We experience the end of the world...and the word, as know them; and the beginning of a new era. Perhaps our main frustration is our inability to envision its new characteristics and features. It's a bit like being drunk in the middle of an earthquake, and not having a language to express it.

We live in a world w/out theory, without ethics and without ideology. Our spiritual metahorizons are rapidly fading, and so are our Geo.-political borders. The nation/state collapses in front of our swelling eyes and is immediately replaced by multi-national macro-communities governed by invisible corporate boards, trading partners and computer firms. The new political class believes, or perhaps pretends to believe, that free trade and a healthy economy are the solutions to all our problems, even to the cultural and social ones. In this unprecedented, may we call it "post-democratic era," basic humanistic concerns are no longer part of their agenda. Civic, human and labor rights, education and art are perceived as minor privileges, and sometimes as dated concerns. Artists and intellectuals don't seem to perform any meaningful role other than that of decorators of the omnipresent horror vacui and entertainers of a new more tolerant and cynical consumer class.

As far as I am concerned, we have no real government looking after the human being. Left to our own civilian fate, it is entirely up to us to figure out which are the new models of survival, citizen collaboration and multi-lateral cooperation; the new terms for a new social contract. In this sense, the 90's to me are about citizen responsibility, community action and a civilian logos. This web site is a humble example of community action.

Let's exercise our political imagination for a moment.

I see
(www.splcenter.org/klanwatch/kw-2.html)

I see
(www.ins.usdoj.gov/borderpatrol/default.htm)

I see
(www.immigration.com/citizenship_questions.html)

I see a whole generation
free falling toward a borderless future
incredible mixtures beyond sci fi:
cholo-punks, cyber-Mayans
(www.pocho.com)

Irish concheros, Benneton Zapatistas,
(www.actlab.utexas.edu/~zapatistas/index.html)

Gringofarians, Buttho rappers, Hopi rockers...
(www.lava.net/~artbeat)

I see them all
wandering around
a continent without a name,
(www.americanpatrol.com/RECONQUISTA/aztlanim.html)

the forgotten paisanos
howling corridos in Fresno & Amarillo
(www.iupui.edu/~floc)

the Mixteco pilgrims heading North toward British Columbia
the Australian surfers waiting for the big wave at Valparaiso
the polyglot Papagos waiting for the sign to return
the Salvadorans coming North to forget
the New Yorkers going South to remember
the stubborn Europeans in search of the last island
     Zumpango, Cozumel, Martinique
I see them all
wandering around
a continent without a name
(www.americanpatrol.com/RECONQUISTA/aztlanim.html)

el TJ transvestite translating Nuyorican versos in Univision
the howling L.A. junkie bashing NAFTA with a bullhorn
El Warrior for Gringostroika scolding the 1st World on MTV
Cholo warriors pointing their camcorders at the cops
(www.artcrimes.com)

AIDS warriors reminding us all of the true priorities in life
(www.creativetime.org/dwa/98/participants.html)

Lacandonian shamans exorcising multi-nationals at dawn
yuppie tribes paralyzed by guilt & fear
grunge rockeros on the edge of a cliff
all passing through Califas
en-route to other selves
& other geographies
(I speak in tongues)
standing on the map of my political desires
I toast to a borderless future
with...
our Alaskan hair
our Canadian head
our US torso
our Mexican genitalia
our Central American cojones
our Caribbean vulva
our South American legs
our Patagonian feet
our Antartic nails
jumping borders at ease
jumping borders with pleasure
amen, hey man
(www.echonyc.com/~confess)


Texts by Guillermo Gómez-Peña.

---

© 1998 
Day Without Art Web Action Project 212/206-6674 x201 staff@creativetime.org

dwa archives