Yanira Collado’s work centers on the concept of the restoration of cultural memory, enacting a symbolic form of archeology by which “mute” objects whose meanings have been dulled by the passage of time become active once again. Collado summons these lost meanings by working with well-worn objects, which range from reclaimed literary texts to used construction materials. The complex, multilayered surfaces of the assemblages that result recall geological strata, serving as ready metaphors for hidden or forgotten histories while evoking socioeconomic divisions and hierarchies.
Collado’s Untitled/sumando lineas consists of large sheets of drywall supported by a wooden structure, onto which the artist has adhered layer upon layer of material, resulting in subtle, irregular patterns. Collado was specifically inspired by the work of Pecolia Warner, a Mississippi textile artist whose work recalls certain patterns that appear in traditional African textiles, particularly the fabrics of the Shoowa people of the Kuba region of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The surface of Untitled/sumando lineas also features painted or transferred symbols, semi-hidden elements that relate to the coded language employed by runaway enslaved people in the United States on their journeys northward via the Underground Railroad.
Identification
Title
Untitled (sumando líneas) for Pecolia Warner (Untitled (Adding up lines) for Pecolia Warner)
Production Date
2019
Object Number
2020.079
Credit Line
Collection Pérez Art Museum Miami, museum purchase with funds provided by PAMM’s Collectors Council with additional contributions provided by Karen Bechtel, Evelio and Lorena Gomez, Jorge M. Pérez, and Craig Robins
Cardboard, textile, ceiling paint, oil paint, wall paint, spackling, and drywall with wood and aluminum
Dimensions
96 x 204 x 48 inches
Visual Description
Untitled (sumando líneas) for Pecolia Warner (Untitled adding up lines for Pecolia Warner) by Yanira Collado is a large, freestanding structure that is made with cardboard, textile, ceiling paint and oil paint, wall spackle and drywall sheets. It measures eight feet tall, seventeen feet wide and four feet deep. For reference, standard ceiling height in the average American home is eight feet tall. This large structure consists of large drywall sheets that are supported by a wooden structure. It sits at a shallow angle, its bottom four feet away from the gallery wall and its flat surface consists of layer upon layer of material collaged on top of one another. The top layer of the structure contains hundreds of rectangular pieces of cardboard that are tessellated across its surface. The top of the cardboard layer has been painted white, onto which Collado has repeatedly lacquer transferred black and white patterns that appear in traditional African textiles and were often used by Pecolia Warner, a Mississippi textile artist. The hazy prints appear like smoke staining the surface of the white layer. Between it all, some sections of unpainted cardboard peek between the white. Royal blue triangles reminiscent of quilt patterns speckle the painted surface at the top left, bottom, and very right middle edge. Narrow strips of deep blue fabric with rough edges form two vertical columns on the left and a shorter column to the far right in dark contrast to the white around it. Almost as if the layers of painted cardboard were torn away to reveal a night sky underneath. At the very bottom edge of the structure, underneath the many adhered layers of cardboard and supports are several layers of bright, multicolored, patterned fabric. The pieces of fabric have been cut into small rectangles and collaged in a similar pattern to the tessellated cardboard above.
Yanira Collado
Yanira Collado — b. 1975, New York; lives in Miami Artist Page
Artworks Related to Caribbean and Caribbean Diaspora, Latin American and Latinx, and Miami-based artists