[accessibleimage] Mexican artist aims to fill deserted hometown with clay figures

Mexican artist aims to fill deserted hometown with clay figures

CBC, Sunday, August 5, 2007

http://www.cbc.ca/arts/artdesign/story/2007/08/05/clay-figure-mexico.html

A Mexican artist is working to "repopulate" his hometown with Picasso-like
clay figures for an art installation that comments on the flood of residents
leaving in a search for a better life in the U.S.

With the help of a $100,000 US grant from the Rockefeller Foundation, artist
Alejandro Santiago has so far created about 1,500 life-sized clay figures
out of the 2,501 he envisions for the project in his hometown of
Teococuilco, located in Mexico's southern Oaxaca state.

"I didn't know how many to make at first, but I knew I had to repopulate the
town," Santiago told the Associated Press this past week.

After spending several years in Paris, the artist returned to his rural
hometown six years ago to discover it peopled mostly with young children and
the elderly.

"Where are all my friends, my relatives?" he asked, before being told that
they had all gone to the U.S. to seek employment as migrant workers.

Wanting to experience what it would be like to make the attempt at crossing
the U.S. border illegally, Santiago tried from Tijuana in 2003. He
ultimately failed, was quickly caught by border officials and returned to
Mexico.

However, while in the border city, he had passed a wall emblazoned by
thousands of crosses -- mounted on the wall by activists to create a
memorial honouring the Mexicans who have died trying to enter the U.S.

Inspired, Santiago estimated that there were about 2,500 crosses and decided
to use that number -- plus one -- for his own "repopulation" clay figure
project in Teococuilco.

According to the artist, the extra figure is meant to represent the fact
that there is always one more person willing to risk his or her life to try
to enter the U.S.

Santiago and his crew of 35 workers are expected to finish his army of
Cubist-looking clay figures -- each individually sculpted, measuring about
1.3 metres high and weighing about 68 kg -- by the end of August.

The sculptures are scheduled to be exhibited in the northern Mexican city of
Monterrey in September. Santiago is also in talks to show his figures in
other exhibits before installing the finished clay people on Teococuilco's
streets.

With files from the Associated Press

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