El Gigante / The Giant.

Clothes of immigrants, poetry, paper mache, acrylic, cornhusks.

El Gigante is an 8-foot-tall installation created as a response to the dehumanization and infantilization of immigrants.

Upon the current political climate, immigrants have commonly been reduced to stereotypes and outdated ideas that undermine and minimize their individual personalities; they are people who are mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters; doctors, construction workers, engineers — each person with different stories to tell.

El Gigante is a sculpture created from clothes of immigrants sewn together. Each piece of fabric worn to weddings and funerals; baptisms and holidays; each piece of clothes worn during moments of joy, moments of sadness — impregnated with special, individual journeys.

The masks were created using poems written by immigrant parents to their children, and from children to their parents. The poems explore subjects of gratitude, regret, nostalgia and joy. I personally gathered poems from my immigrant community and used the paper it was written on to create paper mache. The paper mache was used to create the masks that are the result of dozens of intrapersonal and familiar stories.

On the floor and on the walls sits a bed of cornhusks which are the leftover cornhusks from immigrant families’ Christmas tamales.

By creating a giant sculpture out of seemingly forgettable objects, El Gigante personifies the immigrants who demand their presence to be noted, their voices to be heard and their colors to be seen.