Truth or Consequences, New Mexico
Studio Project - Fall 2020
Based in Truth or Consequences, a popular hot springs town in New Mexico, this project is about reclaiming and continuing a story once interrupted by spanish colonization. This project creates a space for BIPOC people of New Mexico to bask in the power of the indigenous legacy of TEK, cultural interconnectivity, and a place to celebrate the fluidity of identity as a counteraction to physical borders.
Reconquista
Site Plan
Paths Concept
Prior to Spanish colonization, there was a network of indigenous footpaths along the Rio Grande that connected the indigenous peoples of the Southwest to those of Mexico/Mesoamerica. They traded objects, but also knowledge. These paths would later become the paths the Spanish used in accessing and colonizing the pueblos, naming it El Camino Real de Tierra Adentro. The Spanish formalized the road parallel to the Rio Grande, but the indigenous paths were usually changing and fluid. Without relying on the Camino Real that was marked and revised by the Spanish as they used it throughout the years, I chose to use the path of the Rio Grande, along four important and informative sites, instead - which is what usually informed the indigenous paths. These four sites are culturally and historically valuable and would have fallen along the original network.
Directional Arrow Lights
Point to the direction of the original paths referenced.
This border instillation allows visitors to physically move through Corten posts, which allude to the border between Mexico and the United States. A border state, after the Mexican-American war, New Mexico saw the construction of a border. Relationships between indigenous communities were disrupted, much like the Spanish use of the Camino Real interrupted the system of indigenous networks.
The borders will have laser cut picture narratives on them, about stories of the different identities in New Mexico and it’s history.
Border Installation
Plant Palette
To be planted with edible native goodies, to harvest and then eventually distribute to community. This section is meant to be worked and used by volunteers and educational programs, where people will get the opportunity to interact with the plants hands-on.
There is a feeling of enclosure and privacy from the paths, through gradual planting of trees at the edges, followed by taller shrubs, and then grasses and herbs and other delicious plants.