Vamos a hornear un pastel | A Dónde Vas Dreamer

By: Anastasia “Stacy” Kirages

The work in Vamos a hornear un pastel is a meditation on my two cultural identities: Greek and  Mexican. Initially, I was only going to focus on my Mexican identity while at the Casa Lü Sur (formerly El Sur) residency, but I soon realized that it was impossible to leave out the other half of myself because I am a blend of both. Therefore, I used a combination of Greek and Mexican imagery.

The theme of baking is seen throughout the show as it is a metaphor for my mixed identity.  Baking is an activity that is a core memory with both my maternal and paternal grandmother. During the summer in Houston, my mom would drop my sister and I off at our grandparents’  house and after sleeping in for a bit more, we would get up and bake a cake in the afternoon.  Similarly, when visiting my yiayia in Indiana, we would make koulourakia (Greek Easter cookies)  together. When it comes to baking you must follow a recipe, but by tweaking it a little, you can get many different and wonderful results.

In these pieces I utilize artistic approaches such as collage, frottage, sculpture, stop motion with assemblage, risograph printing, and zine-making, paying close attention to texture, which appears in many of the works. For example, the paper bags that I carried my fruit in from Walmart my first week in Mexico City, the grave rubbings of my grandparents on top of the cake, the  National Geographic map of the Mediterranean seafloor, torn paper from political posters around Tlalpan, and more.

Being in Mexico City when the most recent presidential election took place on June 2nd was an impactful and momentous occasion also. In what I call my “fragmentary” works on paper series,  I reflect on political issues such as the genocide in Palestine, congressional speeches, and the controversy over the Parthenon marbles through minimalist collage and subtle suggestive colors.

Free Palestine

Marbles

Follow the Recipe

Anastasia “Stacy” Kirages
is a collage artist, zinester, and community organizer for Zine Fest Houston (ZFH), explores themes of memory, history, nostalgia, and preservation in her work. She utilizes found ephemera through collage and zine-making to reflect on her own family history and relationships and to create fictionalized memories in new contexts. For more information about what she has going on, you can check out her website at https://kllages.com/home.html, or follow her on Instagram: @k.llages.

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