when there are many keys that are not
28:48locally shared and their keys could be
28:51just as exoticizing, only that, as the
28:53decolonial philosophers said, the
28:56universal is not true. They are really
29:00universalized localisms. This is a
29:03question that encompasses many concepts
29:05, but it also reveals how colonization
29:08continues to operate. How artists like
29:12us, or indigenous artists, even among
29:14ourselves, come to think: to what
29:17extent am I exoticizing or to what
29:19extent am I self-exoticizing because we
29:22are dealing with that internal
29:25coloniality of what is exotic and what
29:27is universal. invalid conversations. I
29:41think the equation is not whether there
29:44is a risk or not, it is that societies
29:46are not homogeneous, so there are
29:48multiple perspectives. There are gazes
29:52that exoticize and that deconstruct.
29:56There are gazes that ignore and others
29:57that pay attention. Uh, the risk is not
30:00specific to this type of art, it is
30:02inherent to any art. Art is not, from
30:05my point of view, and especially
30:08contemporary art is not a public square
30:10for consensus, it is a public square
30:13for dialogue and listening. Uh, the
30:16risk is there, and it is the risk of
30:19making any kind of art. I think it is a
30:23discussion that has to do with devices,
30:25the colonial device, and gazes. It's
30:29about stratifying one form of knowledge
30:31over another, the mechanism of how we
30:34negotiate with culture, with the public
30:36, with art, the ways of generating
30:39images, of creating statements and
30:41ideas in art. The memory of many of our
30:46indigenous peoples is oral versus
30:48libraries, archives, and photography.
30:53The memory that archaeology constructs
30:55is within Western frameworks versus the
30:58memory of building and keeping alive
31:00the pottery tradition of many of our
31:02indigenous artists. I think the terms
31:06are perhaps sometimes a bit ahead of
31:08their time or are in the process of
31:10being precise for this discussion. For
31:13a genocide, it is urgent to safeguard
31:15life. For an epistemicide, what is
31:18urgent? Perhaps we are in a survival of
31:21knowledge, and I think talking about
31:23how we consume ourselves could be
31:25another moment in this discussion, but
31:28if there is an urgency—not
31:29necessarily in the detail we mentioned,
31:32but an urgency to preserve for one more
31:34generation—how can clay be modified?
31:37How can one weave? How can we mention
31:40an illness or a feeling in a particular
31:42language? That is the kind of thing
31:45that I think encompasses this
31:46discussion. Not everything happens in
31:48museums. Museums are one chapter of an
31:52entire cultural expression or an entire
31:54negotiation in symbolic terms that we
31:56generate. Uh, artists who identify as
32:00part of an indigenous people, uh, face
32:03a double question. We are asked
32:07questions that are not asked of other
32:09types of art. It is indigenous
32:12contemporary art, contemporary art of
32:14new nations, yet we don't have doubts
32:16about the contemporary art of
32:18colonizing countries. Colonizers do
32:21make art; we have to show that we do.
32:24Many of the conversations with most of
32:26my colleagues who work with, uh,
32:29ancestral knowledge, regardless of
32:31whether they are part of an indigenous
32:33people in the most common sense of the
32:35term, uh, we end up worrying about its
32:38survival. We have looked at each other
32:42many times and we know that the goal of
32:44making the art we do, of the
32:46negotiations we carry out, is sometimes
32:48for a language to survive another
32:50generation; for knowledge to survive a
32:52generation, however we reconstruct it,
32:54however we present it, even authorship
32:56—uh, resumes and other things that
32:58worry the artist in the Western art
33:00world—take a backseat. I think we are
33:03concerned, just as in a genocide one
33:06must rescue life, in an epistemicide
33:08one must rescue and give it more time,
33:11perhaps a few more years, and that is
33:13the span we might get, or maybe a
33:15little longer. But I think there is a
33:18problem with the terms we are using.
33:20The term folklore, exoticization, the
33:23term identities. Uh, identity is also a
33:28Western container that is boxing in
33:31more than 60 languages, boxing in more
33:34than 60 ways of organizing, uh,
33:37emotions and memories. I think these
33:40terms can gradually be imagined in
33:42another way. And picking up and trying
33:45to add to Maria's comment, I think the
33:48device is the deepest part addressing
33:51these types of questions, but I also
33:53mentioned at some point, Maria, where
33:56is the internal colonization? Not like
33:59unfolding again; one does not exist
34:00without the other. Uh, the West and its
34:04knowledge and Indigenous peoples are
34:06not really versus, nor are they exactly
34:08opposites in terms of seeing who is
34:10more powerful. And it’s not as if
34:15many of us artists who work with
34:17Indigenous knowledge are far from
34:19having an internal colonization. We
34:23have an internal colonization. I think
34:26the first territory to dig into, to
34:28explore, to re-inhabit without
34:30colonization is our own bodies, our own
34:32consciousness, our own emotional
34:35apparatuses. And that is where the need
34:38comes from: what happens if I enter a
34:40pavilion, which is an installation
34:42where I have to sit, where I have to
34:43walk and see these materials that are
34:45cracking, that are reacting to the
34:46environment? What is this telling me
34:49with this calm? Because there is also
34:52an internal decolonization that is an
34:54everyday journey. I think our
34:56generation has that marked colonization
34:59, and we were educated in many school
35:01programs where we don't even see
35:03pre-Hispanic art—poorly called
35:05pre-Hispanic, because it sets a
35:07temporal cut at the arrival and
35:09departure of Europeans, right? So, we
35:13have a colonial container; museums are
35:17colonial containers, art is a
35:19colonizing institution. But that
35:23doesn't mean that in those places, in
35:26those centers, there can't be content
35:28that is summoning other things, that is
35:30rethinking relationships, that is
35:33rethinking meanings, and since art and
35:35museums are public goods, well, all
35:37forms of knowledge deserve a space in
35:40that, right? All identities, all voices
35:43deserve it, right? Always in the plural
35:45. That is, in fact, a very good
35:54question. It is a very good topic to
35:57point out because I think it is
35:58something that is haunting all the
36:00artists who do not want to follow the
36:03Western canon, right? Or who directly
36:06belong to Indigenous peoples. It is an
36:09echo whose origin I don't exactly know,
36:12but I do know it starts from the idea
36:16of a center and an exterior, right? So,
36:19the center remains the West, and the
36:21exterior remains what is not the West.
36:25And so it is very interesting to see
36:27how, suddenly, faced with the West,
36:30which wants to take things from what it
36:32considers external, but suddenly
36:34doesn't want to take things because, in
36:37a way, it is sated with itself; but at
36:39the same time, it doesn't want these
36:42things to reach the level that the West
36:44wants to dictate. I want to take things
36:47, but I don't want these things to be
36:49on par with me, to be positioned as
36:51equals. So, this is a way of
36:54dispossessing, of dispossessing native
36:56peoples when suddenly there is a...when
36:59it is suddenly discovered that there
37:01are endless sharp artists, right?,who
37:04do not want to follow Western canons,
37:07but rather want to follow their own;
37:09they want, uh, to have their own roots,
37:12they want to have their own
37:14epistemologies, their own aesthetics.
37:18Suddenly the West says, "No, wait, I
37:19mean, this is already, this is already
37:21very strange, this is exotic." So, it
37:24starts to pose the question to us, how
37:26is it that you are self-exoticizing? No
37:29, no, no, that's not how it is. The one
37:31doing the exoticizing is the West, and
37:33it is posing this to us in a way, for
37:36what? to prohibit, right? Because in
37:40some way, it is the fear of the exotic,
37:43the fear that it imposes on us
37:46generates precautions or generates
37:49prohibitions, generates content
37:52cancellation, generates epistemological
37:55cancellation, generates knowledge
37:58cancellation. Of course, there are also
38:02these other parts on the other side
38:05that just want to, uh, take things from
38:07the surface, right? The, the shapes,
38:10this shape seems pretty to me, but not
38:13in a sense that, uh, like any other
38:15shape might seem pretty, but this shape
38:18seems pretty to me, I'm going to repeat
38:21it, I'm going to modify it, and I'm
38:23going to make, uh, something trivial or
38:26something superficial, right? And so
38:30faced with that, clearly the cultures
38:32from which that shape comes react, and
38:35also because there is a disparity in
38:37economic terms, right? So there are,
38:41there are multiple implications and it
38:44is quite delicate material. Uh, working
38:48with native knowledge is very delicate,
38:50but just because it is delicate doesn't
38:52mean it's impossible, right? but one
38:56simply has to take into account all the
38:58implications, the ones we get to know,
39:00right? And also to conduct ourselves
39:03based on respect, I think, based on
39:05respect and equity. I mean, if we have
39:09respect and equity as a base, that
39:12cannot generate anything else. I don't
39:15know if I'm explaining myself. I mean,
39:17if, if we plant a seed of respect and
39:20equity, it won't generate a seed of, of
39:22imposition, hate, or, or whatever,
39:24right? Uh, if, if we approach native
39:29knowledge from equity and respect, that
39:32will be built in equity and respect.
39:36Well, I thank you very much for the
39:38depth, the duration, and the decolonial
39:40nature of this conversation. This was
39:42another episode of Conversaciones sin
39:44Val.
39:52>> It is important to mention that the
39:53opinions expressed in this episode are
39:55the sole responsibility of those who
39:57voice them and do not necessarily
39:59reflect the official thinking or
40:00position of INBAL. This is an
40:03independent space for dialogue focused
40:06on cultural outreach.
40:10>> I am Fernanda Quiroz and this is
40:12Conversaciones Inbal. Government of
40:17Mexico.

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