social services

4 - channel video installation with social practice elements.

In 2015 I was graduating from CalArts with an MFA in film and video. I had spent a year-and-a-half living illegally in my shared windowless studio located in the sub-level of the school. I had been raised by a single parent, with the aid of social services and had experienced homelessness before. As I was completing my degree I was invited to travel to Wildsumaco Biological Station in Ecuador to help a group of researchers and students document their projects and collect material for my own practice.

After living without windows I can’t tell you how it felt to suddenly be in the rainforest. I woke up before dawn each morning and sipped coffee as tropical birds began their day. I spent most of each day hiking around with my camera and taking little breaks to sob with gratitude.

The station is partly subsidized by a bird lodge where staff have maintained hummingbird feeder for the last ten years. Ecuador is home to over 130 species of hummingbirds and so the country is a big draw for serious birders. Several of the scientists got me started collecting video documentation of hummingbirds pollinating different flowers.

If you ever watch hummingbirds, you will notice pretty quickly that they are not angelic whimsical forest fairies. It struck me that after ten years of habituating to the feeders, the birds still hung onto their hierarchical aggression. In the midst of abundance, scarcity remained a threat. Poverty anxiety is transferred to young. Further, it is believed that hummingbirds are able to remember which flowers are producing nectar, and when they will be refilled. They have everything they need but they still operate on a hierarchical system of scarcity.

Given my situation at the time and my experience as a child growing up in low-income environments I began to draw parallels in the behavior of a capitalistic society. I also realized that poverty as an identity has been robbed of its culture. Within our capitalist society it is taught that anyone can do anything and so the struggles of poverty are a choice rather than the fault of greedy rich people. The struggle is both shamed and sought after because we love a good success story. You may experience poverty but only to beat it. In the most wealthy and abundant society ever we have erased the reality that our culture thrives on a class system that keeps people poor. At the same time, this tradition of poverty has cultural signifiers that should at least be recognized if not celebrated in some cases. The strength of the poor is continually silenced to quell rebellion.

Capitalism operates on divisiveness so it appears to be overwhelmingly nuanced. I could see growing up that poverty manifested for my parents differently. For instance, my white mother was not as ashamed to apply for food stamps, but because of the stigma of social services and black folks my black father was more susceptible to predatory lending. For a long time my white mother struggled to see that even though she experienced real hardships she possessed privileges. Both of them always seemed to be working three jobs to make ends meet. When I left home, even though things were not easy I always kept the journeys of my parents in mind, I haven’t had children to take care of.

This project is a meditation on poverty anxiety: where it comes from and how long it takes to let it go. It it also a reflection on poverty as a culture. What are the strengths we gain from this culture? What would the world look like if we could celebrate aspects of poverty (ingenuity, vulnerability, and sharing) and also rid ourselves of the damaging aspects of poverty (starvation, shame, and suffering)?