Abrazos de Luz
Performance
- Keith Haring Theater
- June 13 | 7pm
Access Provisions: ASL Interpretation, CART, and Audio Description
Abrazos de Luz is a performance evening showcasing four artists: Koyoltzintli, Alx Velozo, Mónica Palma, and Nima Jeizan, curated by Guadalupe Maravilla. Abrazos de Luz is rooted in the belief that all entities—whether birds, plants, rocks, the ocean, food, animals, buildings, cars, or even a hospital chair—possess intrinsic energy. Guadalupe chose these four artists because of their roles in their communities and who they represent in our society. Animism has been central to many ancient cultures’ spiritual perspectives, and it also plays a pivotal role in this performance event and the artists performing. Maravilla highlights the four artists’ individual artistic practices and their existence as individuals who channel love and empathy into everyone around them. Their energy, and energy like theirs, is especially important right now considering how our world constantly challenges us with unwanted wars, political turmoil, forced migrations, overall mental health issues, and the influx of news and information.
As part of the evening’s rituals, Guadalupe has invited these four artists to perform and bring an offering—a home recipe of a beverage to share with the audience during intermission—to welcome everyone into our space.
Alx Velozo’s Take it explores using their medical records as a performance score, drawing parallels between contemporary medical industrial spaces, peep shows, freak shows, and medical theater.
For this participatory performance, Koyoltzintli will enact an invocation to the four terrestrial energies—fire, earth, water, and air—and the cosmic energy that activates them, known as undifferentiated form, chaos, path, the weaver, and/or love. Four participants will be invited to take part in this invocation by coming to the stage and playing along with her.
Cae mi voz is an active drawing involving ropes and levers that constrain and outline the artist’s movement around an area. Cae mi voz can also be seen as a Rube Goldberg machine, a process that accomplishes by complex means what could otherwise be done simply. The artist uses a pulley system of hand-dyed and braided cochineal rope to move around the room, making clear stops to collect or complete an action. As the performance evolves, a clear unifying thread or braid reminds the viewer that all actions and forces in life are connected.
“Caught between an object and a being (subject), I will become the pomegranate. A chainmail of fruit husks oozes with tie-dyed horse hair filaments. A vacant body, the husk becomes a fruitless vessel, bearing dried seeds that rattle like bones. The rattling echoes a world that is not yet here. The rattling of a glass instrument. I live in the future with the innate knowledge of my past, masquerading as a body in the presence of turbulent times; masquerading as in masking—to shelter, a shell, a husk, a cocoon built for ceremonies; a ball. I wish to transcend the present time, moving into a simultaneously prehistoric and future form. I will become the pomegranate.”
*Please note masks are required for this event.