'abuela, i am learning to see the resilience in your silence in your words in your aging body. and, everyday, myself too, i am learning to speak.'

on ghosts, 2022, spoken word performance. First performed at ‘Through the Crowd’, curated by Jo Collective (April 2022, London). 

In the form of a letter to my maternal grandmother, the text piece explores bodies and matrilineal relationships as sites of memory archival, storage of affect and culture, and alternatives to the coloniality of institutional archives and museums. Contrary to romanticisation, these gendered bodies are seen not only as devices of intergenerational transmission, but also as an interruption of such process conditioned by outer sociopolitical systems and oppression, highlighting the concept of intergenerational silence. 

Incorporating elements of storytelling, theory, and autoethnography, the performance aims to create a horizontal spaces of intimacy and knowledge exchange.  

Using Format