The Day We Surrender to the AirA Project by Antonio Jose Guzman

Special Thanks to:

Elvia Jaramillo, Susana Jaramillo Nieto, Shoshana Iten, Roef Langedijk, Siri Driessen, Wietske Langedijk, Sara Langedijk, Regina Peferoen, Laura Peferoen, Rogier Fokke, Antonio “Pitu” Rivera, Armin Kane, Rachel Anthonia Verschoor, Antonio Jaramillo Reyes, Delano Mac Andrew, Femi Dawkins aka Jimmy Rage, Saskia Ten Holt, Fabrice Schomberg, Tia Ryan, Irene Beukers, Suzanne Vis, Jaime Chandler, Dara Ghahremani, Bibi Panhuizen, Valentina Catena, Niels Albers, Peter Jan Jong, Catalino Guerrero, Hernan Guerrero, Jose Guzman, La Casona, Jona de Bokx, David Jablonowski, Friso Ten Holt, Salomon Vergara, Maria del Pilar Blanco, Alejandra Pinzon, Evelyn Raat, Jose Angel, Murillo, Charlotte van Otterloo, Oliva Guzman Muñoz, Flavio Guzman Muñoz, Ton van Beers, Liboria Jaramillo, Alejandro Guzman, Jenny Villarreal, Pepe Villareal, Diecke Bentum, Mir Rodriguez, Corina Schaub, Anouk Piket, Gloriela Villareal, Claas Wernicke, Lidia Jaramillo, Eva Schmitz, Oumar Mbengue Atakosso, Monica Nador, JAMAC Jardim, Miriam São Paulo, Laurent Zuijdwijk, Iris Koppe, Walo Araujo, Adrienne Samos, Felipe Peres Calheiros, Herman van Haaren, Ischa Stuart.

More Info: www.thedaywesurrender.com

Graphic Design:Anna de Jong

The Day we Surrender to The Air has been made possible through the support of the Netherlands foundation for Visual Art, Design and Architecture.

© 2009 Guzman Films, Antonio Jose Guzman. www.aguzman.com

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A project by Antonio Jose Guzman

THE DAY WE SURRENDER TO THE AIR

“A transatlantic diary, an exchange of memories and expectations for the future.”

The Day We Surrender to the Air.

The Day We Surrender to the Air is a multi-media art project in which I investigate the connection between migration, Diaspora and gravity. The connection between these three subjects will be explained in a trans-cultural installation that demon-strates the dialogue between origin, ethnicity and cultural plurality.

The world has experienced thousands of years of migration, starting from migrating nomads in the Fertile Crescent and east-Africa, to the medieval Migration Period and modern day political and economical migration. In The Day We Surrender to the Air, I use myself as an example of the migration between the so-called Old and New Worlds. My identity is the product of my ancestors’ traveling experiences through Polynesia, Eurasia, Mesopotamia, Africa and eventually to America and Europe. This reveals that my genetic identity is based on the various Diasporas of my ancestors, and thus on the decisions they made in migrating to some place or to another. For this reason a voyager will symbolize the travels, migrations and Diasporas of my ancestors. Through the African Ancestry Organization in Washington D.C. and the National Geographic Genographic Project, two organizations that are specialized in DNA research, I will obtain my DNA analysis. The results of this analysis will help me to form my genetic map that will reveal the route my DNA covered through different continents over the past 200,000 years. The project will consist of diverse materials such as photos, videos, texts and sounds from places along these routes. Visual and sound material from people living in the places where my DNA is from is extremely important. The videos and documentaries are made up of multiple histories and question my position as an Afro-Latin-Ameri-can immigrant in a postcolonial society and ultimately in the contemporary world. A documentary film will be made of the whole journey, as well as an online data visualization where new family members and anyone else interested in the project can follow the process, contact me and interact with one another.

This book traces the project The Day We Surrender to the Air from its conception through the various stages with different images, sketches and texts that represent the theory and analysis of the project – both as an installation and as a philosophical social environment.

The Day We Surrender to the Air is subsidized by the Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture (known in the Netherlands as Fonds BKVB).

www.thedaywesurrender.com

Antonio Jose GuzmanAudiovisual Artist & Documentary Filmmakerwww.aguzman.com

“I must surrender myself to what surrounds me, unite myself with its clouds and rocks, in order to be what I am. I need solitude in order to communicate with nature.”Caspar David Friedrich

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“No man can know where he is going un-less he knows exactly where he has been and exactly how he arrived at his present place.” Maya Angelou

...We saw Chagres under peculiar circum-stances. At the time of our arrival there the California fever had reached its extreme height, but was still raging with unabated fury. Every day some steamer or sailing craft from our Atlantic cities, and occasionally one of the latter class from some French or English port, would enter and disgorge its mass of eager life upon the sandy point, and hurry back again for a fresh cargo. I doubt if ever slave ships, in the palmiest days of that hellish traffic, were crowded to the extent of some of the Chagres packets during this period of the California Immigration.

It was a strange and exciting scene to look upon. Frequently after coffee in the morning I used to stroll down to the point, and watching my chance for a seat upon the piazza of the Empire City Hotel, would light my cigar, and gaze for hours unsated upon that wonderful kaleidoscope of human life. No romance that I ever read possessed for me half the interest of that ever changing scene. In the forms of all nations, ages, and conditions of life were represented...

A story of life on the Isthmus (1853)Author: Fabens, Joseph Warren, 1821-1875Subject: Panama - Description and travel

Antonio Jose

Guzman Jaramillo

ElviaRaquel

JaramilloNieto1948

SusanaNieto1923

TrinidadPinzon1900

FranciscaRangel1882

AntonioJaramillo

Reyes1913

TeodoraReyes1883

FaustinaCordova

1858

ReyesJaramillo

1882

FlavioGuzmanMuñoz1945

OlivaMarinaMunoz1923

JustinaVazquez

1906

AmeliaBorbua

1881

SilverioVazquez

1878Juan

EnriqueMunoz1901

MariaCaballero

1880

DugracioGuzman

1875

JoseGuzman

Caballero1906

CatalinoNieto1885

Valentin Nieto1878

JoseAdelardo

Reyes1860

CresenciaVega1860

...Then there was this Russian boy in a club that started to talk to me in his own language. ‘sistrjonka’, he said, ‘little sister’. He was totally convinced that we shared our place of birth. His suggestion made me doubt about the origins of my grandmothers’ strange surname. Maybe features tell more about your identity than artifi-cially invented surnames? For a long time I’ve felt a vague longing to visit Russia. When I was in high school I liked to listen to Russian music, and even tried to deci-pher some Cyrillic. The boy must have been right. I’m a Russian-Egyptian.

I was satisfied with my new identities. Unlike Maya Angelou I found it a very pleasing feeling to belong to something elusive, something that was far and old and that I thus could not com-pletely understand. At the same time I could easily select all the qualities with whom I wanted to be associated with, and neglect those with whom I didn’t. I did not have to obtain any of these qualities myself. Because of my genetic background, they were just there. In this way I could have an identity that was based on stereo-types, but was on itself not stereotypical at all...

Sistrjonka (2009)Author: Siri Driessen