​Exotic Plants in The Garden- What to Do? an installation of the Indian artist 

Ishita Chakraborty, contains a large black handpainted wall. She invites new people whenever I paint the mural in a new exhibition space. It is a conscious decision to collaborate with people for whom painting a white wall black is also a meaningful act! At Kunsthaus Zürich's exhibition, she invited two Colombian artists and musicians to participate. Jehisson Santacruz, a transdisciplinary artist and musician from Colombia, and Jhoseth Silva, a visual artist from Colombia based in Switzerland. 

We proposed the idea of their intervention to start to paint this black wall with a performance, which we integrated later as a ritual. We introduced Ishita Chakraborty to cumbia music, and the origins of cumbia music traced back to the slave trade in Colombia. The performance started with Jehisson playing the Colombian Gaita, and then the three of us began to draw landscapes, people, animals, plants, and poetry on the wall. It starts with definite and visible strokes, symbolizing the stories that still resonate in the collective memory. However, as we advance on the canvas, the saturation increases, the blending with hands leading to an intense darkness. It's an act to tell that our histories are not erased; they still exist under the surface. The blackness speaks to you if you want to hear it!

Jehisson and Jhoseth mention how the intervention seeks, through dance, music, and clothing, to symbolize a part of our idiosyncrasy as migrants. The Black Wall started to witness the invisible voices that have been silenced by oppression, injustice, and violence throughout our histories of colonization, racism, militarization, and capitalist extractivism. 

For Jehisson and Jhoseth, painting this wall, in their words, was a healing process. For Ishita Chakraborty too! It created a new avenue for new understanding, empathy, and collective resistance! I am very thankful for such an experience!

The installation ''Exotic Plants in the Garden- What to Do?'' was on view from March 8 - June 30th, 2024 for Apropos Hodler- current perspectives on an icon exhibition at Kunsthaus Zürich!