Monument bases with missing busts or statues are a common sight in Jessica Kairé’s hometown of Guatemala City. This strange sight is usually due to improper maintenance or theft and, for the artist, these monument bases have become symbolic of both failed leadership and invisiblized histories.
Levantamiento, now showing at the Rubin Center, are a growing suite of interactive soft sculptures based on historic monuments that questions the currency and maintenance of monuments in public space, their influence on our social imaginary, and our role in upholding, or dismantling, the ideals and histories they represent. Each work is a scale replica of an existing monument, and remains either folded on a shelf, or collapsed on the floor until the public collectively decides to raise and animate it.
The act of negotiating its various forms prompts participants to consider how these structures shape who we are, as well as our role in shaping them and their surrounding spaces. The monuments included in the exhibit range from New York to Guatemala City to Ciudad Juárez.
Originally Broadcast on August 19, 2023