MOURNERS

NYC 2022-2023

 According to an article published by the BBC in 2015, 27 million Christmas trees are cut down each year in the US, all of which, at the end of the Christmas season, are evicted from those houses where they lived, dressed with decorations, to be thrown with little care, on the street.  Between December 25 and January 8 of each year, we see a Dantesque scene of trees lying in the garbage next to the rats, the unsold food  and the cardboard. It is then that the complexity of a thoughtless and contradictory society becomes evident , teaching future generations that it is possible, for a few bucks, to gain  a tree that was recently alive, illuminate its decomposition with Christmas lights, and after having fulfilled its cycle of productivity as one of  the main characters of western  tradition, it is turned into garbage, , stripping it of the grandeur of its  role. Thus, millions of trees that do not have the possibility of being recycled are added to the 239 million tons of garbage that the USA produces per year, according to a study carried out by the British organization Verisk Maplecroft.

What is it about these trees that garners my attention? Is it the severe ecological implications in a country whose President has earmarked $370 million for “ecological justice”? Is it the tree’s state of vulnerability? Its exile? Do the currently 223,883 and rising pending eviction cases in New York City make me see these bodies of trees, thrown to the streets as bodies of people, like me? Is it the Crucified Christ, with a crown of thorns on a cross that makes me see the moribund tree, outfitted in its regalia in living rooms, as an example of the perpetual indifference of human beings? Is it answering the question of whether traditions should remain unchanged or adjust to the times? Is living in one of the most consumerist countries in the world what keeps me attentive to every gesture that derives from this?

Is it fair to cut down 27 million trees, with the waste of water, problems of soil erosion, and transport pollution to support 700 farms? I also must assert that I do not intend to focus exclusively on the Tree Object, but to ask the additional question of what is better; to get a plastic or natural tree?

This project takes the migrant body as a starting point to reflect on death, exodus, the occupation and vacating of territory as a political gesture and ecological catastrophe engineered by neo-liberal economic thought. Materials composed of an audio file, photographs and video shows us the internal process of a migrant woman who recognizes her own status in the status of christmas trees, comparing it with the status of all those who live in a state of precariousness and social vulnerability.

In 2021, 10 years after first living in New York City, I found myself doing housekeeping in the neighborhood of fort greene. It was here that American Christmas practices confronted me. Trees for between 45 and 70 dollars were sold on every corner like hot cakes, unleashing a sweet stench all throughout the community. I witnessed the illusion of families who, in an almost performative act, entered their homes with their chosen trees, carrying them like a baby into their homes to decorate them while they drank mugs of hot chocolate, avoiding the cold waves of the city. The days following  I dedicated myself to walking around the neighborhood and contemplating the beauty of trees, perfectly illuminated and decorated, standing emphatically within the living rooms of those homes, almost always empty. It was a bitter sweet sight, not only because of the apathetic ceremonial display, but also because I knew the fate of those trees were analogous to mine; eventually we would emigrate to another territory, another uncertain space, evicted from our homes.

As a display of peace and joy, faced with the insensitivity emitted by these green bodies lying on sidewalks, M.Luisa will conduct a ritual to dignify the tree object by performing a funeral ceremony in its honor. Taking refuge in the comparisons that are made to christian martyr figures such as Christ, she will take on Judeo-Christian tradition and ensure the body is treated with veneration, that it is beatified.

TOWARDS AN ARTIST BOOK …

The entire research into the relationship between all the previously listed issues is compiled in a document that will later take the form of an artist book.

Thanks to the photographer Joseph Cochran for all his support and collaboration during this whole process. Thanks to my mom for helping me sew the shrouds.