How can migrants and their communities anonymously occupy institutional spaces? That is, when bodily presence, in and of itself, is criminalized and the borderlands of institutionalized spaces have collapsed.

STRATA is a series of sculptures which translate biofeedback and voice recordings offered by collaborators from local migrant communities into visual choruses of resistance.The animated, data-visualization sculptures facilitate connections between these communities and institutional and civic spaces through a biometric network interface, providing portals of presence as mechanisms for the occupation of public space. The anonymous database becomes a defining presence inside the museum, each unique, individual representation signifying communication through opacity as an intentional, existential act of freedom.

Radical beauty as de-colonization.

STRATA: Bending Fields of Relation was developed and produced over the course of a two-year residency, under the direction of curator Joey Orr, as part of the Integrated Arts Research Initiative at the Spencer Museum of Art at the University of Kansas, funded by Mellon Foundation and the Andy Warhol foundation. The project involved an extensive community outreach process in which Roney collaborated with DACA support student services group, the Caribbean and Latin Studies Department, as well as local allyship training programs.

STRATA: Bending Fields of Relation was part of knowledges, a group exhibition at the Spencer Museum of Art consisting of artists whose practices are rooted in research. Danielle Roney was included to continue her decades-long advocacy of migrant human rights and the impact of technology on a mechanized cultural identity.

knowledges

Spencer Museum of Art
Lawrence, Kansas
August 24, 2019 – January 5, 2020

As part of this project Roney Studio initiated a vocal database – STRATA: Mantras – for anonymous participatory contribution. Participants were able to record a mantra, phrase, song or prayer and see it become flowing animated movements across the LED video surface like visible sound waves. The Studio remains committed to maintaining the privacy and authorship rights of all participants and contributed materials. STRATA: Mantras was designed to ensure the anonymity of those involved and to allow for participants to decide when and how their contributions are used.