Firelei Báez casts diasporic histories into an imaginative realm, reworking visual references drawn from the past to explore new possibilities for the future. With a goal to reclaim power, Báez overlays figuration, symbolic imagery, and abstract gesture onto large-scale reproductions of found maps and documents. She populates these historically-loaded representations of space with change-making creatures—whose hybrid forms incorporate folkloric and literary references, textile pattern, plantlife, and wide-ranging emblems of healing and resistance—to present fictional alternative universes. The artist will be in conversation with Leticia Alvarado, Associate Professor of Ethnic Studies and American Studies at Brown University. Presented in partnership with the Department of Visual Art.
Brown University Department of Visual Arts