The story behind the tire tumbleweed:
Tires for Sisyphus is a performance video utilizing a spherical tire clad sculpture. Angel Fernandez pushes the object on a 42 acre property in Terlingua Ranch, near Big Bend, Texas. Winter Rusiloski is assistant director, Persephone Battle is drone camera operator, and Christian deLeon is responsible for editing and sound. The video was included in exhibitions at KSpace Contemporary in Corpus Christi, TX and the CICA Museum in South Korea.
The work is a performance video utilizing a spherical tire covered sculpture. The device creates a drawing on the sandy 40-acre surface on our property in Terlingua Ranch. I document the process and finished marking via drone photography as well as on the ground footage. While traveling from South Padre Island to the Big Bend along the U.S. and Mexico border, I encountered chained tires that the Border Patrol uses on the American side. Their white Suburbans drag tires to clear tracks on the dirt paths. This clearing or erasing of tracks allows them to monitor fresh foot traffic. Native Americans used this method to track and hunt various animals. This technique sustained their livelihood, which at times was unpredictable. Tires are symbols of progress, movement and date back to Sumerian culture’s invention of the wheel, one of the most revolutionary inventions of civilization.
I intend to use the tires differently from the subtracting and destroying quality. In Tires for Sisyphus, they are a creative and mark making tool. The tires and my shoes leave impressions on the earth the same way that immigrants leave evidence of their passage. This drawing is a record of the journey. The process of pushing this object on the desolate landscape suggests a perpetual struggle, one filled with tension, pain and hard work. Our existence leaves a mark on the land, good and bad. This same existence also makes impressions on our collective identity, shaping the psyche of this country.
Tires for Sisyphus is a reminder of the great cliché that great things come from hard work, risk and adventure. Immigrants make up the greatest part of our American identity and they embody the entrepreneurial American spirit that helped individuals traverse the Atlantic Ocean on their most perilous journey to this amazing land of opportunity. Presently, people come to this country and risk everything, including their lives. People are caged, turned away, and mistreated. Many will come back and try to find a different way to enter this country. This process is part of the unending cycle, a Sisyphean task, and the pursuit of a better tomorrow that may never come.
15 comments:
"Presently, people come to this country and risk everything, including their lives. People are caged, turned away, and mistreated. Many will come back and try to find a different way to enter this country. This process is part of the unending cycle, a Sisyphean task, and the pursuit of a better tomorrow that may never come." The illegals entering this country are doing so because the word is out that the can come here illegally and remain. This is the fault of liberals who want their vote in the future. If they try to become American citizens legally, they won't have to be "caged, turned away, and (supposedly) mistreated". These people are criminals...period. The Sisyphean task at hand is how to deal with huge numbers that rush the border illegally...not their "pursuit of a better tomorrow". The problems they experience are of their own making and not the fault of the agencies that are trying to deal with them.
Many opinions about this.
I think the House Congress men & women who will not work for improved laws regarding ur Southern border - but instead treat it as a political football - should be voted out of office. And elect men & women who will resolve the problem. The Border Patrol did not create these problems - Congress did. And things will not get better until Congress corrects these problems!
P.S. I think the Dug Cartels are finding - it much easier to smuggle narcotics into America - with the existing Border Patrol being tied up babysitting the vast numbers illegal migrants!
This blog has always been a safe haven from the diverse political views of every Tom, Dick and Harry who espouse their opinion with every social media available....how 'bout we keep it that way.
"FYI - my blog is a diary...not a dialog"- John Wells
WhyR...exactly. Although rare, I may voice a "political view" from time to time if it is something relevant to a blog post - but I am not interested in an extended dialog in the comments. If people want to endlessly debate a topic in the comments, I stay out of it.
Matthew 25:40...
And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.
-- Why not talk about politics once in a while? Today - John led off with a political post.
I agree with Mr. Mahan and John. In San Antonio expressing views like that could be argued by many. My family was one of the many who founded this country and wrote the laws many years ago up to the present. And that is what I believe. This other goes against the country.
-- Margery - I certainly agree with your comment! My father - who was a Justice of the Peace taught me at an early age - the laws of our country are to obeyed. I once drove too fast down Main Street & got a speeding ticket. My own father fined me - and I had to pay the fine for this infraction. Now - if a judge ruled an illegal migrant has to return to his original country - why do these politicians try to help them - so they do not have to go? That is absolutely incorrect! When we start ignoring judicial verdicts - America is going to hell in a hand basket!
I am glad my work, Tires for Sisyphus is creating dialog.
Hey Unknown. I certainly was not going to try to post an essay - talking about the joy or pain of rolling a large ball of tires around - in a very hot desert landscape! That was not my idea of a pleasurable way to spend my time on Terlingua Ranch!
It was very unpleasant. A minor sacrafice of my comfort compared to the perilous travels others make. I'm not sure why I show up as unknown. Name is Angel Fernandez. Contact is darthvato@gmail.com have a blessed day.
-- Angel -- My father purchased his Terlingua Ranch property - almost 50 years ago - to have a place to hunt mule deer. After the deer were decimated by lack of water & too many hunters - he gave the property to his two twin sons. We continued to hunt every year - mainly for doves & blue quail. After the Ranch closed all the Hunt Parks - we had to hunt our property or that of friends that gave us written permission. So we installed a water catchment on our cabin & two guzzlers - so we could grow what we shot each fall right on our land. Best thing we ever did to improve our hunting success. Worked so well - we formed a club called Many Tinajas (Many waterholes) - to encourage the construction of water catchments on other T.R. properties. Don, my twin brother took photos of about 140 new water catchments - then quit. That was enough because it was more than the water sources the cattle ranchers had built - and POATRI allowed to be destroyed. The mule deer now have as many water sources - as they did when the cattle ranchers supplied it for their cattle! Isn't that nice? My email is RHMAHAN@HIWAAY.NET.
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