“Vuelo / Flight“

By Eva Malhotra

The installation, “Flight”/“Vuelo” is a representation of the migration of the monarch butterfly.  The butterfly’s spectacular migration spans North America, making the monarch among the ubiquitous species across Mexico, the U.S. and Canada.

In this piece, the monarch serves as a metaphor for the Latin American migrants who caravan northward in search of safety.  The exhibition space - a mausoleum on the premises of Hollywood Forever Cemetery - tacitly reminds the viewer that even the most vibrant of life forms will die.

Migrating lifeforms, humans and otherwise, often come to a final resting place before being able to return whence they came from.  Like all forms, the monarch is fragile, especially in the face of climate change.  The last 27 years has witnessed the demise of 82% of the world’s winged insects.

The mausoleum is also a place where the living gather to celebrate life.  During the installation of this piece, a group of teenagers gathered for hours round the gravesite of their newly-buried friend, chatting in the cool stillness of the mausoleum’s shade.  The practice of visiting a beloved’s grave, so common across cultures, is ritualized in Mexican culture as the Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) - the holiday for which this installation was imagined.

The corn husks used to create the “butterflies” are also symbolic of Latin American culture.  Maize is a native crop of the Americas and, like so many other living things, made its way northward from southerly realms to become a mainstay.

Flight is thus a celebration and a lamentation - an homage to the vulnerable beings whose flight is a means of survival.