Lopez Hellen, Week 6

    While visiting Xandra Ibarra’s website, one work that captured my attention was the Training for Exhaustion (For The Intelligible) performance in 2015. This art piece included 16 people on a job with an instructor and hypnotist. The first image depicts the joggers running with their faces covered, while the other photos mimic running stances. The people seem in very robotic forms that illustrate the theme of these photos taken by Ibarra. There are so many concepts that this artwork demonstrates, which is why it fascinated me. Also, being compared to insects, cockroaches bring these ideas into a different perspective. These people running together might also display and connect to the Chicanx community since they are a large group. Yet these are the same people like cockroaches who are not considered intelligent and have been here forever. 

    However, like cockroaches, the Chicanx community is very astute as they have fought to stay alive despite the constant discrimination or hate against them. For example, one was how fatigue, as the website indicates, plays a vital role on the joggers given that they are following and covering their faces. Though it does not mean the length of time they had to run for, fatigue can still be present. Another instance the website states is durability. For joggers, durability is essential, and it is a characteristic that most Chicanx or Mexican immigrants have. Many Chocanx or Mexican immigrants are forced to work jobs that most Americans will not do since they seem to be more difficult with little pay. Ibarra’s artwork is very representative of the Chicanx and Mexican immigrant community. This type of performance is unique to come up with. One question that I want to ask Ibarra is how this idea came to mind and where the runners came from for this project.