anywhere and everywhere, 2023
maize, rocking chair, garden lights, audio, performance
anywhere and everywhere pays homage to the people of Lockhart, Texas. This site-specific installation explores notions of home and place by following the family history of Lockhart native, Connie S. Amaya, as she shares anecdotes about growing up in the Tank Town neighborhood.
She recalls working in the fields with her mother and six siblings picking cotton and bundling broom corn (or “la escoba”); walking over to Tank Town, at that time a pork processing factory, to purchase chicharrones and manteca; and witnessing the various local neighborhoods she has lived in transform over the past six decades.
These intimate autobiographical spoken vignettes serve as a soundtrack to a performance piece in which the artist grinds maize, one of the grains processed in the silos, by swaying back and forth over it with a rocking chair. The stories shared reveal how the trajectory of one family is directly and inextricably interwoven with the ever-changing landscape of their hometown. Gardens become a space for community and storytelling; farm fields get developed and serve as visual reminders of time passed. Meanwhile, people continue to move through the land—anywhere and everywhere—to survive.
Audio features Connie S. Amaya, Mary Juarez, John Mathew Bernal, and Paloma Mayorga.
For audio only: