The Colony is a study of the body as a symbol of housing, immigration and gentrification. It entails a 5 channel video installation based on my own experience as a homeless immigrant living in 12 places during 12 months in New York City, tied in to 12 romantic relationships.
Through a constellation of objects and images of the 12 locations I lived in during 12 months, I expand a stream of visual narratives that we negotiate daily, from floor maps to NYC maps, smart phones and GPS, to social and new media. I explore the parallel between house/space and the body, and additional topics such as social and economic resources.
With this project I aim to give visibility to individual empowered female immigrants who came to New York in search of professional growth and career progress. This is in contrast to Spanish women in the 20th-century who came to New York to either reunite with their families/husbands or single women rejected by their families due to out-of-wedlock pregnancy.
I film conversations with migrant women architects as research and space analysis to reconstruct and visualize past events. Especially those related to the 12 love relationships and to the spaces where I lived. Mapping and tracing urban behavior. Working on an interactive map that reflects all patterns of physical movement and emotional interactions with the 12 lovers. Analyzing the lovers’ profile following three of the standard criticisms of buildings designed by architects: first, if they are ugly according to some sort of widely-held community standard; second, liability; and third, functionality.