Edgar Calel, Qetalh ri qa Winaqi pa Säq siwan / El rastro de nuestra gente en el abismo blanco

n Qetalh ri qa Winaqi pa Säq siwan,2014, we are introduced to the artist instrucing a child on how to place her feet on a sketch book filled with white pieces of paper. He stabilizes her legs with his hands and pushes down so that her bare soiled feet leave a red clay footprint in the empty white space. She steps away and leaves a trace of red earth as a memory and documentation of the event. In a final gesture he blows away the excess before turning the page, readying it for the next performer. He instructs the next actor and, as he does so, she scrapes the red earth with her soles so as to accumulate more soil for her sole printing. This process is repeated until, finally, a pet monkey of one of the participants leaves its tiny paw prints on the paper. The monkey is also understood as being part of the community. This work is part Calel’s political practice concerning the struggle for the ownership and defense of the land, which is tied to his people’s ways of life. The performance is a form of census—a recorded proof of his people’s existence and their posession of the land.