My psyche was forever impacted by the conditions I grew up experiencing on the US/Mexico border in Laredo, Texas. Words like el norte, el otro lado, and la migra formed part of my everyday lexicon. I witnessed, firsthand, the separation of friends, family, and loved ones–while personally dealing with an internal identity crisis (or more commonly known as the Chicanx mantra, of “Ni de aquí, Ni de allá.” My experience on the border fueled my passion to investigate immigration issues and led me to explore my identity and gender.
Introduction. Teresita de la Torre’s art is not static, frozen in time – something to look at. It’s dynamic. Do this! Do that! Examine, engage, erupt – something to spur action. It protests immigration policy. It helps her accept, as she calls them, her demons. It’s innocuous, which makes it all the more effective.
She experienced physical and emotional borders first hand. Her family moved from Guadalajara, Mexico to Laredo, Texas, when she was 5. Her father worked as a dishwasher. She went to Texas A&M International University, where she got a BA in Art. Then she got her MFA in Painting and Drawing from Cal State Fullerton. She’s the first person in her family to get a master’s degree. She teaches Beginning Painting as CSUF
From November 20, 2014 to November 20, 2015, she conducted a year-long performance art piece, 365 DAYS IN AN IMMIGRANT’S SHIRT. (She brilliantly explains it here in depth) Briefly stated, she volunteered with Water Station, a non-profit that leaves potable water for people making desert crossings in the hot summer months. She would leave stickers on the bottles that read “With water there is life. Go forward. SPANISH). One day, she found an extra-large green plaid shirt on top of a bush. She took it home, not sure why at first. At the suggestion of one of her professors, she decided she could use it as art. She’d wear it for a month. As she did so, she found it would haunt her as it piqued her imagination. She would wonder, Whose was it? What got them to that point in the desert? Why did they leave it behind?
A month became a year. She got a ton of attention, especially in the non-art press. She made three rules for the performance piece. First, she would wear the shirt daily. To weddings, to family holidays – everywhere. Second, she would document the experience of wearing the shirt. Finally, she would always respond to people who would ask her, Why do you wear the shirt? Her one concession - she would wash it weekly, by hand. (By hand because, threadbare when she found it, it wore out quickly with daily use.)
As a consequence of knowing what she would wear each day, she had one less decision to make. She used the time to reevaluate her life. During the piece, she came out as gay to her older sister. Then to the rest of her family. Coming from a conservative Catholic home, she hid from her family the fact that, from a young age, she preferred girls to boys. With this epiphany, she realized that queerness is beautiful. She fell in love for the first time and says that, had she not worn the shirt for a year, she probably would have kept her sexual identity to herself.
She currently has a show, "Teresita de la Torre: Hilando Relaciones", at Eastside International (ESXLA) (reviewed here).
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JS: Who came first, Teresita the activist or Teresita the artist?
TDLT: I don’t consider myself to be an activist. I am an artist first and foremost.
JS: How do you define activist art?
TDLT: I’m still learning to define that.
JS: As an activist, as an artist, and as an activist-artist, who are your role models?
TDLT: Maria Gaspar, Ana Teresa Fernandez, Cognate Collective, Tanya Aguiñiga… so many others
JS: You teach drawing at Cal State Fullerton. Do you believe that it’s possible to teach activist art? If yes, how? If no, why not?
TDLT: The dream is to one day teach a border arts class. Half lecture, half studio.
JS: How do you choose the particular media in which you work?
TDLT: The idea dictates the media.
JS: What were your artistic interests at the time you began at Texas A&M?
TDLT: I was interested in lot of things, but mainly experimenting with new mediums. I was already mulling on identity politics.
JS: In a lecture, you said you were you said you are aware of your privilege. Would you please elaborate on that?
TDLT: In that specific lecture, I was referring to my citizenship privilege, and how I am documented.
JS: How does Teresita de la Torre: Hilando Relaciones continue what you began with 365 DAYS IN AN IMMIGRANT’S SHIRT?
TDLT: 365 days allowed me to be comfortable with vulnerability, and I came out during the performance, for me it was a natural transition.
JS: Your work seems to be about intimacy. The act of wearing someone else’s shirt. And now, you reveal the privacy of your home. How and, better yet, why does art allow you to expose your vulnerable, intimate self?
TDLT: I believe that vulnerability holds weight and power. It is a way for others to connect to to my work.
JS: You said that you want to do something with your art. 365 DAYS IN AN IMMIGRANT’S SHIRT creates awareness of border issues. What are you doing with this installation?
TDLT: The fragments and remnants of the shirt are currently on view at an elementary school in downtown Los Angeles (Charles White Gallery). I still give talks about my project, my last talk was at a high school in Huntington Beach to a group of Latinx students ( I’ve spoken there for the past 3 consecutive years.)
JS: 365 DAYS IN AN IMMIGRANT’S SHIRT got a ton of publicity in the art as well the general press. Did this create any additional pressure for your current show?
TDLT: That didn’t quite cross my mind.
JS: Your family reacted to your wearing of the immigrant’s shirt. Have they had a chance to react to Hilando Relaciones? If yes, what was their reaction? Was it different that that from 365 DAYS IN AN IMMIGRANT’S SHIRT?
TDLT: My family had every reaction possible to my performance piece. I write a lot about that in my artist book/zine. Not everyone in my family has seen my new work, and those that have are still processing.
JS: What would you want to be the viewer’s one takeaway from the show?
TDLT: I would like for viewers to feel some level of connection. I especially made this show thinking of the teenage Teresita (or for folks that are still struggling to accept their identities), I want to let her know that it is okay to be you.
JS: As an artist, what is your proudest achievement to date?
TDLT: I’m a nerd. I love Ted Talks so my proudest moment is giving a Ted Talk at my undergrad university. Especially because my parents were in the audience.
JS: You make art. You exhibit it. And you teach it. Having said that, are you comfortable in the art world?
TDLT: I’m learning to navigate that world.
JS: What are you working on now?
TDLT: I’m still embroidering, and I’m trying to figure out what to do with film I soaked in the Rio Grande (US/Mexico border in Texas).