Materia

MATERIA was created in Guatemala as part of a series of abstract portraits that record the "space" between the labor/craft produced with ones hands, and the viewpoint of the laborer/crafts-person. Each video in the series documents the intimate relationship between the labor and the laborer, including a weaver, a stonemason, a carpenter, a tortilla-maker, a knife-sharpener, and a butcher. MATERIA is the portrait of the butcher and his son, constructing (or de-constructing, rather) a pig - the video traces this labor from start to finish at an accelerated pace. By inverting the sequence, however, the film produces an abstract view of the "emergence" of the pig through intense labor, clear focus, timely synchronicity, and total engagement between the craftsmen and the subject.

The music is an original composition by Rafael Rondeau, the artist's brother, with whom she often collaborates on her work and installations. The work is equally important as a collaborative process between siblings that are ten years apart - a full generational gap - which allows them to reconnect through memory, experience, and specific familial points of reference.