Kalena Marshall Garcia
“good with a camera”

Projects
You Don’t Look Puerto Rican
COMPHET
Learning Solidarity 1 & 2
Arroz y no Gandules
Domino
Sustainable Printing
Video Work
Curation  
Collaborations
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Domino


Following the first showing of Dulces Promesas, I started to engage with the same content through different experimental materials, taking images of my own, and further researching the lasting effects the company Domino Sugar has had in Puerto Rico. The project has shifted into an ongoing work where I have been laser engraving my images of abandoned sugar cane mills, discriminatory quotes made by historical figures, and archival imagery onto domino sugar boxes, bags, and even Domino sugar itself. One of the more finalized pieces that has come out of this is an untitled work where I pressed Domino brown sugar into a block and laser engraved Charles Herbert Allen’s first annual report of Puerto Rico to the President reading “The soil of this island is remarkably productive…as rich as the delta of the Mississippi or the valley of the Nile. With American capital and American energies, the labor of the natives can be utilized to the lasting benefit of all parties. Porto Rico is really the ‘rich gate’ to future wealth. . .by that indomitable thrift and industry which have always marked the pathway of the Anglo-Saxon.” Overtime, the sugar has cracked and crumbled obscuring the words of promise. This work continues to engage with the tension between historical memory and contemporary exploitation, while also addressing the commodification of our cultural heritage.