benjamin lundberg torres sánchez

about

  • bio + cv
  • contact
  • press / interviews

curation

  • se aculilló?
  • From Procession to Possession

I. performance

  • Ancestres
  • No Wet Materials
  • The Island
  • TO THE BONE
  • El Montón
  • Incorporated Mark: a skin-to-skin for two
  • Safety Pin Removal
  • A Lengua for Mi Boca
  • Audition for Trinity
  • Baudio (Tape 1)
  • Limpieza de Sangre
  • Parachute, (circa 1988 - 2006)
  • i dug 54 stones from the providence river
  • Product of Colombia
  • Lundberg/Torres-Sanchez (L/T-S: Pts. I-III)
  • Hold/Release
  • Naturalization (L/T-S: Pt. I)
  • Colombioplasty (L/T-S: Pt. II)
  • WHITE LIES/ EXIST TO PROTECT PRIVACY
  • Mic Check After the Zimmerman Verdict
  • Prism
  • The Same Colombian: a tête-à-tête for two
  • Memoir: Draft 1

II. visual art + installation

  • others in losing
  • Choqué: Otra Vez
  • #ColorPoll2017
  • Color Poll
  • Casa de Casta

III. video

  • for our sake, not the wind's
  • Bendiciones
  • SPIT/TAKE/PAY/BACK
  • Empire: Can’t Remember to Forget You [Pt.1]
  • The more I hold you
  • Choqué: I collide

IV. spectacles

  • Miss La La & the Roustabouts
  • There's a time and a place...
  • A New Game:
© 2011 - 2025
Theme by WPShower

TO THE BONE

TO THE BONE
Performance. (2017)

In 2017, I created a sculpture for performance, Façade 1, that resembles a two-foot by six-foot section of New England Colonial clapboard siding. I painted the boards with a one-quart undercoat Sherwin William’s “Nearly Brown” (SW 9093.) I then painted the boards with a one-gallon top-coat of Sherwin William’s “White Core” (HGSW4051.) I sand through the layers of white paint to reveal the brown underneath. The performance will end when no white paint remains. I estimate this will take 200+ hours of work if I work relatively unaided.

TO THE BONE uses household paint collected from Sherwin-Williams (whose names echo deeply entrenched racist ideas about color) as layers to be excavated and decolonized. Through performance, I use the simple act of sanding through layers of paint to position color, identity, and home at the border of Interior & Exterior as a site to contemplate erasure and reclamation under white supremacy.

When encountering a majority-white public, starting in Pittsburgh (2017), I have enlisted white accomplices to take over the labor of sanding for me in a reversal of Tom Sawyer’s whitewashing the fence, allowing me space to do interpretive work and storying-telling for audience. In space majority-of color publics, people joining me in sanding becomes a more joyous communal activity.

⁣In 2018, I was invited to perform TO THE BONE many more times than I was in 2017, but was asked to work on them for shorter durations, leading to higher visibility for the performance, but overall less work completed in removing whiteness from “Façade 1.” In reflection, 2018 seems to have been a performance of virtue signaling leading me to sand for longer durations in each performance in 2019. ⁣

⁣In 2017, the boards received 20 hours of sanding.⁣
⁣In 2018, the boards received 6.83 hours of sanding.⁣
⁣In 2019, the boards have received 2.75 hours of sanding. ⁣

Performance History:

Performed 25 May 2019
La Bodega Art Space & Gallery
for the LATINX exhibition
Curated by Cristina Ferrigno
(2 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 16 January 2019
AS220
for Chat Club PVD
Curated by Stine An
(.75 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 30 November 2018
New York University
for Contra Cuentos
Curated the Dream Team at NYU
(.5 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 26 November 2018
AKA Adoptee Forum | NYC
for “Found Connections: Adoptee Solidarity”
Presented by Also-Known-As, Inc.
(.25 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 4 November 2018
The Knockdown Center | Queens, NY
for Political Relief Party (part of the Sunday Service series)
Curated Zavé Martohardjono
(.75 hours, received sanding from the public)

Demoed 19 October 2018 – with board 4/12
The Oakland Asian Cultural Center
for the Latinx Adoptee Expressions panel
part of the 2018 Alliance for the Study of Adoption and Culture conference
Curated by Dr. Stephanie Flores-Koulish
(.08 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 20 September 2018
The Perry and Marty Granoff Center for the Performing Arts at Brown University
for the Se Aculilló | la sutura tierna exhibition
(.25 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 14 August 2018
University of Rhode Island, Providence Campus
for Revolt! Student Protest from 1968 to Today symposium
Curated Laura Marie Marciano
(.5 hours)

Performed 9 June 2018
Washington Street, Empire Street | Providence, RI
as part of PVD Fest
Curated by the Providence Department of Arts, Culture, and Tourism
(4 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 10 September 2017
Main Street, Church Street | North Adam, MA
as part of DownStreet Arts’ TRUST fest
Curated by Michelle M. Daly
(2 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 27 August 2017
Bloomcraft/Babyland | Pittsburgh, PA
as part of PGH Performing Arts Festival
Curated by Abagail Beddall
(3 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 12 August 2017
Empire Street | Providence, RI
as part of AS220’s FOO Fest
(9 hours, received sanding from the public)

Performed 24 March 2017
IMAGO Gallery & Main Street — Warren, RI
With support from Rhode Island State Council on the Arts
and IMAGO Gallery
(6 hours)

Video by Kenny Borge
Photos by Benjamin Lundberg Torres Sanchez and Shannon Leigh Cahill

<i>TO THE BONE</i>. North Adams, MA<br>© Shannon Leigh Cahill 2017
TO THE BONE. North Adams, MA
© Shannon Leigh Cahill 2017
<i>TO THE BONE</i>, white accomplices. North Adams, MA<br>© Lundberg Torres Sanchez 2017
TO THE BONE, white accomplices. North Adams, MA
© Lundberg Torres Sanchez 2017
<i>TO THE BONE</i>, video still. Warren, RI<br>© Kenny Borge 2017
TO THE BONE, video still. Warren, RI
© Kenny Borge 2017
<i>TO THE BONE</i>, video still. Warren, RI<br>© Kenny Borge 2017
TO THE BONE, video still. Warren, RI
© Kenny Borge 2017
<i>Façade 1</i>, sanding detail.<br>© Lundberg Torres Sanchez 2017
Façade 1, sanding detail.
© Lundberg Torres Sanchez 2017