Rossell Santillán, Gabriel
Obsidiano, 2006
Courtesy: Ifa Galerie-Stuttgart, Foto: Gabriel Rossell Santillán
Gabriel Rossell Santillán’s work shows an engagement with images which give centrality to the process of memorial reconstruction. In this way, the topic of the “return of memory (memories)” is at the center of his work. Since the artist first engaged with the Wixárika Indigenous community in Mexico in the Proyecto Wixárika, a thorough thinking about the return of the “order of the things” (1) was set in motion. Regarding this project, it is important to stress the return of the “order of things” (which can be represented in an image) and not the return of the objects themselves. (2) In this way, the Wixárika project has the aim to develop a method - a way - to return knowledge and memories of sacred ceremonies to Wixáritari communities in Mexico.
Beyond this project, the topic of the “relation of things” - the reconnection of offerings and ceremonial utensils with the community - has always been present and has continued in his most recent work. The installation Obsidiano (2006) reflects on the exposure of a ceremony which should not be seen in direct light. Here, the artist used different projection surfaces (a laptop, an obsidian) to expose sacred chanting through opacity - thus preventing the ceremony to be contextualized through linearity and absorbed by modernity. In his work Die Entstehungsgeschichte der Sonne (2008), Rossell Santillán exposes a video - through filtering the image through wood - about a method of knowledge transmission. Here, while a man narrates a ceremonial chant (myth), his wife embroiders and records this ceremonial chant in textile form - through thread and colors - for future generations. This video installation weaves memory, narration, ceremonial chant (myth), textile, embroidery, wood, as well as female and male practices and elements. The video Los Lobos. Zweites Zusammentreffen und Befragung der Wixárika Opfergabe in Berlin (2017–2022), shows
conversations between Mara’akate, the artist and staff of the Museum in Dahlem - after having engaged in two ceremonies. At the museum, where every participant was re-named, the Mara’akate looked for images of extinct animals and plants as well as ceremonial utensils with drawings, patterns and/or techniques carrying information about textile methods which do not exist in the Wixárika communities anymore. This resulted in the project of a booklet about these extinct animals and plants as well as the offerings (which are in Berlin) and the extinct methods, for the younger generations. Further, the video shows how the Mara’akate reordered ceremonial utensils at the museum and explained the importance of maintaining a correct order of (material) things. According to their knowledge, this order is important for the wellbeing of humanity. The video Die Besteigung des Quemado (2012) depicts a procession to the sacred mountain Quemado where Mara’akate from different provinces asked their ancestors what to do about a Canadian mining company that had found gold in Matehuala and Wirikuta. For the Mara’akate, it is not just about sacred mountains, but also about the sacredness of the earth, the wind, water, and the minerals. Gold, for example, is perceived to maintain the earth’s stability and, therefore, it should not be extracted. The second part of the video shows Dionisio’s first visit to the Dahlem Museum in Berlin and the first ceremony, after which Mara’akame Dionisio stated that “the objects were already dead”.
The tapestries for the exhibit Flowers Beneath Our Feet, which Gabriel Rossell Santillán has created in collaboration with other artists like Karen Michelsen Castañón, Lizza May David, Keiko Kimoto, Antonio Paucar, Luis Ortiz and Emiliano Cruz Méndez show the process of collecting pieces and reconstructing images - in this case, it is about representations which existed before western colonization. This collecting, bringing together and reconstructing by the artist aims to make a statement, expressing that an order of the world not only existed, but was broken and scattered since the beginning of the colonial enterprise - in the 16th century. Through collecting and bringing together images and meanings, memory - as “the order of things” - returns in the work of the artist and we can access images and knowledge about interculturality, interspiritual dialogues, as well as relations between human and non-human entities which are not available as such anymore. In the work of Gabriel Rossell Santillán, the “order of things” can return to challenge historical narratives. Anyhow, as the artist has also expressed, imagination also plays a role when giving a finished form to the whole process of memorial reconstruction. This means that, if only certain pieces of an old work (or “order”) can be recovered (like in the case of the Moghul tapestry of the 16th century), those pieces that were lost or disappeared can be reconnected - today - through creativity and wild imagination.
(1) This is connected to ancestral fathers and mothers, as well as to their relations to offerings and elements of ceremonies such as non-human subjects, rivers and mountains.
(2) For the Wixárika, what we call “ethnological objects” are, in fact, offerings and ceremonial utensils.
Text: Andrea Meza Torres; deutsche Übersetzung: Johanna Schindler
Gabriel Rossell Santillán’s work shows an engagement with images which give centrality to the process of memorial reconstruction. In this way, the topic of the “return of memory (memories)” is at the center of his work. Since the artist first engaged with the Wixárika Indigenous community in Mexico in the Proyecto Wixárika, a thorough thinking about the return of the “order of the things” (1) was set in motion. Regarding this project, it is important to stress the return of the “order of things” (which can be represented in an image) and not the return of the objects themselves. (2) In this way, the Wixárika project has the aim to develop a method - a way - to return knowledge and memories of sacred ceremonies to Wixáritari communities in Mexico.
Beyond this project, the topic of the “relation of things” - the reconnection of offerings and ceremonial utensils with the community - has always been present and has continued in his most recent work. The installation Obsidiano (2006) reflects on the exposure of a ceremony which should not be seen in direct light. Here, the artist used different projection surfaces (a laptop, an obsidian) to expose sacred chanting through opacity - thus preventing the ceremony to be contextualized through linearity and absorbed by modernity. In his work Die Entstehungsgeschichte der Sonne (2008), Rossell Santillán exposes a video - through filtering the image through wood - about a method of knowledge transmission. Here, while a man narrates a ceremonial chant (myth), his wife embroiders and records this ceremonial chant in textile form - through thread and colors - for future generations. This video installation weaves memory, narration, ceremonial chant (myth), textile, embroidery, wood, as well as female and male practices and elements. The video Los Lobos. Zweites Zusammentreffen und Befragung der Wixárika Opfergabe in Berlin (2017–2022), shows
conversations between Mara’akate, the artist and staff of the Museum in Dahlem - after having engaged in two ceremonies. At the museum, where every participant was re-named, the Mara’akate looked for images of extinct animals and plants as well as ceremonial utensils with drawings, patterns and/or techniques carrying information about textile methods which do not exist in the Wixárika communities anymore. This resulted in the project of a booklet about these extinct animals and plants as well as the offerings (which are in Berlin) and the extinct methods, for the younger generations. Further, the video shows how the Mara’akate reordered ceremonial utensils at the museum and explained the importance of maintaining a correct order of (material) things. According to their knowledge, this order is important for the wellbeing of humanity. The video Die Besteigung des Quemado (2012) depicts a procession to the sacred mountain Quemado where Mara’akate from different provinces asked their ancestors what to do about a Canadian mining company that had found gold in Matehuala and Wirikuta. For the Mara’akate, it is not just about sacred mountains, but also about the sacredness of the earth, the wind, water, and the minerals. Gold, for example, is perceived to maintain the earth’s stability and, therefore, it should not be extracted. The second part of the video shows Dionisio’s first visit to the Dahlem Museum in Berlin and the first ceremony, after which Mara’akame Dionisio stated that “the objects were already dead”.
The tapestries for the exhibit Flowers Beneath Our Feet, which Gabriel Rossell Santillán has created in collaboration with other artists like Karen Michelsen Castañón, Lizza May David, Keiko Kimoto, Antonio Paucar, Luis Ortiz and Emiliano Cruz Méndez show the process of collecting pieces and reconstructing images - in this case, it is about representations which existed before western colonization. This collecting, bringing together and reconstructing by the artist aims to make a statement, expressing that an order of the world not only existed, but was broken and scattered since the beginning of the colonial enterprise - in the 16th century. Through collecting and bringing together images and meanings, memory - as “the order of things” - returns in the work of the artist and we can access images and knowledge about interculturality, interspiritual dialogues, as well as relations between human and non-human entities which are not available as such anymore. In the work of Gabriel Rossell Santillán, the “order of things” can return to challenge historical narratives. Anyhow, as the artist has also expressed, imagination also plays a role when giving a finished form to the whole process of memorial reconstruction. This means that, if only certain pieces of an old work (or “order”) can be recovered (like in the case of the Moghul tapestry of the 16th century), those pieces that were lost or disappeared can be reconnected - today - through creativity and wild imagination.
(1) This is connected to ancestral fathers and mothers, as well as to their relations to offerings and elements of ceremonies such as non-human subjects, rivers and mountains.
(2) For the Wixárika, what we call “ethnological objects” are, in fact, offerings and ceremonial utensils.
Text: Andrea Meza Torres; deutsche Übersetzung: Johanna Schindler