Projects

Icali (To Fight) - 2025

Over the past year, the shifting landscape of my neighborhood has become impossible to ignore. Gentrification in my community has intensified, marked by the rise of luxury apartments and the erasure of spaces that once held deep cultural and personal significance. This project emerged from a growing urgency I felt to document and respond to these changes through my photography.

In this body of work, I photograph familiar scenes in my neighborhood—quiet houses, street corners, construction sites—and digitally reframe them using elements from pre-colonial Mexican art and architecture. I incorporate images of native temples, indigenous iconography, and hand-drawn frames that I have scanned to create frames. This layering process is essential to the concept, it merges the past and present, making visible the culture and history often buried beneath modern development. The borders specifically reference colonial forces, drawing a connection between the historical colonization of Indigenous Mexican communities and the current "colonization" through gentrification.

My creative process is rooted in digital compositing and historical research. I seek out authentic imagery from archives and historical documents to ensure that each symbol I use carries meaning and respects its origins. The editing process is meticulous and deliberate, mimicking the care with which communities hold onto their traditions in the face of displacement.

Ultimately, this work is about cultural preservation. It’s my way of honoring the resilience of my heritage and the neighborhoods shaped by it. Photographing and reimagining these spaces allows me to process the emotional weight of witnessing this transformation—and to make a statement about the power and persistence of cultural memory.

<ins> tag

<ins> tag (2025%^*()

// Photo Log [001]

>> DEVICE: Sony Digital Mavica MVC-FD71

>> STORAGE: 3.5" Floppy Disk (Capacity: 1.44MB)

init.capture {

for each photo in session {

save_to(floppy_disk);

}

// GL!TCH_EVENT: disk_corruption_detected

// METHOD: Data Bending :: Manual Hex Interference

if (floppy_disk.status == "corrupted") {

apply(databending_technique);

note("origin of glitch concept");

}

// statement:

console.log("I took all these photos with a Sony Digital Mavica MVC-FD71 which stores photos on floppy disks. I got the idea to glitch the photos using data bending techniques after one of the floppy disks was corrupted. Each Disk is 1.44MB.");

inkblot.

inkblot (2024)

The past few years of my life have been of great introspection and self doubt. I discovered that helping other people wherever and whenever I can, is something that brings me joy. With this realization came the immediate questioning of “Do I help people because I want to do something good and help? Or do I help people because it brings me fulfillment?”. Everyday I question my actions in a never ending cycle of “Am I a good person?” and what that means. An ouroboros of self doubt and loathing. This is the mentality that I wanted to show through my art. This blot of black over my consciousness is a visual I wanted to portray through a noir introspective view.

I used the black ink and otherworldly look of the photos as a visual of the mind of the character we are following through the series. Just like the back and forth and omnipotence of self doubt in my psyche, the black ink is ever present and in all things. The narrative I wanted to focus on was a vigilante doing a good act in stopping a criminal but you begin to see that maybe it's not a noble or fair cause. The use of the black ink was a visual I curated because it was the one that resonated the most with the emotions and thoughts that have been encircling my consciousness for a few years.