HOME

Since my life as a migrant in Berlin, I have explored more intimate aspects of my personal processes and the theme and question for home has become a central point of my work.

The altar of the migrant – Where is home?
Participatory action I Installation
2018
Insurgencias 2018 / Agora Collective
Berlin, Germany

A participatory ongoing research project around the question of home. Regarded as a place (that one creates around objects of significant value reminding of important people, moments and distant locations), a bedside table displays a collection of the items gathered from immigrants in Berlin. Was presented at Agora Collective on 29.09.18. Produced in the frame of ¡n[s]urgênc!as 2018 – Berlin based platform for socially conscious artistic practices and activistic positions from the south. Initiated by Agora Collective, funded by Berlin Senate of Culture and Europe under the section “Weltoffenes Berlin Program”, curated by Paz Ponce and Daniela Labra. https://insurgencias.net/home/2018_/

<< […] Both the flag in its function of signifier of a Nation-State, as well as the migratory experience itself are creative elements that reappear in

the work that Manuela García Aldana presented in Agora. First, she asked collaborators and artists to give her personal objects that would remind

us of the place from which we migrated and that would materialize, thus, the memory of migrating from the collection and care of objects.

On a table, the artist placed the fetishes forming a sort of altar to our migrations and migration in general. Sacredness, derived from Christian

practices and altered through syncretism – an insurgent process in itself – is repeated in the Migrant Confessional, in which Manuela, together with

the collective Las Milagreras, invited migrants to share / confess experiences in a dark and long pipe tunnel. Intimate and at the same time

intimidating, this space radically contradicts white cube and resists its institutionalization.>>

Sebastián Eduardo [Dávila] – Art critic & researcher on decoloniality (PHD Candidate at Lüneburg University)

Immigrants Confessional Booth
Participatory action
2018
Insurgencias 2018 / Agora Collective
Berlin, Germany

A participatory ongoing research project around the question of home. Regarded as a moment (that one perceives) rather than a space (where one leaves), a one-on-one intimate installation interrogates berlin-based immigrants: when is home? The answers are collected in the form of an audio archive which expands the life of this parallel temporary community created in a space in between: a ventilation corridor inside the KINDL complex, in Berlin-Neukölln. Transcriptions of this archive are formatted in a 4 minute video rein scribed in my own neighbourhood in Berlin. The Immigrant´s Confessional Booth was presented at Agora Collective on 29.09.18. Produced in the frame of ¡n[s]urgênc!as 2018 – Berlin based platform f or socially conscious artistic practices and activistic positions from the south. Initiated by Agora Collective, funded by Berlin Senate of Culture and Europe under the section “Weltoffenes Berlin Program”, curated by Paz Ponce and Daniela Labra. https://insurgencias.net/home/2018_/

Zuhause I Home I Hogar
Video
4´48´´
2019
Berlin, Germany

A participatory ongoing research project around the question of home. Regarded as a moment (that one perceives) rather than a space (where one leaves), a one-on-one intimate installation interrogates berlin-based immigrants: when is home? The answers are collected in the form of an audio archive which expands the life of this parallel temporary community created in a space in between: a ventilation corridor inside the KINDL complex, in Berlin-Neukölln. Transcriptions of this archive are formatted in a 4 minute video rein scribed in my own neighbourhood in Berlin. The video was presented at “Fluxus Tierra” in Berlin. A a dialog between Mexico and Berlin. Curated by Karne Kunst and Generación Espontánea. https://www.karnekunst.com/open-call-dialogo-mexico-berlin-2019-micro-residencia/

Wer sind wir?
Collective project
2018
BDP – Mädchenladen Spandau
Berlin Germany

A newspaper made in October 2018 with immigrant girls that live in Spandau, Berlin. In the newspaper the girls shared the way they live and see their neighborhood.