Temporal Liberation

The Beginning

The making of this mural began on November 7, 2024 at 2:15PM, just days after the 2024 Presidential Elections. I didn’t think it would be hard. After all, I’ve done something similar before: a mural for the political campaign of Leni Robredo in the past. That’s until we all started creating. Everyone had different ideas and different ways on how to execute, some were artists, most were not.

The Middle

Claudia’s reflections:

• Everyone feels identified and represented by the angry, sad sun. Everyone resonates with that powerful image that is filled with the same amount of sorrow, as it is filled with frustration and light.
• The mountains, bloodshed and intense, are a powerful statement, both of the calamity of the damage we all are inflicting to the environment and it is a metaphor of the danger that surrounds us.
• The abyss is painfully clear, it talks about the deep hole we had all contributed to create, which is now hard to come out from.
• However, the people trapped in the abyss are all blue. That was an excellent choice, and a poetic metaphor because, beyond the difference and intransigence, people are quite similar. We all want to be loved and to love, we all want to be safe.
• The bones talk about the past, the blooming trees talk about the possibility of a better today, the spirals of the sky allude to a possible change for the future.

This all, and much more, you were able to bring to the mural which tells a story that resonates with many people in many countries. You were able to do something amazing, and very rare: as you painted, you acknowledged others, you considered your fellow artists, each brushstroke you placed was your personal contribution and a way to add to a group’s evolution.  You painted “third dimensionally” .

The End

The last step after the varnish was the reflection, and I admit I’ve delayed it until today.

I delayed it because I didn’t know how to talk about something I was still inside of. The mural didn’t end when we set down the brushes it kept going in how I thought about collective making, about what it means to add your mark to something that belongs to everyone.

What I know now: making something alongside people you barely know is a different kind of intimacy. You have to trust that their brushstroke won’t ruin yours. You have to let go of the version you imagined. And somewhere in that letting go, something truer comes through something none of us could have made alone.