Public Sculpture / Pyrotechnic Performance

A time-based artwork in the form of a quarter-scale replica of a 17th-century sailing ship used by European colonists landing in the Americas. Constructed in Mexico using invasive common reeds and incorporating additional phragmites gathered from New England using twinning techniques for boat-building, this public sculpture brings together reed-weaving techniques from Tultepec, México, and from Lake Titicaca in Peru.

The ephemeral sculpture, becomes prop and site in a fictionalized “first encounter” performance between Indigenous people and European colonists. Accompanied by live Brazilian drumming, the performance transitioned from a somber battle into a festive traditional Mexican pyrotechnic display and the theatrical destruction of the ship. This work addresses the legacy of colonization across the Americas, highlighting the painful and violent process of cultural erasure and hybridization. Primary partners in the construction of the work have been the Artsumex (pyrotechnic) collective from Tultepec, Rhode Island-based pyrotechnician John Ruggieri of Ocean State Pyrotechnics, Aymara-American artist Aymar Ccopacatty, Marcus Santos and his afro-brazilian band Grooversity, and the Arnold Arboretum of Harvard University.

Commissioned by Boston Public Art Triennial

Photos by Robert Gallegos