El Camello

Year: 2023

Media: Furniture pads (drop cloth), Lumber, Concrete, Foam Sealant (body) , Joint Compound, Soda cans

Size: 26” x 33” x 78” (approximately)

    El Camello is a portrait of the men in my family, a caricature of them on their journey north. Composed of authentic construction materials, the sculpture encapsulates the persistence toward prosperity. The slouching, stalking figure is an abstraction of the human form, illustrating the almost dehumanizing effort of manual labor.
    The jacket worn by the figure is made of a drop cloth from my father's construction site, the material blotted by the laborious environment. The bust is made of insulation foam and joint compound, its rear sculpted to resemble a worker’s back and sanded slick as a reference to the infamous slur. Its back is almost entirely hidden from the viewer, only visible as bulging muscles through the felt jacket.
    Hanging from the underbelly of the piece are two soda cans, originally an allusion to wedding cans and Marital immigration yet, it also implies male genitalia and the pertinence of masculinity.
    The title, El Camello, serves as a double entendre, in Colombia the term is used as slang for the monotonous day-to-day, while also meaning camel in Spanish, connoting the sculptures hunched back.