Vida, 2020

Video Art
Duration: 5’03”
Image: Laura Fong Prosper
Sound: Ela Spalding

Two friends who share time between Panama and Berlin found themselves on opposite sides of the world during the covid-19 pandemic. Based on their voice notes to each other, they created this first collaboration reflecting on the effects of the crisis on family life as well as society as a whole. Vida is a personal response to how to approach life today as mothers and humans.

My collaborator is Laura Fong Prosper (https://www.artconnect.com/profile/laura-fong-prosper)


Vida (2020)

Homebound is a sound piece created combining field recordings of spring in Berlin with the forest in Panama, two of my songs - Black Lion and It's a Forest - and one of my Sundown lullabies for humanity.
It's a brief reflection on the covid-19 crisis and its implications / invitation to stay home; or rather, an invitation to use this time to return "home" and see / shift how we live today.

Homebound (2020)

In Our hands, 2018-2020
Variable dimensions. Photo series / e-book and box set of cards / toolkit and workshop series.

In Our Hands presents the possibility of building a bridge between our selves and our surroundings; to suggest a correlation between our state of health and that of the planet. The series of 24 images of hand yoga positions over vulnerable ecosystems is conceived as a toolkit to help us care more for ourselves, in order to better care for each other and nature. Visit my website to purchase the e-book or learn more about the project. I've also shared some free videos on my Instagram TV @stereotropic. Enjoy!


In Our Hands (2018-2020)

Ocaso / Sundown, 2019
Immersive sound installation, originally created for the Bienal de La Habana XIII.

To soothe the mind, relax the cells, stop for a moment the overdose of information; to allow ourselves to receive comfort for the great changes past and yet to come, to grieve the loss of nature. Recreating the bedtime routine of a child, between lullabies and stories about life on the planet, Sundown is a space for reflection and rest for living beings of all ages.
The work is an installation that combines overflowing sounds of lullabies for humanity, with stories or texts focused on resilience and life’s cycles relevant to the place where the piece is installed. The arrangement of these elements in the space, along with a variety of possible seating, aims to provoke a situated reflection on the space-time we live in and our position as well as disposition in relation to nature and geologic time.


OCASO / SOUNDOWN (2019)

Songs for Limón, Songs for Colón, 2016 
Sound and social intervention with jukebox in Horizonte Rocola, Pasaje de Cristal – in collaboration with the collective Islas Resonantes. The work was created for the X Central American Biennial in Limon, Costa Rica. Jukebox dimensions: 160 x 60 x 40 cm

Songs for Limón, Songs for Colón is a luminous and calypsonian jukebox that I created as a way to build a musical solidarity bridge between Limón (Costa Rica) and Colón (Panamá), using calyspo sound waves as the medium. The list of songs in the jukebox was collected through an open invitation to dedicate songs to these two cities in Panama and Costa Rica. 
Both port-cities share somewhat similar historical and present circumstances: both were founded by colonial and postcolonial interests, which at some point had a confluence of immigration from the Antilles. In Colon the drive was the American Gold Rush and later the Panama Canal, in Limon it was the United Fruit Company carrying bananas. When economic and political changes came about, government attention shifted away from these cities for decades letting them fall into decay. Now, the gates to the Caribbean are attractive again to the powers that be, and they face the opportunity and/or threat of restoration lead by economic interests which don’t exactly incorporate an honest social appreciation for their inhabitants. Both cities share calypso. And it is revealing that songs fifty or more years old tell stories or reflect social sentiments that are very much relevant today. 

SONGS FOR LIMON, SONGS FOR COLON (2016)

Panamá Caribe, 2015. City of Colón, Panamá.

Participatory Performance. Duration: 60 min. Comissioned for INTEROCEÁNICO, curated by Sebastián Calderón Bentin for Fluid States: Performances of UnKnowing, Performance Studies international (PSi). 

During a Caribbean sunset we performed a gesture, a suggestion of a festival facing the sea, inspired by synchronised swimming, synchronous celebrations and parallel histories. Various cultural groups manifested three historical periods of Colon in one time and space. Their actions and accompanying colourful flags pay homage to the role Colon plays in Panama’s history and highlight its present, with all the power and beauty of its natural and cultural heritage. 

Panamá Caribe was created to address the 100th Anniversary of the Panama Canal and the celebrations that should have taken place to honour the historical and cultural importance of the City of Colón (the Caribbean entrance of the Canal) for the identity and development of the entire country. In the face of a new development scheme for the city that is systematically erasing its history and people, this small gesture is a suggestion of a large festival that could have the potential to boost the city’s economy through its true wealth: its people and culture. 


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Ela Spalding