Archipelago 2011

Archipelago is an organized deposit of asphalt from broken down roads along the Luis A. Ferrer Highway in Puerto Rico. Ferrer was a former governor and founder of the Ponce Art Museum. His construction company and political administration paved many roads and public facilities in the archipelago during the 1970s. We wanted to bring the street to the museum as an archaeological dwelling to reflect on the remnants of our anthropogenic footprint caused by the industrialization of the island. It’s a 2011 installation that deteriorates with time, erodes with water and changes with seismic activity. Sometimes the reflecting pool is dry and other times it’s filled, but the water level is constantly fluctuating like tides because of an unsolved water leak never repaired ever since it was first built. Ferrer wanted the pool to have two fountains on each side to represent the colonial influences of Spain and United States feeding the island. Ironically non of them work any longer and for us this provided the perfect scenario for the museum to express its colonial idiosyncrasy, preservation challenges and aspirations of renovation with this dynamic installation of asphalt inside the reflecting pool of the garden.