An exploration of the social role of art through one of the leading figures…
Squatters
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At the end of the 1980s, two abandoned buildings in Manhattan’s Lower East Side were occupied by a group of young artists, many of them immigrants, who renovated them and transformed them into self-sustaining homes outside the law. Drawing from multiple archival sources, Santamaría traces the history of Puerta 10 and Umbrella House through the voices of those who lived them.
The documentary incorporates footage filmed by the squatters themselves during the renovation process, offering an intimate record of a community that built its homes by hand. Through these personal archives and testimonies, the film reflects on the fragility of collective utopias and their ongoing struggle against time, memory, and the systems that surround them.
“If walls have ears, Catalina Santamaría is their spokesperson” — Lise Clavi, Culture aux Trousses
“It’s the living tale of a utopia…” —Mariza Bafile, Viceversa Magazine
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Migration Studies; Visual Arts; Activism; Sociology; Urban Studies; Human Rights; LatinxKeywords
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| 00:00:37.277 --> 00:00:41.782 The word squat means to be in a squatting position 00:00:41.782 --> 00:00:46.253 or to be settled in a place for a certain amount of time. 00:00:49.156 --> 00:00:52.859 I am squatted in a place 00:00:52.859 --> 00:00:54.127 that belongs to me. 00:00:57.297 --> 00:01:03.136 The people who took over abandoned spaces in need of a roof. 00:01:03.136 --> 00:01:06.273 We have lived and rebuilt them. 00:01:13.313 --> 00:01:13.980 Taking control 00:01:13.980 --> 00:01:17.217 and ownership of an unused space 00:01:17.217 --> 00:01:19.186 and making it your own. 00:01:23.890 --> 00:01:25.759 Invader. 00:01:29.262 --> 00:01:31.531 Occupying buildings I suppose comes 00:01:31.531 --> 00:01:34.134 when human beings don´t have a place to live. 00:01:39.072 --> 00:01:40.907 It's really weird 00:01:40.907 --> 00:01:46.513 but being a squatter is about the most Republican thing 00:01:46.513 --> 00:01:50.016 because it's total self-sufficiency. 00:01:56.389 --> 00:01:58.758 Perhaps a dreamer. 00:02:02.696 --> 00:02:05.232 Hope, 00:02:05.232 --> 00:02:08.535 hope and resilience. 00:02:16.676 --> 00:02:19.079 To inhabit a place 00:02:19.079 --> 00:02:23.416 disabled by the City. 00:02:28.355 --> 00:02:29.523 Squatting for me 00:02:29.523 --> 00:02:33.059 is bringing the beating heart into 00:02:33.059 --> 00:02:35.662 into the city. 00:02:54.915 --> 00:02:59.085 Robert Moses was responsible for the removal 00:02:59.085 --> 00:03:03.757 of about 12,000 people from the Lower East Side and demolished the buildings. 00:03:03.757 --> 00:03:09.496 And the projects were built in 1936, I think was Jacob Riis, 00:03:09.496 --> 00:03:11.565 and the whole complexion of the neighborhood changed. 00:03:11.565 --> 00:03:14.134 Then in the 1950s, the U.S. 00:03:14.134 --> 00:03:17.871 did something with the sugar market and Puerto Rico, and they were giving 00:03:17.871 --> 00:03:21.508 Puerto Rican immigrants $50 to catch a plane to New York 00:03:21.508 --> 00:03:27.047 to come and work in the service industries and the garment districts. 00:03:27.047 --> 00:03:29.549 And then there was an economic downturn. 00:03:29.549 --> 00:03:33.553 Many people lost their jobs. 00:03:33.553 --> 00:03:35.522 It was very difficult. 00:03:35.522 --> 00:03:39.192 And along with that, the property values went down. 00:03:39.192 --> 00:03:44.231 Landlords stopped providing services in the neighborhood. 00:03:44.231 --> 00:03:46.933 By the sixties, it had become 00:03:46.933 --> 00:03:48.668 a major drug area. 00:03:50.670 --> 00:03:54.107 This is the side of New York that 15 or 20 years ago 00:03:54.107 --> 00:03:56.876 was shown in the movies as an abandoned neighborhood 00:03:56.876 --> 00:04:01.114 where scoundrels, bandits, drugs and murderers lived; 00:04:01.114 --> 00:04:03.750 it was that dark side of New York. 00:04:07.254 --> 00:04:09.756 A disaster. It seemed like the aftermath of a war because 00:04:09.756 --> 00:04:13.026 all you saw were abandoned buildings, garbage, violence, 00:04:13.026 --> 00:04:19.933 everything that comes when the government is not acting as it should. 00:04:19.933 --> 00:04:25.939 In 1980, 81, 82, 83, 00:04:25.939 --> 00:04:31.311 the Lower East Side looked like a bombsite. 00:04:31.311 --> 00:04:35.048 At night after 8 all you could hear was 00:04:35.048 --> 00:04:38.151 the heroin peddler´s call “white horse, white horse". 00:04:38.785 --> 00:04:41.554 It was spooky to walk at night. 00:04:41.588 --> 00:04:43.990 No one cared to live here. 00:04:43.990 --> 00:04:47.460 One day the landlord came to collect his rent 00:04:47.460 --> 00:04:49.929 and he was chased out by two Black Americans with machetes. 00:04:49.929 --> 00:04:52.098 He then ran into the store and said 00:04:52.098 --> 00:04:57.704 "I´ll sell you a 25 apartment building for 1000 bucks" 00:04:57.704 --> 00:05:01.207 and the Puerto Rican guy told him “I don’t buy problems”. 00:05:01.207 --> 00:05:04.444 The landlords basically just abandoned many of the buildings 00:05:04.444 --> 00:05:07.781 because it was financially the best thing they could do. 00:05:07.781 --> 00:05:10.850 And so the City became the owner of many, 00:05:10.850 --> 00:05:12.786 many buildings all over New York City. 00:05:51.958 --> 00:05:54.694 We opened the building in November of 1988. 00:05:54.694 --> 00:05:58.398 We went in through a side lot, 00:05:58.398 --> 00:06:00.333 picked a window on the ground floor 00:06:00.333 --> 00:06:05.472 that was as much out of view from the street as we could 00:06:05.472 --> 00:06:07.640 so that we wouldn't draw attention. 00:06:07.640 --> 00:06:10.844 And we took out the cinder blocks 00:06:10.844 --> 00:06:14.647 that were blocking the window and started to explore the inside. 00:06:22.422 --> 00:06:24.824 It was full of debris. 00:06:28.094 --> 00:06:32.298 Me, Geerte and Steven Ashmore 00:06:32.298 --> 00:06:37.704 were the three original founders of this building. 00:06:37.704 --> 00:06:39.406 I had won a scholarship 00:06:39.406 --> 00:06:42.409 from Andy Warhol to go to art school in New York. 00:06:42.409 --> 00:06:48.448 So I came to New York, but I really had no money to pay rent or anything. 00:06:48.515 --> 00:06:52.152 And I figured, well, you know, I've been squatting for so many years 00:06:52.152 --> 00:06:56.022 in the Netherlands and I've seen the squats all over Europe. 00:06:56.022 --> 00:07:01.494 You know, stayed in the squats all over Europe, so why not in New York? 00:07:01.494 --> 00:07:03.430 And Steve was in my class 00:07:03.430 --> 00:07:07.033 and at the time he had a really nice loft, 00:07:07.033 --> 00:07:10.203 but he was going to lose his loft 00:07:10.203 --> 00:07:14.174 and she needed a place to live as well. 00:07:14.174 --> 00:07:18.244 And so she said to me, I'm used to doing this thing called squatting. 00:07:18.945 --> 00:07:21.314 At the time, I didn't even know what a squat was. 00:07:23.416 --> 00:07:24.884 I left Pennsylvania 00:07:24.884 --> 00:07:28.221 when the marriage broke up really badly 00:07:28.221 --> 00:07:32.926 and I kind of lost my mind for a while 00:07:32.926 --> 00:07:35.428 and I knew I had to get out of there. 00:07:35.428 --> 00:07:40.700 And also I realized I was transgender too, 00:07:40.700 --> 00:07:44.103 and I couldn't do a transition in Pennsylvania, 00:07:44.103 --> 00:07:50.043 I lived in the boondocks where they still have KKK, 00:07:50.043 --> 00:07:52.345 so I had to get out of there. 00:07:52.345 --> 00:07:57.984 And I knew that New York is the only city for me because it's where I was born. 00:07:57.984 --> 00:08:01.087 So I came back, but 00:08:01.087 --> 00:08:05.525 I was on the verge of homelessness like four years. 00:08:05.525 --> 00:08:10.563 I started hanging out at ABC No Rio and when I finally got evicted 00:08:10.563 --> 00:08:14.033 from the SRO, they let me sleep in the basement there. 00:08:14.033 --> 00:08:16.102 So I'd go to school during the day 00:08:16.102 --> 00:08:19.339 to learn art anatomy and draw from the model. 00:08:19.339 --> 00:08:22.542 And then at night I would go to ABC No Rio and actually 00:08:22.542 --> 00:08:25.745 be a model myself for other artists. 00:08:25.745 --> 00:08:29.782 And Siobhan was one of the artists who was drawing me. 00:08:29.782 --> 00:08:34.354 I am drawing her and I would start shaking so much I couldn't draw anymore. 00:08:34.354 --> 00:08:36.456 And I knew I had to talk to her. 00:08:36.456 --> 00:08:37.690 After a drawing session. 00:08:37.690 --> 00:08:42.629 We'd hang out and we'd have a beer and eventually got to know each other. 00:08:42.629 --> 00:08:44.964 And he was like, hey, I'm looking for a place to live. 00:08:44.964 --> 00:08:47.534 And I'd be like, Yeah, so am I. 00:08:47.534 --> 00:08:48.935 I'm going to be squatting. 00:08:48.935 --> 00:08:50.970 I didn’t even know what a squat was. 00:08:50.970 --> 00:08:53.039 Kind of just like with Steve, so I explained 00:08:53.039 --> 00:08:57.010 and he was like, yeah I'll join you in this, it sounds great. 00:09:01.614 --> 00:09:03.182 One day, one weekend day, 00:09:03.182 --> 00:09:08.154 we walked around the East Village and scouted buildings. 00:09:08.154 --> 00:09:12.792 We looked at a lot of different abandoned buildings all over the East Village, 00:09:12.792 --> 00:09:16.563 and even though we couldn't go inside them, 00:09:16.563 --> 00:09:18.631 we kind of determined that 00:09:18.631 --> 00:09:22.335 this building looked to be 00:09:22.335 --> 00:09:25.305 sound, like structurally very sound. 00:09:31.911 --> 00:09:34.881 We started living here immediately. 00:09:45.992 --> 00:09:47.293 All the steps 00:09:47.293 --> 00:09:51.598 that have been in the building had been knocked out. 00:09:51.598 --> 00:09:56.469 So those first nights I took the fire escape up to the third floor 00:09:56.469 --> 00:10:01.307 and would crawl into my tent and I would crawl into two sleeping bags. 00:10:01.307 --> 00:10:05.178 I would have all my clothes on. So, so cold, 00:10:05.178 --> 00:10:08.348 and the pigeons would fly through the windows. 00:10:08.348 --> 00:10:10.083 There were no windows. 00:10:11.918 --> 00:10:15.888 You start by finding a spot 00:10:15.888 --> 00:10:22.328 that is not very large that you can sort of clean up, 00:10:22.328 --> 00:10:26.165 sort of seal off from the wind and the cold. 00:10:26.165 --> 00:10:28.701 And you need to do it quickly because you need to have a place 00:10:28.701 --> 00:10:32.372 to rest your head and eat something 00:10:32.372 --> 00:10:35.708 and kind of be clean. 00:10:35.708 --> 00:10:39.379 There was a total of five of us at the beginning. 00:10:39.445 --> 00:10:41.614 People that were meaning to live here. 00:10:41.614 --> 00:10:45.284 Two of them dropped out within the first two weeks because it was too stressful 00:10:45.351 --> 00:10:46.452 for them. 00:10:47.387 --> 00:10:54.460 “The Book of the House is the name and it tells the story of 10 Door.” 00:10:54.460 --> 00:10:57.096 I got here in 1987. 00:10:58.765 --> 00:11:01.934 My first time at Tompkins Square Park, 00:11:01.934 --> 00:11:05.171 it was a Saturday night, and I was afraid to go in 00:11:05.171 --> 00:11:11.310 because the homeless had lighted the place with garbage cans full of wood. 00:11:11.310 --> 00:11:15.782 They had an organization called The Tent City, 00:11:15.782 --> 00:11:20.219 because they lived inside the park in tents and cardboard houses. 00:11:30.496 --> 00:11:33.866 All I can say about the squatter movement 00:11:33.866 --> 00:11:37.403 is that when I arrived my friend showed me 00:11:37.403 --> 00:11:41.841 the homeless in Tompkins Square Park under siege. 00:11:41.841 --> 00:11:43.843 No food was allowed to reach them. 00:11:43.843 --> 00:11:47.046 Things go on in Manhattan that nobody knows. 00:11:47.046 --> 00:11:53.853 It's a constant experiment with the dwellers and their culture. 00:11:53.853 --> 00:12:00.493 I found this abnormal and fascinating in many ways. 00:12:02.962 --> 00:12:08.901 One day the cops came and there was a pitched battle 00:12:08.901 --> 00:12:12.705 where some were killed, many were injured, 00:12:12.705 --> 00:12:15.975 and a lot of them arrested. 00:12:25.485 --> 00:12:29.288 Years later I moved into this building 00:12:29.288 --> 00:12:37.964 and my home was the sleeping place of these homeless people 00:12:37.964 --> 00:12:41.434 given to me by a fellow from Colombia. 00:12:41.434 --> 00:12:44.637 Book of the House is the name 00:12:44.637 --> 00:12:46.472 and it tells the story of 10 Door. 00:12:46.472 --> 00:12:51.778 The house was known as 10 Door. 00:12:51.778 --> 00:12:56.115 Then came the Latinos 00:12:56.115 --> 00:12:59.218 and changed the name to Puerta 10. 00:12:59.218 --> 00:13:01.754 I didn’t know where to begin that night. 00:13:01.754 --> 00:13:08.528 It was a huge mess and our lazy way was of little help. 00:13:08.528 --> 00:13:10.530 It was a long night. 00:13:11.597 --> 00:13:13.699 Move into the house. 00:13:13.699 --> 00:13:16.169 To learn to spell correctly 00:13:16.169 --> 00:13:18.871 so his diverse and distant friends 00:13:18.871 --> 00:13:20.640 won't laugh at him. 00:13:27.013 --> 00:13:30.983 I was then living in Manhattan with my wife and son. 00:13:30.983 --> 00:13:36.789 I heard about the squatter movement in 86, 87, 00:13:36.789 --> 00:13:38.658 through my friend, Héctor Quintana. 00:13:39.358 --> 00:13:43.496 Héctor was brought here by a guy named Edgar. 00:13:47.700 --> 00:13:50.203 This building was squatted earlier, 00:13:50.203 --> 00:13:53.739 when we moved in, we put a lot of effort 00:13:53.739 --> 00:13:55.975 and began rebuilding it. 00:15:35.808 --> 00:15:41.814 Héctor and I agreed to document the process of the squatters. 00:15:41.814 --> 00:15:48.521 I was then a camera enthusiast since I was studying film 00:15:48.521 --> 00:15:52.325 and wanted to be a cameraman and editor. 00:15:53.626 --> 00:15:58.297 I decided to study film to record 00:15:58.297 --> 00:16:01.200 the musical events at the Village Gate, 00:16:01.200 --> 00:16:04.236 after befriending Eddie Montalvo. 00:16:04.236 --> 00:16:10.776 Eddie was the percussionist of Héctor Lavoe and Rubén Blades. 00:16:10.776 --> 00:16:15.614 And he introduces me to all the musicians. 00:16:15.614 --> 00:16:20.886 No one was filming these events 00:16:20.886 --> 00:16:24.223 so I enrolled on a film career in The New School for Social Research. 00:16:25.992 --> 00:16:30.763 I hardly ever used a tripod 00:16:30.763 --> 00:16:36.535 and became a sort of experienced steadicam operator myself. 00:16:36.535 --> 00:16:39.305 It was a kind of cinéma vérité. 00:16:42.341 --> 00:16:47.413 Héctor and I recorded countless hours. 00:16:47.413 --> 00:16:56.522 Héctor's intention in the end was to film a documentary about the squatters, 00:16:56.522 --> 00:17:06.165 a process which had been going on since the early 1950’s. 00:17:06.165 --> 00:17:08.768 This became our project. 00:17:08.768 --> 00:17:14.106 Each recorded on our own and withheld the material to share later. 00:17:14.106 --> 00:17:20.813 Héctor would say: “Orlando, leave the camera since you can’t be here to record.” 00:17:21.614 --> 00:17:27.586 This kept going way into 1992, 93, 00:17:27.586 --> 00:17:32.892 when for personal reasons I withdrew from the squatter scene 00:17:33.959 --> 00:17:37.830 and I gave up the space to an sculptor friend, Juan salazar 00:17:37.830 --> 00:17:42.601 who was, penniless and newly arrived from Pennsylvania. 00:17:42.601 --> 00:17:45.871 He lived there for a while 00:17:45.871 --> 00:17:48.274 till an unfortunate circumstance made him go back to Colombia. 00:17:48.274 --> 00:17:50.276 I was introduced to the group of fellow dwellers: 00:17:50.276 --> 00:17:52.478 This here is my friend Juan Salazar, 00:17:52.478 --> 00:17:55.781 he will be staying at my place, I´m giving it to him. 00:17:55.781 --> 00:17:58.784 He needs it for his family. 00:17:58.784 --> 00:18:00.886 That was all I had at the time. 00:18:03.756 --> 00:18:05.958 I came here from Pittsburgh 00:18:05.958 --> 00:18:09.361 after the birth of my second child, Manuel Salvador. 00:18:09.361 --> 00:18:13.432 I had already broke with the father of my two sons, Juan Salazar. 00:18:13.432 --> 00:18:16.202 We got here around 1993. 00:18:16.202 --> 00:18:19.305 I stayed in the place six months 00:18:19.305 --> 00:18:24.210 but because we were not together, I needed another place to live. 00:18:24.210 --> 00:18:26.145 Only the fifth floor was left, 00:18:26.145 --> 00:18:32.118 and it was taken by a guy known as the king of the homeless 00:18:32.118 --> 00:18:34.620 — but he’d only been given half of it. 00:18:34.620 --> 00:18:37.323 His name was Ari, an Afro-American, 00:18:37.323 --> 00:18:41.360 He was the leader of those homeless I mentioned 00:18:41.360 --> 00:18:45.264 — the ones who had taken over the park at the time 00:18:45.264 --> 00:18:49.802 He was asked to share the other half with me. 00:18:52.037 --> 00:18:56.175 My father was Danish and my mother was Turkish Canadian 00:18:56.175 --> 00:18:59.945 When I was like 13 to 15 we moved back to Denmark. 00:18:59.945 --> 00:19:05.484 We'd been living in Canada for ten years before that, and then in 1985, 00:19:05.484 --> 00:19:08.854 my family moved to this neighborhood, to the Lower East Side, 00:19:08.854 --> 00:19:13.626 and then soon I realized that there was a squatting scene in the Lower East Side, 00:19:13.626 --> 00:19:17.630 East Village area, and I started hanging out in the squats 00:19:17.630 --> 00:19:21.333 and eventually when I was about 18 or 19, 00:19:21.333 --> 00:19:25.504 I moved in to C Squat where I lived for several years. 00:19:25.504 --> 00:19:32.344 And at the time the building was in really bad shape. 00:19:32.344 --> 00:19:33.078 That's crazy. 00:19:33.078 --> 00:19:37.416 And we were mostly young people, you know, and at a certain point 00:19:37.416 --> 00:19:43.856 I was like, I got to get out of here and I went traveling for almost a year. 00:19:43.856 --> 00:19:46.959 And then in 1993, 00:19:46.959 --> 00:19:50.863 I came back to the city and I knew that I wanted to live here 00:19:50.863 --> 00:19:55.734 and I wanted to be in a place where there is a possibility for development, 00:19:55.734 --> 00:19:59.371 where part of the goal was to have something permanent. 00:19:59.371 --> 00:20:03.008 And I actually showed up around the same time that Juan and Geanme, 00:20:03.008 --> 00:20:05.811 we came at exactly the same time. 00:20:06.679 --> 00:20:11.450 I came from Pereira because my boyfriend was living in New York. 00:20:13.819 --> 00:20:16.222 I am three times a wetback. 00:20:16.222 --> 00:20:18.958 This means crossing three borders. 00:20:18.958 --> 00:20:21.060 From Salvador to Guatemala, 00:20:21.060 --> 00:20:24.964 then from Guatemala to Mexico and finally from Mexico to the USA. 00:20:24.964 --> 00:20:26.498 Juan was working as an actor 00:20:26.498 --> 00:20:28.567 and I started to weave. 00:20:28.567 --> 00:20:29.935 We lived in the Bronx, 00:20:29.935 --> 00:20:32.805 and at a party we met Héctor Quintana 00:20:32.805 --> 00:20:35.107 who told us all about the squatters. 00:20:35.107 --> 00:20:39.345 Héctor told me to go to Umbrella House 00:20:39.345 --> 00:20:42.881 and to ask for Gabriel Pintado. 00:20:42.881 --> 00:20:51.557 The building was dark and spooky. 00:20:51.557 --> 00:20:54.994 To me the space was intimidating. 00:20:54.994 --> 00:20:58.063 I told Gabriel we were artists 00:20:58.063 --> 00:21:00.833 with hardly no means. 00:21:00.833 --> 00:21:04.536 He said to come to the meeting tonight 00:21:04.536 --> 00:21:08.307 and I will translate to them what you have to say. 00:21:08.907 --> 00:21:11.343 So it was. 00:21:11.343 --> 00:21:15.814 I left thrilled. 00:21:15.814 --> 00:21:19.018 We would have a place to live, 00:21:19.018 --> 00:21:22.688 I told Juan 00:21:22.688 --> 00:21:25.157 and we both came the following Sunday 00:21:28.894 --> 00:21:31.230 to see the place 00:21:32.798 --> 00:21:36.869 and started the process to become members. 00:21:39.471 --> 00:21:42.574 After four months of work we were accepted 00:21:42.574 --> 00:21:45.644 and began to work on our own living space. 00:21:59.825 --> 00:22:03.495 I arrived at Umbrella in 1990… 00:22:03.495 --> 00:22:09.234 dates sort of diffuse, like abstract paintings. 00:22:09.234 --> 00:22:12.438 I went there, but it was… 00:22:12.438 --> 00:22:17.776 a bunch of abandoned buildings, 00:22:17.776 --> 00:22:23.415 it was not very appealing, but 00:22:23.415 --> 00:22:28.420 I had about 4 months due at the studio I had for rent. 00:22:28.420 --> 00:22:31.523 Juanito Merchán was already living in the building 00:22:31.523 --> 00:22:34.927 so I ended up helping him finishing his place. 00:22:34.927 --> 00:22:37.496 It was a lot of work. 00:22:37.496 --> 00:22:41.667 I was with Juan 6 to 8 months. 00:22:41.667 --> 00:22:44.636 I lived in several places till I ended where I´m now, 00:22:44.636 --> 00:22:48.006 10, 12 years ago. 00:22:57.449 --> 00:23:02.488 I arrived at Umbrella House on October 1993 00:23:02.488 --> 00:23:07.860 heartbroken by a relationship I had in Jackson Heights, Queens. 00:23:07.860 --> 00:23:11.997 It was through Mario Bustamante that I met 00:23:11.997 --> 00:23:14.700 Gabriel Pintado, an Uruguayan photogtapher. 00:23:14.700 --> 00:23:20.873 Initially he gave me a small room we named “Cuartico Azul” like the tango 00:23:20.873 --> 00:23:24.143 and then I became part of the building doing community work 00:23:24.143 --> 00:23:29.882 before all of them agreed giving me my own apartment. 00:23:35.621 --> 00:23:36.855 When we opened this building, 00:23:36.855 --> 00:23:39.625 we had this cat named Buick, 00:23:39.625 --> 00:23:43.495 and he belonged to someone who's not here anymore. 00:23:43.495 --> 00:23:46.899 But who didn't take really good care of him. 00:23:46.899 --> 00:23:49.535 And it was like none of us 00:23:49.535 --> 00:23:53.038 really paid attention to him at the time. 00:23:53.038 --> 00:23:56.642 And then one day I saw him in the hallway 00:23:56.642 --> 00:23:59.878 and he had blood in his eyes 00:23:59.878 --> 00:24:02.514 and he was he was really ill. 00:24:02.514 --> 00:24:05.217 And then we found him in the basement. 00:24:05.217 --> 00:24:07.119 He went down there to die. 00:24:08.954 --> 00:24:10.122 A few months later, 00:24:10.122 --> 00:24:14.526 I just had this, like, spiritual awakening where I felt so bad 00:24:14.526 --> 00:24:18.630 that I didn't do anything. 00:24:29.241 --> 00:24:34.246 It’s the most unforgivable sin. 00:24:34.246 --> 00:24:35.314 When I started the building, 00:24:35.314 --> 00:24:39.585 I did any number of things to survive 00:24:39.585 --> 00:24:45.157 during that time from catering work to waiting tables 00:24:45.157 --> 00:24:47.993 to being a dancer in nightclubs. 00:24:47.993 --> 00:24:53.065 The way I got started was in a club that is literally in our backyard. 00:24:53.065 --> 00:24:57.135 I used to go dancing there just to have a good time. 00:24:57.135 --> 00:25:00.005 And then I thought, 00:25:00.005 --> 00:25:02.774 you know, I'd kind of like to do that. 00:25:02.774 --> 00:25:07.446 And so I asked, and they hired me to start dancing. 00:25:07.446 --> 00:25:10.682 And I started in our backyard right now. 00:25:11.083 --> 00:25:14.853 I was also somewhat later working as a photographer 00:25:14.853 --> 00:25:17.356 and doing fine art photography on the side. 00:25:36.909 --> 00:25:42.915 In those days squatters used the plaster containers 00:25:42.915 --> 00:25:46.084 as toilet collectors. 00:25:46.084 --> 00:25:48.687 They would place them on the 5th floor. 00:25:48.687 --> 00:25:53.058 The place was stashed with buckets full of waste and urine 00:25:53.058 --> 00:25:56.662 and old fridges all meant to be thrown at the cops. 00:25:56.662 --> 00:26:01.433 When I took over the 5th floor there were more than 60 buckets 00:26:01.433 --> 00:26:02.768 one on top of the other. 00:26:02.768 --> 00:26:06.471 Some had cracked open since wood on the floor had rotten 00:26:06.471 --> 00:26:11.810 after 5 years in the open. 00:26:11.810 --> 00:26:17.783 One by one I began to carry them out. 00:26:19.651 --> 00:26:21.053 There was no floor. 00:26:21.053 --> 00:26:30.329 You had to walk over boards placed on the roof beams. 00:26:32.598 --> 00:26:37.202 I started by bringing down all the walls. 00:26:37.202 --> 00:26:42.174 Mario had all the tools, he owned a car 00:26:42.174 --> 00:26:47.145 and had experience reconstructing these apartments. 00:26:47.913 --> 00:26:49.247 He was a great help. 00:26:51.249 --> 00:26:55.387 One of the biggest problems was not having a sewer drain. 00:26:55.387 --> 00:27:02.461 So outside on the street we began building one. 00:27:02.461 --> 00:27:05.430 But then came the City inspectors to stop us. 00:27:05.430 --> 00:27:08.734 This building belongs to the City they said. 00:27:08.734 --> 00:27:11.970 The good thing is it was on a Friday. 00:27:11.970 --> 00:27:14.806 On Monday we will come to shut off the place. 00:27:15.273 --> 00:27:21.346 We worked against the clock building a tunnel from the basement 00:27:21.346 --> 00:27:25.717 and into the middle of the street. 00:27:25.717 --> 00:27:31.089 It required a wooden structure such as is built in mining 00:27:31.089 --> 00:27:34.192 to avoid the street from collapsing if a truck passed over. 00:27:34.192 --> 00:27:37.195 to avoid the street from collapsing if a truck passed over. 00:27:37.195 --> 00:27:39.665 And we were doing it nonstop and doing it. 00:27:39.665 --> 00:27:42.501 Everybody, teamwork, pocket for grade. 00:27:42.501 --> 00:27:48.206 We finished the job and covered the hole outside 00:27:48.206 --> 00:27:52.077 so when the inspectors arrived 00:27:52.077 --> 00:27:56.715 we already had a sewer drain working. 00:27:56.715 --> 00:28:00.752 That was the most amazing engineering feat. 00:28:00.752 --> 00:28:04.890 The same had to be done for the electric system. 00:28:04.890 --> 00:28:10.996 At 2 a.m. in winter out on the street we opened the main box 00:28:10.996 --> 00:28:16.568 to connect with a 5000 volt power source. 00:28:16.568 --> 00:28:20.872 A hazardous feat since if you are struck you are a dead monkey. 00:28:21.406 --> 00:28:25.711 I did it but it was a bold action. 00:28:29.314 --> 00:28:32.017 Will you stop speaking Spanish? 00:28:32.017 --> 00:28:33.418 Okay, okay. 00:28:34.786 --> 00:28:36.154 Then I met Helena. 00:28:36.154 --> 00:28:38.090 who was from the Netherlands. 00:28:38.090 --> 00:28:40.625 She lived around the corner 00:28:40.625 --> 00:28:43.729 with her boyfriend at the time, and she really wanted 00:28:43.729 --> 00:28:47.699 to be part of the building and have her own place. 00:28:47.699 --> 00:28:50.202 So then she joined us, which was really great 00:28:50.202 --> 00:28:51.603 for the both of us 00:28:51.603 --> 00:28:53.672 because we are both Dutch. 00:29:00.979 --> 00:29:03.548 Wow, the water is all black... It is coming from... 00:29:03.548 --> 00:29:06.518 I'm singing in the shower. 00:29:09.521 --> 00:29:12.190 Did your film upstairs, the barrels? 00:29:12.190 --> 00:29:13.024 No, not yet. 00:29:13.024 --> 00:29:17.429 Oh, you should we have water containers up on the floor up here. 00:29:17.429 --> 00:29:22.300 “Can I take a shower” and then after a couple of months, they will start complaining like 00:29:22.300 --> 00:29:25.203 “can you take a shower once a month.” 00:29:25.871 --> 00:29:30.041 “Can't you just come alone and not take ten other squatters with you?” 00:29:30.041 --> 00:29:33.712 You don't want to bother other people with your own shit. 00:29:34.479 --> 00:29:41.553 "They’re our magical houses." 00:30:01.373 --> 00:30:06.178 It has been a very slow process because it has required a lot of work, 00:30:06.178 --> 00:30:10.215 each part we build needs to comply with the standards of the City; 00:30:10.215 --> 00:30:12.617 because we are not only in a process of taking 00:30:12.617 --> 00:30:15.987 an abandoned building and making it a cave to live in, 00:30:15.987 --> 00:30:20.125 but doing what is logical, which is to reconstruct. 00:30:32.771 --> 00:30:34.706 That is why we inhabit these homes, 00:30:34.706 --> 00:30:36.808 they’re our magical houses, 00:30:36.808 --> 00:30:39.845 each one is unique because we allow ourselves to design 00:30:39.845 --> 00:30:42.914 the inside of each house. 00:31:20.218 --> 00:31:22.754 Tango, that´s my dog´s name. He is my buddy. 00:31:22.754 --> 00:31:25.857 Come over here Tango, on the chair. 00:31:25.857 --> 00:31:31.396 He is my best friend. I don´t know if I´m his best friend. 00:31:31.396 --> 00:31:35.934 As the story goes: there once was a poet who had a dog 00:31:35.934 --> 00:31:39.771 but it really was a dog who had a poet. 00:31:39.771 --> 00:31:45.076 Tell us, Tango, what are we to do with so much loneliness, 00:31:45.076 --> 00:31:51.283 so much cold, so much madness? 00:31:51.283 --> 00:31:53.084 Answer the phone, Tango. 00:32:01.092 --> 00:32:02.127 We started 00:32:02.127 --> 00:32:05.463 becoming involved with community garden called La Plaza Cultural. 00:32:05.463 --> 00:32:08.566 I became the chairperson for the garden in 1990 00:32:08.566 --> 00:32:12.103 and we started meeting to plan to restore the garden. 00:32:12.103 --> 00:32:14.973 And one of the efforts that we spearheaded 00:32:14.973 --> 00:32:19.110 was to involve neighborhood artist in revitalizing the park. 00:32:19.311 --> 00:32:22.847 That's how Mario got involved, and he ended up putting 00:32:22.847 --> 00:32:26.885 this sculpture which we call the Heart of Loisaida. 00:33:31.516 --> 00:33:35.720 The squatters were artists, 00:33:35.720 --> 00:33:39.791 people way off the social norm. 00:33:45.530 --> 00:33:49.034 To many it was a solution to their housing need 00:33:49.034 --> 00:33:53.505 but to us it was also a way of artistic expression. 00:34:00.912 --> 00:34:05.750 In my case I wanted to disregard all notions acquired, 00:34:05.750 --> 00:34:09.554 the craft I had been taught, theories of color and composition, 00:34:09.554 --> 00:34:14.492 all that stuff that ruled me for so many years. 00:34:14.492 --> 00:34:17.228 I wish to become speechless. 00:34:20.498 --> 00:34:23.501 But of course this is a most difficult matter. 00:34:23.501 --> 00:34:28.540 Maybe some day I'll be able to get there. 00:34:33.378 --> 00:34:40.652 Essentially as squatters we shared our need to survive as artists. 00:34:40.652 --> 00:34:43.721 The toughest part was 00:34:43.721 --> 00:34:45.190 not having heat on the winter, 00:34:45.190 --> 00:34:46.624 to be freezing cold. 00:34:56.434 --> 00:34:58.069 It was windy and very cold 00:34:58.069 --> 00:35:02.640 and the wind just whipped through the entire building. 00:35:02.974 --> 00:35:08.279 I'm not saying it was comfortable, but 00:35:08.279 --> 00:35:10.181 it was not too much for me. 00:35:10.181 --> 00:35:13.952 I did not stay there all the time. 00:35:13.952 --> 00:35:20.125 Winters were freezing cold. 00:35:20.125 --> 00:35:23.661 Sure as hell... winters were hell. 00:35:23.661 --> 00:35:28.900 Don´t remind me of the cold in winter. 00:35:28.900 --> 00:35:32.070 I hate to talk about it. 00:35:32.070 --> 00:35:33.771 I was allergic to fiberglass. 00:35:33.771 --> 00:35:37.842 I would make rooms 00:35:37.842 --> 00:35:41.579 with thick plastic walls 00:35:41.579 --> 00:35:43.915 and inside, placed electric heaters. 00:35:43.915 --> 00:35:46.217 Each crevice had to be insulated with fiberglass. 00:35:46.217 --> 00:35:51.256 No cold would filter in if I was in control. 00:35:51.256 --> 00:35:54.526 Juan built a loft 00:35:54.526 --> 00:35:57.829 where the kids could sleep and be warmer. 00:35:57.829 --> 00:36:03.668 I used to tell them it was their house on the tree top. 00:36:03.668 --> 00:36:08.640 Kids fall easy on fantasy, 00:36:08.640 --> 00:36:14.012 and this would help if they were to compare 00:36:14.012 --> 00:36:17.715 our space with the home of their friends, 00:36:17.715 --> 00:36:21.619 avoiding my kids a trauma. 00:36:21.619 --> 00:36:30.662 It was also a fascinating life choice. 00:36:31.863 --> 00:36:35.466 It gave me a lot of freedom. 00:36:36.034 --> 00:36:39.837 The apartment was beautiful 00:36:39.837 --> 00:36:41.673 with exposed beams 00:36:41.673 --> 00:36:44.442 where I would hang a loom and weave. 00:36:44.442 --> 00:36:49.280 In those days I wove tapestries. 00:36:58.957 --> 00:37:02.827 I had this big table where homework 00:37:02.827 --> 00:37:05.763 and art was done. 00:37:05.763 --> 00:37:09.334 It was very beautiful. 00:37:10.702 --> 00:37:16.941 My kids loved their place. 00:37:23.014 --> 00:37:24.115 We lived here 00:37:24.115 --> 00:37:29.053 for 17 years without heat which is that's 00:37:29.053 --> 00:37:34.259 how I got into rescuing cats in the quantity I did. 00:37:40.565 --> 00:37:43.334 The cats would sleep on top of me 00:37:43.334 --> 00:37:45.803 and I stayed warm. 00:37:52.277 --> 00:37:54.145 The most I ever had 00:37:54.145 --> 00:37:59.150 at a longer time was like around 60. 00:37:59.150 --> 00:38:02.253 I can't believe that I did that now. 00:38:09.927 --> 00:38:12.196 I only have 15, 00:38:12.196 --> 00:38:16.601 you know, I had one cat named Kiwi. 00:38:16.601 --> 00:38:21.205 He was seven years old and he got this vicious cancer in his eye. 00:38:21.205 --> 00:38:25.043 I knew he was going to die and it was like heartbreak 00:38:25.043 --> 00:38:29.180 because this cat was like my husband, my soul mate. 00:38:29.180 --> 00:38:34.519 I never had an experience like this 00:38:34.519 --> 00:38:37.822 with another species before. 00:38:37.822 --> 00:38:40.058 And like we used to dream together. 00:38:40.058 --> 00:38:44.729 He'd sit in my lap and we'd have these incredible dreams together, 00:38:44.729 --> 00:38:48.399 when we would go to sleep. 00:38:48.399 --> 00:38:50.401 It's really horribly sad 00:38:50.401 --> 00:38:52.337 when they die, 00:38:52.337 --> 00:38:54.939 it's like losing a child or a lover. 00:39:06.617 --> 00:39:10.621 You can lay them out more aesthetically. 00:39:10.621 --> 00:39:13.558 These are the hardest ones to put in. 00:39:13.558 --> 00:39:17.128 This is so we recognize each other when we meet again. 00:39:17.729 --> 00:39:19.464 We all have earrings. 00:40:54.792 --> 00:40:56.928 Marta, my neighbor was pregnant 00:40:56.928 --> 00:40:59.897 and she gave birth to Marcelo Gaia 00:40:59.897 --> 00:41:02.099 in her apartment with a midwife 00:41:02.099 --> 00:41:05.670 and 3 months later I was pregnant. 00:41:09.474 --> 00:41:14.045 I had always pictured myself giving birth at home 00:41:14.045 --> 00:41:18.549 since this was a tradition in my family. 00:41:31.095 --> 00:41:33.264 Paula and Marcelo were both born here 00:41:33.264 --> 00:41:39.103 and she grew up in a community 00:41:39.103 --> 00:41:41.772 similar to the one I grew up. 00:41:41.772 --> 00:41:44.275 We were a single family. 00:41:45.009 --> 00:41:47.411 My daughter was born in 1998. 00:41:47.411 --> 00:41:51.482 Her mom was Sarah, who was one of the early people who lived here. 00:41:51.482 --> 00:41:53.551 We'd been together for a bunch of years and we split up 00:41:53.551 --> 00:41:56.621 when she was about a year old and she moved out. 00:41:56.621 --> 00:41:57.955 So she spent, you know, 00:41:57.955 --> 00:42:01.726 nights here with me and nights with her mom since she was born. 00:42:01.726 --> 00:42:05.630 Her and Paula, who is about a year older than her. 00:42:05.630 --> 00:42:07.765 They call each other sister. 00:42:07.765 --> 00:42:10.067 People here were from all over the US, 00:42:10.067 --> 00:42:15.006 from Portugal, Germany, Mexico, Asia... 00:42:15.006 --> 00:42:19.310 Europeans, Americans and then folks from Latin America. 00:42:22.079 --> 00:42:26.584 In this building there was a lot of discrepancy. 00:42:26.584 --> 00:42:30.955 You could say there was a rivalry among 00:42:30.955 --> 00:42:34.325 Hispanics and White Americans. 00:42:34.325 --> 00:42:37.495 I got along with both groups. 00:42:37.495 --> 00:42:42.833 Hispanics were my friends since most of them were from Colombia. 00:43:12.096 --> 00:43:18.135 To be an invader was a very strong anarchic position. 00:43:18.135 --> 00:43:24.241 I believe in anarchy when those who govern don't do the job. 00:43:24.241 --> 00:43:29.113 Anarchy is the last resource to make things work. 00:43:29.113 --> 00:43:32.383 The city had 100,000 abandoned buildings. 00:43:32.383 --> 00:43:33.384 Unbelievable. 00:43:33.384 --> 00:43:37.655 They could have solved the problem of housing. 00:43:37.655 --> 00:43:40.391 The political stance of living in capitalist 00:43:40.391 --> 00:43:44.629 New York City without paying a dime 00:43:44.629 --> 00:43:49.533 was a great challenge. 00:43:49.533 --> 00:43:52.403 It was poetic. 00:43:54.639 --> 00:43:57.742 A way of life that challenges the establishment. 00:44:12.890 --> 00:44:14.225 The word anarchist, 00:44:14.225 --> 00:44:17.528 got so twisted, like a lot of people 00:44:17.528 --> 00:44:22.500 you say anarchist is somebody holding a bomb, you know, and it's bullshit. 00:44:22.500 --> 00:44:24.835 That's not what anarchy is. 00:44:30.441 --> 00:44:38.683 To occupy a space that is not yours is anarchy. 00:44:42.053 --> 00:44:47.158 But inside the building we had rules. 00:44:49.660 --> 00:44:53.030 We got very organized among ourselves 00:44:53.030 --> 00:44:57.768 about doing the necessary work, how ever done. 00:44:57.768 --> 00:45:03.007 I remember finding a gigantic steel I-beam 00:45:03.074 --> 00:45:06.077 like from one of those scaffolding, on Broadway. 00:45:06.077 --> 00:45:09.313 I put it on my shoulder and walked it over here 00:45:09.313 --> 00:45:13.350 and that was like, what really did my back, I was doing that all the time. 00:45:13.350 --> 00:45:17.722 100 pound bags of cement, you know, running with them 00:45:17.722 --> 00:45:22.793 from a construction site, sand, you know, all the really heavy stuff 00:45:22.793 --> 00:45:25.996 you needed for the major work we were doing here. 00:45:25.996 --> 00:45:30.668 My neck is so badly destroyed, they want to 00:45:30.668 --> 00:45:33.137 remove some of the disks and 00:45:33.137 --> 00:45:35.873 then replaced them with titanium disks. 00:45:35.873 --> 00:45:39.243 And it's now not just three disks, but five. 00:45:39.243 --> 00:45:43.581 So it's a progressive degenerative 00:45:43.581 --> 00:45:45.149 spinal injury 00:45:45.149 --> 00:45:49.720 that I really did myself by lifting things the wrong way. 00:45:49.720 --> 00:45:50.521 I didn't know. 00:45:55.960 --> 00:46:01.265 On 10 Door we were well organized. 00:46:01.265 --> 00:46:08.005 If we agreed someone was not complying with community rules 00:46:08.005 --> 00:46:11.542 he or she would have to leave. 00:46:11.542 --> 00:46:16.547 Within 2 or 3 months 8 people were compelled to leave. 00:46:16.547 --> 00:46:20.084 In a squat those who do not contribute 00:46:20.084 --> 00:46:21.819 become a burden. 00:46:21.819 --> 00:46:25.256 Everyone benefits from working together. 00:46:25.256 --> 00:46:31.128 It’s an anarchist socialist system. 00:46:31.128 --> 00:46:36.534 You have to do unto others 00:46:36.534 --> 00:46:38.569 even if they don't do unto you. 00:46:38.569 --> 00:46:42.006 At 10 Door we had many conflicts. 00:46:42.006 --> 00:46:45.976 Even amongst countrymen. 00:46:45.976 --> 00:46:49.947 Unable to get along I was at risk and moved out to Brooklyn. 00:46:49.947 --> 00:46:54.151 That was terrible. 00:47:04.762 --> 00:47:07.431 We developed relationships 00:47:07.431 --> 00:47:10.134 in the early years of this building 00:47:10.134 --> 00:47:15.840 very similar to what like an army platoon develops 00:47:15.840 --> 00:47:20.177 like where you’re really close you know ‘cause your lives 00:47:20.177 --> 00:47:21.879 depend on each other. 00:47:28.652 --> 00:47:29.353 It's literally 00:47:29.353 --> 00:47:33.991 like a foxhole mentality ‘cause you're always under threat, 00:47:33.991 --> 00:47:36.360 you know, you have to be hyper vigilant. 00:47:36.360 --> 00:47:40.097 So it's kind of like being in a war, but it was a different 00:47:40.097 --> 00:47:45.035 kind of war, was the housing war, you know, 00:47:45.035 --> 00:47:48.572 and beautiful things happened as a result. 00:49:12.089 --> 00:49:12.957 The conditions, 00:49:12.957 --> 00:49:15.993 the living conditions were so harsh 00:49:15.993 --> 00:49:18.228 that, you know, I mean, and 00:49:18.228 --> 00:49:21.665 to have to work together on a continuous basis, 00:49:21.665 --> 00:49:26.937 you really have to be able to get along with the people that you live with. 00:49:39.583 --> 00:49:42.486 And my life took a different turn. 00:49:42.486 --> 00:49:46.757 So I eventually chose not to continue to participate. 00:49:54.765 --> 00:49:57.968 When I moved in here in the nineties, 00:49:57.968 --> 00:50:01.638 it was very hard. 00:50:05.876 --> 00:50:10.581 People were not nice to each other. 00:50:11.949 --> 00:50:14.685 It was better than some other places actually. 00:50:17.821 --> 00:50:18.889 We got a lot of work done. 00:50:18.889 --> 00:50:22.559 I mean, the the building people were committed to getting work done 00:50:25.396 --> 00:50:26.997 for years It was like this, 00:50:26.997 --> 00:50:29.933 people were constantly working on the building you know, 00:50:29.933 --> 00:50:31.969 and in ways it's like amazing, like why? 00:50:31.969 --> 00:50:34.772 And I also figured out through time 00:50:34.772 --> 00:50:40.210 how to, like, have better meetings, not fight as much, 00:50:40.210 --> 00:50:41.512 find different ways of being 00:50:41.512 --> 00:50:43.113 in community with each other. 00:50:46.050 --> 00:50:50.421 We had a safety key 00:50:50.421 --> 00:50:53.524 to avoid the entrance of unknown people 00:50:53.524 --> 00:50:56.360 because someone from the City could come in, 00:50:56.360 --> 00:51:03.067 take photos, as evidence of unsafe conditions 00:51:03.067 --> 00:51:05.903 and as a result 00:51:05.903 --> 00:51:09.706 they could kick us out without much trouble. 00:51:11.308 --> 00:51:14.211 I always thought a house is a temple, 00:51:14.211 --> 00:51:16.413 a place of shelter, 00:51:16.413 --> 00:51:19.550 a hiding place, 00:51:23.287 --> 00:51:29.126 and suddenly you realize 00:51:29.126 --> 00:51:31.929 it's not safe. 00:51:34.098 --> 00:51:37.868 I got my space through work. 00:51:37.868 --> 00:51:42.106 I still believe teamwork makes anything possible. 00:51:42.106 --> 00:51:44.341 So I worked hard. 00:51:46.543 --> 00:51:51.682 My 8 year old kid would help me out. 00:51:57.921 --> 00:52:01.391 Let traffic pass, you know, we’’ll have fun. 00:52:01.391 --> 00:52:06.196 We are not here to provoke, we are here to make a showing. 00:52:06.196 --> 00:52:10.334 He even came along to the rallies. 00:52:17.074 --> 00:52:20.144 Giuliani was like for the privatization of the City. 00:52:20.144 --> 00:52:21.211 He was for the City 00:52:21.211 --> 00:52:25.382 just being in the hands of private developers and private entities. 00:52:25.382 --> 00:52:28.852 And he took up a campaign against the gardens 00:52:28.852 --> 00:52:33.090 and gardeners and some of the gardeners got together and resisted it. 00:52:33.090 --> 00:52:38.428 They did demonstrations or whatever, and that made them his enemy. 00:52:38.428 --> 00:52:40.430 And it was the same thing with the squatters. 00:52:40.430 --> 00:52:43.500 So the squatters became kind of like an issue for him. 00:52:43.500 --> 00:52:45.035 Oh, I'm going to get rid of those guys. 00:53:07.824 --> 00:53:08.926 Umbrella House. 00:53:08.926 --> 00:53:11.695 The source of the name 00:53:11.695 --> 00:53:14.298 comes from a couple of different things. 00:53:14.298 --> 00:53:19.736 Geerte, the Dutch girl had this idea that this building 00:53:19.736 --> 00:53:24.708 could function as an umbrella organization for squatters. 00:53:24.708 --> 00:53:29.146 But we also wanted to be an artist work hotel. 00:53:29.146 --> 00:53:33.350 We figured a way to give back to the community 00:53:33.350 --> 00:53:38.589 is to open spaces for people to stay temporarily. 00:53:38.589 --> 00:53:42.826 They can work on their artwork in exchange for some work on the building. 00:53:42.826 --> 00:53:47.631 But it was also possibly because there were so many leaks in the roof. 00:53:47.631 --> 00:53:49.967 The building have been abandoned 00:53:49.967 --> 00:53:53.537 by someone who did not want the building to be squatted 00:53:54.004 --> 00:53:58.508 and not just remove the steps but made holes in the roof 00:53:58.508 --> 00:54:03.680 and then on each floor at the same points they had made holes. 00:54:03.680 --> 00:54:06.116 So when it would rain, it would literally rain 00:54:06.116 --> 00:54:09.753 all the way down to the ground floor. 00:54:09.753 --> 00:54:11.255 And if you were 00:54:11.255 --> 00:54:14.258 going to walk around, you would have needed an umbrella. 00:54:14.258 --> 00:54:16.393 There are holes in all the floors. 00:54:16.393 --> 00:54:19.596 Like literally the snow would come down straight 00:54:19.596 --> 00:54:21.098 down the staircase. 00:54:41.285 --> 00:54:45.022 Ricardo had the idea of hanging 00:54:45.022 --> 00:54:49.393 painted umbrellas in the fire escape. 00:54:49.393 --> 00:54:54.731 People on the street would stop and take photos 00:54:54.731 --> 00:55:02.606 dazzeled by the sight of this architectural performance. 00:55:02.873 --> 00:55:06.476 The cause pursued was exciting but it meant 00:55:06.476 --> 00:55:07.744 a huge amount of work. 00:55:07.744 --> 00:55:10.047 Nonetheless we found occasion to party… 00:55:10.047 --> 00:55:11.448 Some of these parties were recorded. 00:55:51.855 --> 00:55:56.693 Umbrella House was the house of many people. 00:55:56.693 --> 00:55:59.563 At Ricardo´s apartment there were always people confering 00:55:59.563 --> 00:56:04.501 but at my place people only came to party. 00:56:51.281 --> 00:56:55.452 The whole revitalization of the neighborhood 00:56:55.452 --> 00:56:58.989 took place with people who were inspired. 00:56:58.989 --> 00:57:02.192 I think with the vision of the sixties 00:57:02.192 --> 00:57:03.794 to make a better world. 00:57:06.763 --> 00:57:12.903 When the squatters arrived, we brought music, 00:57:12.903 --> 00:57:15.105 art, poetry; 00:57:15.105 --> 00:57:18.975 we filled the gardens with flowers. 00:57:18.975 --> 00:57:21.912 We opened Puerta 10, 00:57:21.912 --> 00:57:25.949 a gallery at Juan Salazar’s apartment. 00:57:25.949 --> 00:57:32.255 We cleared the bicycle space in front too. 00:57:33.723 --> 00:57:37.360 From Puerta 10 to Latinoamerica ’94 00:57:37.360 --> 00:57:40.397 The gallery opened at 10 pm on April 29 00:57:40.397 --> 00:57:44.968 with an exhibit by Mario Bustamante 00:57:44.968 --> 00:57:49.739 a jack of all trades and sculptor in exhile. 00:57:49.739 --> 00:57:55.145 That same day Mario made the metal plate on the buiding. 00:58:02.352 --> 00:58:07.958 April 29 exhibit was a huge success and months later 00:58:07.958 --> 00:58:11.428 we launched the Latinoamerican Art Exhibit. 00:58:11.428 --> 00:58:18.301 The catalogue was awesome.. 00:58:18.301 --> 00:58:20.837 This is from the exhibit, 00:58:20.837 --> 00:58:24.007 this is a drawing of one of my tapestries. 00:58:53.570 --> 00:58:56.740 We were all a bunch of beautiful lunatics. 00:58:58.808 --> 00:59:01.244 It became a wonderful dwelling place. 00:59:01.244 --> 00:59:03.780 Every New Year we threw a party 00:59:03.780 --> 00:59:08.018 and people from all over arrived 00:59:08.018 --> 00:59:11.888 after midnight to a "Cinderella ball." 00:59:15.525 --> 00:59:19.529 Marvelous nights that carried on till dawn. 00:59:24.768 --> 00:59:29.506 There I met the famous painter Omar Rayo who was over with his wife. 00:59:30.173 --> 00:59:33.977 We built a theater and plays were performed, 00:59:33.977 --> 00:59:36.680 we created the Colombian Film Festival. 00:59:36.680 --> 00:59:39.783 The first edition of the Colombian Film Festival 00:59:39.783 --> 00:59:44.888 was due to CODELA, Coalition of Latin Artists, 00:59:44.888 --> 00:59:48.124 founded by Héctor at 10th street squat building. 00:59:48.124 --> 00:59:53.730 It lived through 5 or 6 yearly editions. 00:59:53.730 --> 00:59:55.865 The first film shown was 00:59:55.865 --> 00:59:57.634 Time to Die by Jorge Alí Triana. 01:00:05.809 --> 01:00:09.479 One day I came home at about 1:00 in the morning 01:00:09.479 --> 01:00:14.818 and the entire block was police barricaded off and what it happened 01:00:14.818 --> 01:00:17.821 was the abandoned building 01:00:17.821 --> 01:00:21.091 next to us had actually collapsed. 01:00:21.091 --> 01:00:24.361 The City came in 01:00:24.361 --> 01:00:27.097 to make sure that everything was safe and that they were going to have 01:00:27.097 --> 01:00:28.698 to demolish that building. 01:00:28.698 --> 01:00:33.870 People in the building knew that if we completely left our building, 01:00:33.870 --> 01:00:38.141 that very likely we would never get back in. 01:00:38.141 --> 01:00:43.079 They brought in the big crane with the wrecking ball 01:00:43.079 --> 01:00:47.384 and they were going to take down that building which caved in. 01:00:47.384 --> 01:00:52.022 But in the process they were going to hit our building with enough damage 01:00:52.022 --> 01:00:55.659 to make it so that we couldn't stay no matter what. 01:00:55.659 --> 01:00:58.328 So what we did during this time is 01:00:58.328 --> 01:01:01.498 we stood in our windows 01:01:01.498 --> 01:01:04.267 on that side of the building 01:01:09.773 --> 01:01:14.811 and the crane operator could not 01:01:14.811 --> 01:01:18.715 operate it anymore because if we were standing in the windows, 01:01:18.715 --> 01:01:23.453 if he hit us, we die and he'd be in trouble. 01:01:23.453 --> 01:01:26.656 We were able to convince the police 01:01:26.656 --> 01:01:29.759 to continue the demolition by hand 01:01:29.759 --> 01:01:33.163 instead of with the big mechanical claw. 01:01:33.163 --> 01:01:36.766 For three days we had a siege here 01:01:36.766 --> 01:01:40.737 where we would not leave the building and they could not get in. 01:01:42.305 --> 01:01:44.074 I was 01:01:44.074 --> 01:01:48.078 fairly sure we were not going to survive as a building. 01:01:48.078 --> 01:01:48.978 They quit. 01:01:48.978 --> 01:01:53.316 They just left after three days and we won. 01:01:53.316 --> 01:01:56.519 Many of the other buildings, squatter buildings in the East Village 01:01:56.519 --> 01:01:58.354 were evicted during that time. 01:02:30.487 --> 01:02:33.690 There were literally 3 to 4 hundred riot police 01:02:33.690 --> 01:02:36.559 with armored personnel carriers, 01:02:36.559 --> 01:02:39.362 snipers on the roof to evict 01:02:39.362 --> 01:02:41.297 these buildings on 13th Street. 01:02:41.664 --> 01:02:44.367 They're victims of injustice. 01:02:44.367 --> 01:02:46.836 It gives me sorrow. 01:02:46.836 --> 01:02:49.439 This can’t go on. 01:02:49.439 --> 01:02:51.875 It gives me sorrow. 01:02:51.875 --> 01:02:54.844 Things will change soon. 01:02:54.844 --> 01:02:56.846 It gives me sorrow. 01:02:56.846 --> 01:02:59.983 Don’t lose hope. 01:02:59.983 --> 01:03:02.852 It gives me sorrow.c 01:03:12.428 --> 01:03:16.166 The squatters were lawbreakers 01:03:16.166 --> 01:03:23.006 so they didn’t want to negotiate but evict them. 01:03:23.006 --> 01:03:32.949 There could have been in some cases involvement with drugs but that was not the general case. 01:03:32.949 --> 01:03:34.818 It that was actually under Giuliani 01:03:34.818 --> 01:03:38.888 that towards the end of his administration, 01:03:38.888 --> 01:03:41.591 he wanted to get rid of all the City owned properties. 01:03:41.591 --> 01:03:46.863 So he started the ball rolling on creating some kind of deal. 01:03:46.863 --> 01:03:51.167 When he was approached by UHAB, his administration 01:03:51.167 --> 01:03:53.469 kind of was like, okay, we'll work something out. 01:03:53.469 --> 01:03:56.573 So you have is goes back to the 1970s 01:03:56.573 --> 01:04:01.411 and was set up to provide technical assistance to homesteaders. 01:04:01.411 --> 01:04:04.547 Homesteading meant that people would apply to the City 01:04:04.547 --> 01:04:07.350 and the City will allocate them a building 01:04:07.350 --> 01:04:09.018 and then they would work on the building 01:04:09.018 --> 01:04:11.087 while not living there, for years. 01:04:11.087 --> 01:04:14.991 Homesteading was, you know, a good program, but it was very 01:04:14.991 --> 01:04:18.428 it required a lot of work and a lot of commitment and dedication. 01:04:18.428 --> 01:04:19.896 And the squatters 01:04:19.896 --> 01:04:22.465 kind of just said, you know what, we're just going to go ahead and do it. 01:04:22.465 --> 01:04:23.933 We're not going to go through these programs. 01:04:23.933 --> 01:04:26.669 And so two some extent there was 01:04:26.669 --> 01:04:29.072 tension between the homesteading community 01:04:29.072 --> 01:04:30.640 and the squatting community. 01:04:36.179 --> 01:04:38.348 The UHAB deal 01:04:38.348 --> 01:04:41.651 was started by a guy named Fernando 01:04:41.651 --> 01:04:44.020 who lived at 10th Street 01:04:46.623 --> 01:04:48.191 So Fernando told UHAB 01:04:48.191 --> 01:04:51.628 that children were living in the building, 01:04:51.628 --> 01:04:56.966 and when he told UHAB about this, 01:04:56.966 --> 01:05:00.103 the setting changed completely. 01:05:00.103 --> 01:05:04.073 11 buildings were accepted and saved 01:05:04.073 --> 01:05:07.710 from being burned by the City. 01:05:07.710 --> 01:05:11.581 UHAB developed a plan with our input you know basically. 01:05:11.581 --> 01:05:15.752 The buildings were going to be transferred to UHAB 01:05:15.752 --> 01:05:18.121 and then after development was complete, 01:05:18.121 --> 01:05:21.891 it would be transferred to the residents of the building. 01:05:21.891 --> 01:05:26.763 It happened in 2002 where the deal 01:05:26.763 --> 01:05:28.598 with the City was signed. 01:05:28.598 --> 01:05:31.367 And then we had to like, fix the building up, basically. 01:05:31.367 --> 01:05:34.504 And it wasn't until August of 2010 01:05:34.504 --> 01:05:37.106 that we became owners of the building. 01:05:37.106 --> 01:05:40.543 9 buildings made it for rehab and 2 more were in waiting. 01:05:40.543 --> 01:05:42.245 Ours was last because 01:05:42.245 --> 01:05:47.250 it was badly damaged since a fire had struck it. 01:05:49.152 --> 01:05:53.756 Some 16 years ago. 01:06:05.034 --> 01:06:08.271 This building is where I open my wings, 01:06:08.271 --> 01:06:10.940 it is the place where I fulfill my dreams, 01:06:10.940 --> 01:06:14.110 where I have been building a small monastery 01:06:14.110 --> 01:06:16.913 and this building has allowed me to be what I have dreamt of, 01:06:16.913 --> 01:06:18.581 to do what I want 01:06:18.581 --> 01:06:20.550 and to live the way I want. 01:06:24.754 --> 01:06:30.593 We had a meeting and the news was we are now legalized. 01:06:30.593 --> 01:06:33.563 I walked upstairs relieved 01:06:33.563 --> 01:06:36.032 and opened the door to my apartment, 01:06:36.032 --> 01:06:38.568 I had the shakes... 01:06:38.568 --> 01:06:41.871 Placed my hand on the wall... 01:06:41.871 --> 01:06:46.943 I did not realize it would mean so much to me. 01:06:50.947 --> 01:06:55.451 Looked up at the umbrella emblem. 01:06:56.019 --> 01:07:00.289 I need a break. 01:07:05.294 --> 01:07:09.766 I said to the house we saved you 01:07:09.766 --> 01:07:12.602 and now you have saved us. 01:07:16.906 --> 01:07:19.142 For years we had lived never knowing 01:07:19.142 --> 01:07:24.013 whether tomorrow literally tomorrow you would be evicted. 01:07:24.013 --> 01:07:27.050 But once we began the legalization process, 01:07:27.050 --> 01:07:30.319 we really could feel like we didn't have to worry about that anymore. 01:07:30.319 --> 01:07:32.588 And for me, that was the biggest change. 01:07:32.588 --> 01:07:35.958 They owned the building which is just wonderful. 01:07:35.958 --> 01:07:38.961 That's what we did it all for, you know. 01:07:38.961 --> 01:07:43.066 I'm very, very happy to see that this is the result, yes. 01:07:43.066 --> 01:07:47.437 I didn't really want to go that route, but I was outvoted. 01:07:47.437 --> 01:07:49.439 But, you know, 01:07:49.439 --> 01:07:50.873 I didn't want it 01:07:50.873 --> 01:07:53.876 to become what it's become now. 01:07:53.876 --> 01:07:57.480 It was very difficult negotiating with Siobhan, but we did. 01:07:58.114 --> 01:08:01.851 Because I believed in like a really anarchist 01:08:01.851 --> 01:08:05.021 equal 01:08:05.021 --> 01:08:06.589 equality. 01:08:06.589 --> 01:08:12.595 The brotherhood and creative way of life in this building 01:08:12.595 --> 01:08:16.032 was magical. Magic in every detail, 01:08:16.032 --> 01:08:18.801 the building itself, the entrance, the floor, 01:08:18.801 --> 01:08:20.903 the stairs that we made out of cement 01:08:20.903 --> 01:08:24.407 filled with dolls, photos, old junk. 01:08:25.074 --> 01:08:26.876 The building had magic all over, 01:08:26.876 --> 01:08:29.645 now it is a normal building 01:08:29.645 --> 01:08:33.850 but the magic remains somewhere hidden within us. 01:09:26.602 --> 01:09:30.206 We had gardens in the side lots, originally. 01:09:33.476 --> 01:09:35.011 When that ended, 01:09:35.011 --> 01:09:37.780 then we started gardening on the roof. 01:09:38.281 --> 01:09:41.450 We had the idea probably led by Tauno Biltsted 01:09:42.952 --> 01:09:46.989 to actually have designed and built on our roof, 01:09:46.989 --> 01:09:49.425 technically what's called a green roof. 01:09:49.425 --> 01:09:52.562 For some reason it captured my imagination, 01:09:52.562 --> 01:09:55.631 the idea of a building sort of growing vegetables on the roof. 01:09:55.631 --> 01:09:58.701 I thought of it as a model 01:09:58.701 --> 01:10:03.239 for thinking about future kind of urban spaces 01:10:03.239 --> 01:10:05.741 and integrating sort of rooftops into buildings. 01:10:07.443 --> 01:10:09.145 We got the plans together. 01:10:09.145 --> 01:10:10.846 and we get the architect and the engineer. 01:10:10.846 --> 01:10:14.150 We structurally reinforced part of the roof 01:10:14.150 --> 01:10:18.254 by putting in new steel beams, going from brick to brick, 01:10:18.254 --> 01:10:19.889 a new roof over that. 01:10:19.889 --> 01:10:22.225 A special soil brought in 01:10:22.225 --> 01:10:25.995 to grow the vegetables in. 01:10:25.995 --> 01:10:28.664 Everyone in the building is welcome to come up 01:10:28.664 --> 01:10:31.133 and harvest those vegetables. 01:10:36.072 --> 01:10:38.808 And now we have 900 square feet 01:10:38.808 --> 01:10:40.910 of growing space on the roof. 01:10:40.910 --> 01:10:43.212 In the Container Garden. 01:10:43.212 --> 01:10:48.951 There is enough open space where people do go up there and do meditation, yoga. 01:10:48.951 --> 01:10:51.320 We also have community activities. 01:10:51.320 --> 01:10:54.423 We have small concerts up there, we have movie nights. 01:11:17.480 --> 01:11:20.816 Nothing remains, just the satisfaction 01:11:20.816 --> 01:11:25.554 of being part of the movement 01:11:25.554 --> 01:11:29.892 rallying with folks on the Lower East Side. 01:11:29.892 --> 01:11:32.194 I cherish those moments. 01:12:04.393 --> 01:12:09.565 Fearful in a distant corner far away from where you would rather be… 01:12:09.565 --> 01:12:13.269 you, one more number in the mathematics of sorrow, 01:12:13.269 --> 01:12:16.605 barely noticing the cradling affection of your motherly teacher... 01:12:16.605 --> 01:12:23.012 such a feeble creature with tiny empty hands… 01:12:23.012 --> 01:12:26.215 All your father can do is ask for forgiveness… 01:12:26.215 --> 01:12:29.985 absent in the distance, knowing all about you. 01:12:41.097 --> 01:12:43.899 Disciplined painters 01:12:43.899 --> 01:12:46.168 get organized 01:12:46.168 --> 01:12:49.839 dismiss small talk 01:12:49.839 --> 01:12:52.408 and start painting. 01:12:54.643 --> 01:12:56.846 They don’d even need this. 01:12:57.880 --> 01:13:00.449 So I wonder, 01:13:00.449 --> 01:13:04.353 am I just a painter who likes alcohol, 01:13:04.353 --> 01:13:07.490 or am I an alcoholic who paints, 01:13:07.490 --> 01:13:10.726 or maybe both. 01:13:37.987 --> 01:13:41.390 New York City for me is this building. 01:13:41.390 --> 01:13:47.363 I'm very grateful for it because without this building 01:13:47.363 --> 01:13:49.765 I wouldn't be here, but I also wouldn't 01:13:49.765 --> 01:13:54.603 have had the rich as richer life as I've had in New York City. 01:13:54.603 --> 01:13:56.405 Painting takes a lot of space actually. 01:14:48.424 --> 01:14:50.793 I see aging luminous bones 01:14:50.793 --> 01:14:54.497 weary with the weight of passion… 01:14:54.497 --> 01:14:57.633 my hair on fire in the middle of winter… 01:14:57.633 --> 01:15:00.135 every lock of hair cherishing 01:15:00.135 --> 01:15:04.807 all that was loved and learned weaved in patience and with vigor… 01:15:04.807 --> 01:15:07.810 …I see the tale of my children written 01:15:07.810 --> 01:15:11.380 clearly in the wrinkles of my skin… 01:15:11.380 --> 01:15:20.022 raging against the many falls to arise once more. 01:15:20.022 --> 01:15:22.958 I have earned the privilage of sipping tea 01:15:22.958 --> 01:15:25.694 with a joyous heart 01:15:25.694 --> 01:15:28.097 in a quiet afternoon. 01:15:28.097 --> 01:15:30.533 Aged queen with wide spread wings. 01:15:30.533 --> 01:15:32.835 I look at you, I wrap you in my arms, 01:15:32.835 --> 01:15:35.604 brave, glorious soul. 01:15:35.604 --> 01:15:37.273 you have flown so high 01:15:37.273 --> 01:15:39.975 and I am breathless with your beauty. 01:15:45.614 --> 01:15:48.117 My daughter, she is a very present, 01:15:48.117 --> 01:15:53.589 strong, intelligent you know, and self-reliant young woman. 01:15:53.589 --> 01:15:55.291 She knows how to be in the world, 01:15:55.291 --> 01:15:59.695 and she understands part of that as being, how she was raised. 01:15:59.695 --> 01:16:02.665 And the fact that she was raised in a way 01:16:02.665 --> 01:16:05.301 where the rules were made by 01:16:05.301 --> 01:16:08.070 her and the people around her, 01:16:08.070 --> 01:16:09.805 not by society in general. 01:16:21.650 --> 01:16:22.751 Do not obey. 01:16:22.751 --> 01:16:27.056 It would be my message, but claim your right to live your life 01:16:27.056 --> 01:16:28.757 the way you see fit. 01:16:28.757 --> 01:16:31.493 I was 24 years old at the time, 01:16:31.493 --> 01:16:35.698 so I lived there from 1988 01:16:35.698 --> 01:16:38.400 through 1991, 01:16:38.400 --> 01:16:43.138 and in the end I chose to really focus more on my art. 01:17:19.074 --> 01:17:20.075 I never regretted it, 01:17:20.075 --> 01:17:23.946 but I was very disappointed ‘cause it was a big dream of mine. 01:17:23.946 --> 01:17:28.884 It was shattered and it really put me into a depression 01:17:28.884 --> 01:17:30.719 there for a while. 01:17:43.365 --> 01:17:47.836 Do what's in your heart and don't worry about the rest of it. 01:17:49.805 --> 01:17:51.173 Still here. 01:17:51.173 --> 01:17:52.241 Can't believe it. 01:17:52.241 --> 01:17:54.376 I can't believe it. 01:17:55.277 --> 01:17:57.146 I kind of think 01:17:57.146 --> 01:18:01.650 I may only be here ten more years on the planet, but, 01:18:01.650 --> 01:18:05.187 you know, we'll see how that goes. 01:18:13.362 --> 01:18:18.367 Héctor was a warrior who fought to make the building their own. 01:18:19.935 --> 01:18:24.139 He is most cherished. 01:18:24.139 --> 01:18:27.643 He died in the building. 01:18:34.783 --> 01:18:37.853 Héctor deceased and I kept most of my footage. 01:18:37.853 --> 01:18:46.128 Unfortunately Héctor's footage remains in the place he died. 01:18:47.029 --> 01:18:50.432 Camila, this is the workshop. 01:18:50.432 --> 01:18:56.338 It's large and full with antique machines. 01:18:56.338 --> 01:19:00.008 This machine is old but really good. 01:19:11.520 --> 01:19:14.857 Life is an adventure… 01:19:14.857 --> 01:19:16.225 the experience of being… 01:19:16.225 --> 01:19:19.261 Any place I feel well I stay if not, I go elsewhere… 01:19:19.261 --> 01:19:22.231 because life is everywhere. 01:19:22.231 --> 01:19:27.636 I was not born to remain… I am just passing by. 01:19:37.012 --> 01:19:40.349 So happens today and many other days 01:19:40.349 --> 01:19:42.785 my soul, my house and my life 01:19:42.785 --> 01:19:46.288 are dark rooms where an abandoned child 01:19:46.288 --> 01:19:51.460 sees god as a firefly and dreams the sun. 01:19:51.460 --> 01:19:54.863 Perhaps he lifts a hand in the crowd 01:19:54.863 --> 01:19:59.701 but I am blind man without a cane or guide. 01:19:59.701 --> 01:20:02.171 So happens today in the stormy waters of the soul 01:20:02.171 --> 01:20:04.740 and written in paper is my solitude. 01:20:04.740 --> 01:20:06.809 So happens today 01:20:06.809 --> 01:20:13.816 I wish to write beloved friends a goodbye poem. 01:20:13.816 --> 01:20:19.788 Thinking over with great expectation on this song. 01:20:19.788 --> 01:20:24.126 Sunday, night is falling and I feel lonely. 01:20:24.126 --> 01:20:26.528 So it is. 01:20:28.831 --> 01:20:31.867 This is Richie's house, 01:20:31.867 --> 01:20:35.404 where he lived the best years of his life 01:20:35.404 --> 01:20:38.607 as a poet, 01:20:38.607 --> 01:20:40.943 here he became who he was 01:20:40.943 --> 01:20:44.580 and here he ceased to exist, physically. 01:20:55.958 --> 01:20:58.727 He left behind a woman who was his wife, 01:20:58.727 --> 01:21:00.462 a very loving woman. 01:21:00.462 --> 01:21:07.135 Celebrating Poe: 10 years without Ricardo 01:21:07.135 --> 01:21:15.077 My share of Ricardo was of his last days and little in time. 01:21:15.077 --> 01:21:21.116 Afterwards I was able to asses how crucial he was 01:21:21.116 --> 01:21:24.987 in the life of so many young artists 01:21:24.987 --> 01:21:29.391 enticing them to do what they had to do in life. 01:21:29.391 --> 01:21:35.864 When I die I will be a poem for peace. 01:21:37.099 --> 01:21:39.201 Nothing remains, 01:21:39.201 --> 01:21:43.505 after the last word, perhaps a period. 01:21:43.505 --> 01:21:49.811 So full in the silence of beautiful death. |
00:00:37.277 --> 00:00:41.782 La palabra squat quiere decir estar en cuclillas 00:00:41.782 --> 00:00:46.253 o estar asentado en un lugar por determinada cantidad de tiempo. 00:00:49.156 --> 00:00:52.859 Estoy acuclillada en este espacio 00:00:52.859 --> 00:00:54.127 al que pertenezco. 00:00:57.297 --> 00:01:03.136 Los tomadores de espacios abandonados que dada la necesidad de un techo, 00:01:03.136 --> 00:01:06.273 los hemos habitado y los hemos reconstruido. 00:01:13.313 --> 00:01:13.980 Taking control 00:01:13.980 --> 00:01:17.217 and ownership of an unused space 00:01:17.217 --> 00:01:19.186 and making it your own. 00:01:23.890 --> 00:01:25.759 Cortante, es invasor. 00:01:29.262 --> 00:01:31.531 Ocupar edificios, viene también de, supongo 00:01:31.531 --> 00:01:34.134 desde la humanidad cuando no han tenido donde vivir. 00:01:39.072 --> 00:01:40.907 It's really weird 00:01:40.907 --> 00:01:46.513 but being a squatter is about the most Republican thing 00:01:46.513 --> 00:01:50.016 because it's total self-sufficiency. 00:01:56.389 --> 00:01:58.758 Soñador talvez. 00:02:02.696 --> 00:02:05.232 Hope, 00:02:05.232 --> 00:02:08.535 hope and resilience. 00:02:13.573 --> 00:02:16.276 Yo creo más bien en los okupas. 00:02:16.276 --> 00:02:20.180 Osea en ocupar un lugar que está deshabilitado por la ciudad 00:02:20.180 --> 00:02:23.416 y nosotros entramos y lo habilitamos para vivir. 00:02:28.355 --> 00:02:29.523 Squatting for me 00:02:29.523 --> 00:02:33.059 is bringing the beating heart into 00:02:33.059 --> 00:02:35.662 into the city. 00:02:54.915 --> 00:02:59.085 Robert Moses was responsible for the removal 00:02:59.085 --> 00:03:03.757 of about 12,000 people from the Lower East Side and demolished the buildings. 00:03:03.757 --> 00:03:09.496 And the projects were built in 1936, I think was Jacob Riis, 00:03:09.496 --> 00:03:11.565 and the whole complexion of the neighborhood changed. 00:03:11.565 --> 00:03:14.134 Then in the 1950s, the U.S. 00:03:14.134 --> 00:03:17.871 did something with the sugar market and Puerto Rico, and they were giving 00:03:17.871 --> 00:03:21.508 Puerto Rican immigrants $50 to catch a plane to New York 00:03:21.508 --> 00:03:27.047 to come and work in the service industries and the garment districts. 00:03:27.047 --> 00:03:29.549 And then there was an economic downturn. 00:03:29.549 --> 00:03:33.553 Many people lost their jobs. 00:03:33.553 --> 00:03:35.522 It was very difficult. 00:03:35.522 --> 00:03:39.192 And along with that, the property values went down. 00:03:39.192 --> 00:03:44.231 Landlords stopped providing services in the neighborhood. 00:03:44.231 --> 00:03:46.933 By the sixties, it had become 00:03:46.933 --> 00:03:48.668 a major drug area. 00:03:50.670 --> 00:03:53.873 Este es el lado de Nueva York que hace 15 años, 20, 00:03:53.873 --> 00:03:56.643 se veía en las películas como un barrio de abandono, 00:03:56.643 --> 00:04:00.880 donde estaban los malandrines, los bandidos, la droga, los asesinatos, 00:04:00.880 --> 00:04:03.516 esta era toda esa escena oscura de Nueva York. 00:04:07.254 --> 00:04:09.756 Un desastre, parecía después de una guerra porque 00:04:09.756 --> 00:04:13.026 eran edificios abandonados, basura, violencia, 00:04:13.026 --> 00:04:19.933 todo esto que trae cuando el gobierno no está actuando en forma debida en ese punto. 00:04:19.933 --> 00:04:25.939 Lo que era en el año 1980, 81, 82, 83, 00:04:25.939 --> 00:04:31.311 ese Lower East Side parecía un campamento que le hubiesen tirado una bomba. 00:04:31.311 --> 00:04:35.048 Lo único que usted oía ahí después de las 8 de la noche era 00:04:35.048 --> 00:04:38.151 “white horse, white horse”, que era heroína. 00:04:41.588 --> 00:04:43.990 Nadie quería vivir aquí. 00:04:43.990 --> 00:04:47.460 Un día vino el dueño de un edificio a cobrar una renta 00:04:47.460 --> 00:04:49.929 y dos negros salieron perseguiéndolo con un machete, 00:04:49.929 --> 00:04:52.098 y se metió a la tienda y le dijo: 00:04:52.098 --> 00:04:57.704 «Oiga señor le vendo este edificio de 25 apartamentos, se lo vendo por 1.000 dólares». 00:04:57.704 --> 00:05:01.207 Y el señor puertorriqueño me dijo: «Yo no compro problemas». 00:05:01.207 --> 00:05:04.444 The landlords basically just abandoned many of the buildings 00:05:04.444 --> 00:05:07.781 because it was financially the best thing they could do. 00:05:07.781 --> 00:05:10.850 And so the City became the owner of many, 00:05:10.850 --> 00:05:12.786 many buildings all over New York City. 00:05:51.958 --> 00:05:54.694 We opened the building in November of 1988. 00:05:54.694 --> 00:05:58.398 We went in through a side lot, 00:05:58.398 --> 00:06:00.333 picked a window on the ground floor 00:06:00.333 --> 00:06:05.472 that was as much out of view from the street as we could 00:06:05.472 --> 00:06:07.640 so that we wouldn't draw attention. 00:06:07.640 --> 00:06:10.844 And we took out the cinder blocks 00:06:10.844 --> 00:06:14.647 that were blocking the window and started to explore the inside. 00:06:22.422 --> 00:06:24.824 It was full of debris. 00:06:28.094 --> 00:06:32.298 Me, Geerte and Steven Ashmore 00:06:32.298 --> 00:06:37.704 were the three original founders of this building. 00:06:37.704 --> 00:06:39.406 I had won a scholarship 00:06:39.406 --> 00:06:42.409 from Andy Warhol to go to art school in New York. 00:06:42.409 --> 00:06:48.448 So I came to New York, but I really had no money to pay rent or anything. 00:06:48.515 --> 00:06:52.152 And I figured, well, you know, I've been squatting for so many years 00:06:52.152 --> 00:06:56.022 in the Netherlands and I've seen the squats all over Europe. 00:06:56.022 --> 00:07:01.494 You know, stayed in the squats all over Europe, so why not in New York? 00:07:01.494 --> 00:07:03.430 And Steve was in my class 00:07:03.430 --> 00:07:07.033 and at the time he had a really nice loft, 00:07:07.033 --> 00:07:10.203 but he was going to lose his loft 00:07:10.203 --> 00:07:14.174 and she needed a place to live as well. 00:07:14.174 --> 00:07:18.244 And so she said to me, I'm used to doing this thing called squatting. 00:07:18.945 --> 00:07:21.314 At the time, I didn't even know what a squat was. 00:07:23.416 --> 00:07:24.884 I left Pennsylvania 00:07:24.884 --> 00:07:28.221 when the marriage broke up really badly 00:07:28.221 --> 00:07:32.926 and I kind of lost my mind for a while 00:07:32.926 --> 00:07:35.428 and I knew I had to get out of there. 00:07:35.428 --> 00:07:40.700 And also I realized I was transgender too, 00:07:40.700 --> 00:07:44.103 and I couldn't do a transition in Pennsylvania, 00:07:44.103 --> 00:07:50.043 I lived in the boondocks where they still have KKK, 00:07:50.043 --> 00:07:52.345 so I had to get out of there. 00:07:52.345 --> 00:07:57.984 And I knew that New York is the only city for me because it's where I was born. 00:07:57.984 --> 00:08:01.087 So I came back, but 00:08:01.087 --> 00:08:05.525 I was on the verge of homelessness like four years. 00:08:05.525 --> 00:08:10.563 I started hanging out at ABC No Rio and when I finally got evicted 00:08:10.563 --> 00:08:14.033 from the SRO, they let me sleep in the basement there. 00:08:14.033 --> 00:08:16.102 So I'd go to school during the day 00:08:16.102 --> 00:08:19.339 to learn art anatomy and draw from the model. 00:08:19.339 --> 00:08:22.542 And then at night I would go to ABC No Rio and actually 00:08:22.542 --> 00:08:25.745 be a model myself for other artists. 00:08:25.745 --> 00:08:29.782 And Siobhan was one of the artists who was drawing me. 00:08:29.782 --> 00:08:34.354 I am drawing her and I would start shaking so much I couldn't draw anymore. 00:08:34.354 --> 00:08:36.456 And I knew I had to talk to her. 00:08:36.456 --> 00:08:37.690 After a drawing session. 00:08:37.690 --> 00:08:42.629 We'd hang out and we'd have a beer and eventually got to know each other. 00:08:42.629 --> 00:08:44.964 And he was like, hey, I'm looking for a place to live. 00:08:44.964 --> 00:08:47.534 And I'd be like, Yeah, so am I. 00:08:47.534 --> 00:08:48.935 I'm going to be squatting. 00:08:48.935 --> 00:08:50.970 I didn’t even know what a squat was. 00:08:50.970 --> 00:08:53.039 Kind of just like with Steve, so I explained 00:08:53.039 --> 00:08:57.010 and he was like, yeah I'll join you in this, it sounds great. 00:09:01.614 --> 00:09:03.182 One day, one weekend day, 00:09:03.182 --> 00:09:08.154 we walked around the East Village and scouted buildings. 00:09:08.154 --> 00:09:12.792 We looked at a lot of different abandoned buildings all over the East Village, 00:09:12.792 --> 00:09:16.563 and even though we couldn't go inside them, 00:09:16.563 --> 00:09:18.631 we kind of determined that 00:09:18.631 --> 00:09:22.335 this building looked to be 00:09:22.335 --> 00:09:25.305 sound, like structurally very sound. 00:09:31.911 --> 00:09:34.881 We started living here immediately. 00:09:45.992 --> 00:09:47.293 All the steps 00:09:47.293 --> 00:09:51.598 that have been in the building had been knocked out. 00:09:51.598 --> 00:09:56.469 So those first nights I took the fire escape up to the third floor 00:09:56.469 --> 00:10:01.307 and would crawl into my tent and I would crawl into two sleeping bags. 00:10:01.307 --> 00:10:05.178 I would have all my clothes on. So, so cold, 00:10:05.178 --> 00:10:08.348 and the pigeons would fly through the windows. 00:10:08.348 --> 00:10:10.083 There were no windows. 00:10:11.918 --> 00:10:15.888 You start by finding a spot 00:10:15.888 --> 00:10:22.328 that is not very large that you can sort of clean up, 00:10:22.328 --> 00:10:26.165 sort of seal off from the wind and the cold. 00:10:26.165 --> 00:10:28.701 And you need to do it quickly because you need to have a place 00:10:28.701 --> 00:10:32.372 to rest your head and eat something 00:10:32.372 --> 00:10:35.708 and kind of be clean. 00:10:35.708 --> 00:10:39.379 There was a total of five of us at the beginning. 00:10:39.445 --> 00:10:41.614 People that were meaning to live here. 00:10:41.614 --> 00:10:45.284 Two of them dropped out within the first two weeks because it was too stressful 00:10:45.351 --> 00:10:46.452 for them. 00:10:54.460 --> 00:10:57.096 Yo vine como en el 87. 00:10:58.765 --> 00:11:01.934 La primera vez que yo vine al Tompkins Square Park, 00:11:01.934 --> 00:11:05.171 vine un sábado como a las 8 de la noche y me dio miedo entrar 00:11:05.171 --> 00:11:08.741 porque la luz que había en el Tompkins Square, eran canecas llenas de madera 00:11:08.741 --> 00:11:11.310 que ponía los homeless que vivían ahí. 00:11:11.310 --> 00:11:14.180 Formaban una organización que se llamaban los Tent City, 00:11:14.180 --> 00:11:15.782 Tent como la de tienda de campaña, 00:11:15.782 --> 00:11:20.219 porque tenían carpas ahí y casas de cartón dentro del parque. 00:11:30.496 --> 00:11:33.599 El movimiento squat, tener que hablar de ese movimiento, 00:11:33.599 --> 00:11:34.834 cuando yo llegué a Nueva York, 00:11:34.834 --> 00:11:37.403 la primer noche, lo que me mostró mi amigo cuando llegué, 00:11:37.403 --> 00:11:41.841 y era que habían sitiado a todos los homeless en el Tompkins Square Park. 00:11:41.841 --> 00:11:43.843 No dejaban entrar comida. 00:11:43.843 --> 00:11:47.046 En Manhattan pasan cosas que el mundo nunca sabe. 00:11:47.046 --> 00:11:53.853 Pero es un experimento constante con las humanidades, con las culturas que existen allí 00:11:53.853 --> 00:12:00.493 Y eso me pareció absolutamente aberrante y encantador y fuera de lugar. 00:12:02.962 --> 00:12:08.901 Y un día vino la policía y hubo una batalla campal 00:12:08.901 --> 00:12:11.537 donde hubo algunos muertos, muchos muchos heridos 00:12:11.537 --> 00:12:15.975 y por supuesto muchos muchos arrestados por la fuerza del orden. 00:12:25.485 --> 00:12:29.288 Años más tarde, yo llegaría a ese edificio que era como el bastión 00:12:29.288 --> 00:12:32.759 de esos miserables, 00:12:32.759 --> 00:12:37.964 y el piso donde todos los acostaban a dormir fue mi casa, 00:12:37.964 --> 00:12:41.434 me la regaló un cullabro, un colombiano. 00:12:41.434 --> 00:12:44.637 Mira se llama el libro de la casa 00:12:44.637 --> 00:12:46.472 y es la historia de Puerta 10. 00:12:46.472 --> 00:12:51.778 La casa sí era conocida como 10 Door, Puerta 10 00:12:51.778 --> 00:12:56.115 y ya nosotros digamos que llegamos con el cuento latino, 00:12:56.115 --> 00:12:59.218 entonces latinizamos el nombre y le pusimos Puerta 10 . 00:12:59.218 --> 00:13:01.754 Aquella noche no supe por donde empezar, 00:13:01.754 --> 00:13:05.558 pues era tanto el desorden, y la pereza que se impuso, 00:13:05.558 --> 00:13:08.528 y se constituyó como la única y legítima ley de la noche, 00:13:08.528 --> 00:13:10.530 fue entonce muy larga esa noche. 00:13:11.597 --> 00:13:13.699 ….perforar a la casa, 00:13:13.699 --> 00:13:15.902 y aprender a escribir correctamente 00:13:15.902 --> 00:13:18.871 para que sus amigos tan distantes y distintos 00:13:18.871 --> 00:13:20.640 no se rieran de él. 00:13:27.013 --> 00:13:30.983 Yo vivía aquí en Manhattan cierto con mi esposa y mi hijo 00:13:30.983 --> 00:13:36.789 pero ya me había enterado del movimiento squat en el año 86, 87, 00:13:36.789 --> 00:13:38.658 a través de un amigo mío, Héctor Quintana. 00:13:39.358 --> 00:13:43.496 Héctor llegó ahí a ese lugar por un muchacho, que se llama Edgar, 00:13:47.700 --> 00:13:50.203 Ese edificio había tenido ya un historial, 00:13:50.203 --> 00:13:53.739 qué pasó, que cuando nosotros llegamos le metimos mucha fuerza 00:13:53.739 --> 00:13:55.975 y empezamos a construirlo 00:15:35.808 --> 00:15:41.113 Y es debido en este proceso al trabajo que yo hablo con Héctor y decidimos documentar esto 00:15:41.113 --> 00:15:48.521 porque, en ese momento yo vivía muy emocionado practicando la cámara porque estaba estudiando cine 00:15:48.521 --> 00:15:52.325 y quería ser camarógrafo y editor. 00:15:53.626 --> 00:15:58.297 Cuando decidí ir a estudiar cine lo hice con la intención de registrar 00:15:58.297 --> 00:16:01.200 eventos que sucedían en el Village Gate 00:16:01.200 --> 00:16:04.236 y fue así como yo conocí a Eddie Montalvo. 00:16:04.236 --> 00:16:10.776 Eddie Montalvo era un percusionista que trabajó con Héctor Lavoe por muchos años y con Rubén Blades, 00:16:10.776 --> 00:16:15.614 y es Eddie Montalvo quien se encarga de meterme en este círculo de músicos, 00:16:15.614 --> 00:16:20.886 y él me comenta que no había ni un fotógrafo registrando estos eventos que sucedían allí. 00:16:20.886 --> 00:16:24.223 Entonces me matriculé en New School for Social Research. 00:16:25.992 --> 00:16:30.763 Casi nunca utilicé el trípode 00:16:30.763 --> 00:16:36.535 y me perfeccioné en ser un camarógrafo prácticamente como un steady cam, 00:16:36.535 --> 00:16:39.305 osea era más o menos como un cinema vérité. 00:16:42.341 --> 00:16:47.413 Grabamos horas y horas y horas. 00:16:47.413 --> 00:16:51.584 Y Héctor en toda idea que pensaba quería hacer un documental. 00:16:51.584 --> 00:16:56.522 Sí pero esa era la razón, era hacer un documental sobre ese proceso de squatters 00:16:56.522 --> 00:17:06.165 que es un proceso que se venía dando desde los años 50’s, de ahí en adelante. 00:17:06.165 --> 00:17:08.768 Ambos hicimos el proyecto, Héctor y yo, 00:17:08.768 --> 00:17:12.805 y él guardaba su parte y yo guardaba mi parte y no la intercambiábamos no. 00:17:12.805 --> 00:17:14.907 Y mi cámara muchas veces yo la dejaba allí porque él me decía Orlando 00:17:14.907 --> 00:17:18.677 deje la cámara que me toca registrar esto y usted no puede estar. 00:17:21.614 --> 00:17:27.586 Y eso terminaría prácticamente en el año 92, 93 más o menos 00:17:27.586 --> 00:17:30.356 en la que yo ya me retiro del movimiento squat 00:17:30.356 --> 00:17:32.892 por problemas familiares 00:17:33.959 --> 00:17:37.830 y el espacio se lo cedí a un amigo escultor, Juan Salazar 00:17:37.830 --> 00:17:42.601 que acababa de llegar de Pensilvania con una mano adelante y otra atrás, 00:17:42.601 --> 00:17:45.871 y él se instaló ahí por un tiempo hasta que 00:17:45.871 --> 00:17:48.274 cosas del destino lo hicieron mudar a Colombia. 00:17:48.274 --> 00:17:50.276 El tipo me presentó en la reunión, 00:17:50.276 --> 00:17:52.478 él es mi amigo Juan Salazar 00:17:52.478 --> 00:17:55.781 y él se va a quedar ahí viviendo, yo le voy a donar el espacio, 00:17:55.781 --> 00:17:58.784 él necesita ese espacio para él y su familia. 00:17:58.784 --> 00:18:00.886 Y era lo único que yo tenía. 00:18:03.756 --> 00:18:05.958 Llegué de Pittsburgh, 00:18:05.958 --> 00:18:09.361 después de tener a mi segundo hijo, Manuel Salvador, 00:18:09.361 --> 00:18:13.432 ya me había separado de Juan Salazar, el papá de mis hijos. 00:18:13.432 --> 00:18:16.202 Llegamos acá como en el 93 00:18:16.202 --> 00:18:19.305 y ahí me quedé unos 6 meses, 7 meses, 00:18:19.305 --> 00:18:21.140 como ya estábamos separados 00:18:21.140 --> 00:18:24.210 me tocó conseguirme un lugar para donde irme, 00:18:24.210 --> 00:18:26.145 y no había sino el quinto piso, 00:18:26.145 --> 00:18:32.118 que el quinto piso lo tenía un chico que era supuestamente “el rey de los homeless” 00:18:32.118 --> 00:18:34.620 pero solamente le habían dado la mitad. 00:18:34.620 --> 00:18:37.323 Se llamaba Ari, afroamericano, 00:18:37.323 --> 00:18:42.461 era el líder de esos homeless, de los que te digo 00:18:42.461 --> 00:18:45.264 que habían sitiado en el parque en esa época. 00:18:45.264 --> 00:18:49.802 Entonces le pidieron que la otra mitad que si la podía compartir conmigo. 00:18:52.037 --> 00:18:56.175 My father was Danish and my mother was Turkish Canadian. 00:18:56.175 --> 00:18:59.945 When I was like 13 to 15 we moved back to Denmark. 00:18:59.945 --> 00:19:05.484 We'd been living in Canada for ten years before that, and then in 1985, 00:19:05.484 --> 00:19:08.854 my family moved to this neighborhood, to the Lower East Side, 00:19:08.854 --> 00:19:13.626 and then soon I realized that there was a squatting scene in the Lower East Side, 00:19:13.626 --> 00:19:17.630 East Village area, and I started hanging out in the squats 00:19:17.630 --> 00:19:21.333 and eventually when I was about 18 or 19, 00:19:21.333 --> 00:19:25.504 I moved in to C Squat where I lived for several years. 00:19:25.504 --> 00:19:32.344 And at the time the building was in really bad shape. 00:19:32.344 --> 00:19:33.078 That's crazy. 00:19:33.078 --> 00:19:37.416 And we were mostly young people, you know, and at a certain point 00:19:37.416 --> 00:19:43.856 I was like, I got to get out of here and I went traveling for almost a year. 00:19:43.856 --> 00:19:46.959 And then in 1993, 00:19:46.959 --> 00:19:50.863 I came back to the city and I knew that I wanted to live here 00:19:50.863 --> 00:19:55.734 and I wanted to be in a place where there is a possibility for development, 00:19:55.734 --> 00:19:59.371 where part of the goal was to have something permanent. 00:19:59.371 --> 00:20:03.042 And I actually showed up around the same time that Juan and Geanme, 00:20:03.042 --> 00:20:05.811 we came at exactly the same time. 00:20:06.679 --> 00:20:11.450 Yo vengo de Pereira para Nueva York porque mi novio Juan Merchán estaba acá. 00:20:13.819 --> 00:20:16.222 Yo soy 3 veces mojada, 00:20:16.222 --> 00:20:18.958 3 veces mojado es pasar 3 fronteras 00:20:18.958 --> 00:20:21.060 que vienen desde el Salvador, Guatemala, 00:20:21.060 --> 00:20:24.964 Guatemala, México y México Estados Unidos. 00:20:24.964 --> 00:20:26.498 Juan actuaba y 00:20:26.498 --> 00:20:28.567 yo empecé a tejer. 00:20:28.567 --> 00:20:29.935 Vivíamos en el Bronx, 00:20:29.935 --> 00:20:32.805 y en una fiesta conocimos a Héctor Quintana, 00:20:32.805 --> 00:20:35.107 y él nos habla sobre el movimiento squat. 00:20:35.107 --> 00:20:39.345 Entonces Héctor me dice que venga a Umbrella House 00:20:39.345 --> 00:20:42.881 y me dijo pregunta por Gabriel Pintado. 00:20:42.881 --> 00:20:51.557 Y el edificio estaba muy oscuro, el corredor era largo, 00:20:51.557 --> 00:20:54.994 yo estaba intimidada por el espacio. 00:20:54.994 --> 00:20:58.063 Entonces yo le explico a Gabriel que somos artistas, 00:20:58.063 --> 00:21:01.133 no ganamos mucho dinero, y él me dice, 00:21:01.133 --> 00:21:04.536 no pues mira lo que vas a hacer, vamos a tener la reunión hoy, 00:21:04.536 --> 00:21:08.307 entonces tú explicas lo que me estás diciendo y yo te traduzco. 00:21:08.907 --> 00:21:10.943 Yo me sentí segura. 00:21:10.943 --> 00:21:15.814 Entonces pues yo voy a casa feliz, porque encontré 00:21:15.814 --> 00:21:19.018 mi amor, encontré mi casa. 00:21:19.018 --> 00:21:22.688 Y le cuento a Juan lo maravilloso y lo estupendo, 00:21:22.688 --> 00:21:25.157 entonces el domingo vinimos, 00:21:28.894 --> 00:21:31.230 y vimos el espacio. 00:21:32.798 --> 00:21:36.869 Entonces empezamos el proceso para ser miembros 00:21:39.471 --> 00:21:42.574 cumplimos el período de prueba, los 4 meses, 00:21:42.574 --> 00:21:45.644 entonces ya empezamos a trabajar en nuestro espacio. 00:21:59.825 --> 00:22:03.495 Yo llegué a Umbrella creo que en el 90... 00:22:03.495 --> 00:22:09.234 las fechas a esta altura ya se van divagando, son como la pintura abstractas. 00:22:09.234 --> 00:22:14.573 Yo pasé pero, pues era, era, 00:22:14.573 --> 00:22:17.776 pues los edificios totalmente abandonados, y todo un contexto 00:22:17.776 --> 00:22:23.415 que no daba mucha gana de arrimarse por estos lares pero 00:22:23.415 --> 00:22:28.420 en esa época yo ya estaba debiendo en el estudio que tenía, creo que 4 meses 00:22:28.420 --> 00:22:31.523 Juanito Merchán ya estaba acá en el edificio, 00:22:31.523 --> 00:22:34.326 yo trabajaba con él ayudándole a terminar su sitio que... , 00:22:34.326 --> 00:22:37.496 todos los sitios tenían una cantidad de trabajo enorme 00:22:37.496 --> 00:22:40.699 y estuve con Juanito Merchán 6, 8 meses creo. 00:22:40.699 --> 00:22:43.869 Tuve varios sitios hasta que llegué al que tengo ahora 00:22:43.869 --> 00:22:48.006 hace ya como 10, 12 años. 00:22:57.449 --> 00:23:02.488 Yo llegué a Umbrella House en octubre de 1993, 00:23:02.488 --> 00:23:07.860 luego de sufrir duras penas de amor en Jackson Heights, Queens. 00:23:07.860 --> 00:23:11.997 Llegué por intermedio de Mario Bustamante y por intermedio de él 00:23:11.997 --> 00:23:14.700 conocí a Gabriel Pintado, fotógrafo uruguayo 00:23:14.700 --> 00:23:20.873 quien inicialmente me dio hospedaje en un cuartito pequeño azul, como un tango que tenía 00:23:20.873 --> 00:23:24.143 y luego pasé a ser parte de la casa ya haciendo trabajos comunitarios, 00:23:24.143 --> 00:23:29.882 luego como invitado de la casa y luego ya me dieron mi propio apartamento por conceso. 00:23:35.621 --> 00:23:36.855 When we opened this building, 00:23:36.855 --> 00:23:39.625 we had this cat named Buick, 00:23:39.625 --> 00:23:43.495 and he belonged to someone who's not here anymore. 00:23:43.495 --> 00:23:46.899 But who didn't take really good care of him. 00:23:46.899 --> 00:23:49.535 And it was like none of us 00:23:49.535 --> 00:23:53.038 really paid attention to him at the time. 00:23:53.038 --> 00:23:56.642 And then one day I saw him in the hallway 00:23:56.642 --> 00:23:59.878 and he had blood in his eyes 00:23:59.878 --> 00:24:02.514 and he was he was really ill. 00:24:02.514 --> 00:24:05.217 And then we found him in the basement. 00:24:05.217 --> 00:24:07.119 He went down there to die. 00:24:08.954 --> 00:24:10.122 A few months later, 00:24:10.122 --> 00:24:14.526 I just had this, like, spiritual awakening where I felt so bad 00:24:14.526 --> 00:24:18.630 that I didn't do anything. 00:24:29.241 --> 00:24:34.246 It’s the most unforgivable sin. 00:24:34.246 --> 00:24:35.314 When I started the building, 00:24:35.314 --> 00:24:39.585 I did any number of things to survive 00:24:39.585 --> 00:24:45.157 during that time from catering work to waiting tables 00:24:45.157 --> 00:24:47.993 to being a dancer in nightclubs. 00:24:47.993 --> 00:24:53.065 The way I got started was in a club that is literally in our backyard. 00:24:53.065 --> 00:24:57.135 I used to go dancing there just to have a good time. 00:24:57.135 --> 00:25:00.005 And then I thought, 00:25:00.005 --> 00:25:02.774 you know, I'd kind of like to do that. 00:25:02.774 --> 00:25:07.446 And so I asked, and they hired me to start dancing. 00:25:07.446 --> 00:25:10.682 And I started in our backyard right now. 00:25:11.083 --> 00:25:14.853 I was also somewhat later working as a photographer 00:25:14.853 --> 00:25:17.356 and doing fine art photography on the side. 00:25:36.909 --> 00:25:42.915 Por esa época los squatters usaban los containers donde se pone el plaster 00:25:42.915 --> 00:25:46.084 como baño y lo colectaban 00:25:46.084 --> 00:25:48.687 y lo ponían en el 5to piso. 00:25:48.687 --> 00:25:53.058 Eso estaba lleno de buckets de deshechos y orina 00:25:53.058 --> 00:25:56.662 y refrigeradores y todo para tirarle a la policía. 00:25:56.662 --> 00:26:01.433 Cuando yo llegué al 5to piso había más de 60 buckets, 00:26:01.433 --> 00:26:02.768 unos encima de otros, 00:26:02.768 --> 00:26:06.471 unos ya se habían abierto porque la madera se había podrido 00:26:06.471 --> 00:26:11.810 porque eso llevaba ahí más de 5 años desde que abrieron el edificio 00:26:11.810 --> 00:26:17.783 y me tocó empezar a sacar todos esos buckets uno por uno. 00:26:19.651 --> 00:26:21.053 El apartamento no tenía piso, 00:26:21.053 --> 00:26:26.959 yo tenía unas tablas que usaba para caminar porque solamente estaban los “beams” 00:26:26.959 --> 00:26:30.329 y ponía pedazos de madera y por ahí caminaba. 00:26:32.598 --> 00:26:37.202 Y empecé a demoler las paredes, a quitar absolutamente todo, 00:26:37.202 --> 00:26:42.174 y como Mario tenía acceso imagínate a todas las herramientas, tenía el carro 00:26:42.174 --> 00:26:47.145 y tenía experiencia en rehabilitar estos apartamentos, 00:26:47.913 --> 00:26:49.247 me ayudó muchísimo. 00:26:51.249 --> 00:26:55.387 Uno de los grandes problemas era que no teníamos donde sacar las aguas sucias 00:26:55.387 --> 00:27:02.461 entonces empezamos a hacer la instalación de la salida de las aguas sucias por encima de la calle, 00:27:02.461 --> 00:27:05.430 entonces vinieron los inspectores de la ciudad y dijeron 00:27:05.430 --> 00:27:08.734 “no este edificio es de la ciudad, ustedes no pueden hacer trabajos aquí. “ 00:27:08.734 --> 00:27:11.970 The good thing is it was on a Friday. 00:27:11.970 --> 00:27:14.806 El lunes vamos a venir a cerrar esto aquí. 00:27:15.273 --> 00:27:21.346 Empezamos a hacer el hueco por el basement, al centro de la calle un túnel. 00:27:21.346 --> 00:27:25.717 Así contra reloj porque era una cosa que no podíamos parar y era un hueco muy grande 00:27:25.717 --> 00:27:29.121 y que era muy peligroso porque cuando tú haces un hueco en la calle, 00:27:29.121 --> 00:27:31.089 pasan los camiones y se derrumba 00:27:31.089 --> 00:27:34.192 entonces había que ponerle estructura 00:27:34.192 --> 00:27:37.195 de madera como las minas. 00:27:37.195 --> 00:27:39.665 And we were doing it nonstop and doing it. 00:27:39.665 --> 00:27:42.501 Everybody, teamwork, pocket for grade. 00:27:42.501 --> 00:27:48.206 Instalamos, volvimos a cerrar todo y cuando llegaron los oficiales de la ciudad a cerrar 00:27:48.206 --> 00:27:52.077 el hueco que habíamos hecho por encima de la calle y a clausurar todo, 00:27:52.077 --> 00:27:56.715 pues nosotros ya teníamos hecho la tubería de la calle. 00:27:56.715 --> 00:28:00.752 That was the most amazing engineering feat. 00:28:00.752 --> 00:28:04.389 Y lo mismo nos tocó con la electricidad 00:28:04.389 --> 00:28:08.360 había que ir en la mitad de la calle, a los 2 de la mañana en invierno 00:28:08.360 --> 00:28:10.996 abrir unas tapas de la electricidad 00:28:10.996 --> 00:28:16.568 y conectarnos con las principales que son 5000 volteos, 00:28:16.568 --> 00:28:20.872 que si lo coge a uno eso pues queda uno como un miquito. 00:28:21.406 --> 00:28:25.711 Lo hice no, pero de por sí es una brutalidad. 00:28:29.314 --> 00:28:32.017 Will you stop speaking Spanish? 00:28:32.017 --> 00:28:33.418 Okay, okay. 00:28:34.786 --> 00:28:36.154 Then I met Helena. 00:28:36.154 --> 00:28:38.090 who was from the Netherlands. 00:28:38.090 --> 00:28:40.625 She lived around the corner 00:28:40.625 --> 00:28:43.729 with her boyfriend at the time, and she really wanted 00:28:43.729 --> 00:28:47.699 to be part of the building and have her own place. 00:28:47.699 --> 00:28:50.202 So then she joined us, which was really great 00:28:50.202 --> 00:28:51.603 for the both of us 00:28:51.603 --> 00:28:53.672 because we are both Dutch. 00:29:00.979 --> 00:29:03.548 Wow, the water is all black... It is coming from... 00:29:03.548 --> 00:29:06.518 I'm singing in the shower. 00:29:09.521 --> 00:29:12.190 Did your film upstairs, the barrels? 00:29:12.190 --> 00:29:13.024 No, not yet. 00:29:13.024 --> 00:29:17.429 Oh, you should we have water containers up on the floor up here. 00:29:17.429 --> 00:29:22.300 “Can I take a shower” and then after a couple of months, they will start complaining like 00:29:22.300 --> 00:29:25.203 “can you take a shower once a month.” 00:29:25.871 --> 00:29:30.041 “Can't you just come alone and not take ten other squatters with you?” 00:29:30.041 --> 00:29:33.712 You don't want to bother other people with your own shit. 00:29:34.479 --> 00:29:41.553 "They’re our magical houses." 00:30:01.373 --> 00:30:06.178 Ha sido un proceso lento porque llevan mucho trabajo 00:30:06.178 --> 00:30:10.215 cada parte que se ponga debe ir bajo las normas de la ciudad, 00:30:10.215 --> 00:30:12.617 porque estamos en un proceso no sólo coger 00:30:12.617 --> 00:30:15.987 un edificio abandonado y que sea una cueva para vivir en ella 00:30:15.987 --> 00:30:20.125 sino hacer el proceso lógico que es la reconstrucción. 00:30:32.771 --> 00:30:34.706 Por eso habitamos estos hogares 00:30:34.706 --> 00:30:36.808 por eso nuestras casas mágicas, 00:30:36.808 --> 00:30:39.845 cada una tiene su forma porque nos permitimos el diseño 00:30:39.845 --> 00:30:42.914 dentro de cada una de las casas. 00:31:20.218 --> 00:31:22.754 Tango es mi perro, es mi compañero 00:31:22.754 --> 00:31:25.857 Venga para acá compañero, Tango a la silla 00:31:25.857 --> 00:31:31.396 El es mi mejor amigo, yo no sé si soy su mejor amigo, 00:31:31.396 --> 00:31:35.934 porque la historia dice que era una vez un poeta que tenía un perro, 00:31:35.934 --> 00:31:39.771 pero no es así, era un perro que tenía un poeta. 00:31:39.771 --> 00:31:45.076 Tango, y entonces, qué vamos a hacer a veces cuando la soledad nos golpea 00:31:45.076 --> 00:31:51.283 qué vamos a hacer con el frío, qué vamos a hacer con tanta locura que nos habita? 00:31:51.283 --> 00:31:53.084 Conteste Tango. 00:32:01.092 --> 00:32:02.127 We started 00:32:02.127 --> 00:32:05.463 becoming involved with community garden called La Plaza Cultural. 00:32:05.463 --> 00:32:08.566 I became the chairperson for the garden in 1990 00:32:08.566 --> 00:32:12.103 and we started meeting to plan to restore the garden. 00:32:12.103 --> 00:32:14.973 And one of the efforts that we spearheaded 00:32:14.973 --> 00:32:19.110 was to involve neighborhood artist in revitalizing the park. 00:32:19.311 --> 00:32:22.847 That's how Mario got involved, and he ended up putting 00:32:22.847 --> 00:32:26.885 this sculpture which we call the Heart of Loisaida. 00:33:31.516 --> 00:33:35.720 La gente que se metió en los squats pues eran o artistas o gente 00:33:35.720 --> 00:33:39.791 muy por fuera del standard común de la sociedad. 00:33:45.530 --> 00:33:46.998 Para mucha gente fue solución de vivienda 00:33:46.998 --> 00:33:49.034 pero para nosotros era solución de vivienda 00:33:49.034 --> 00:33:51.469 y de quehacer artístico. 00:34:00.912 --> 00:34:05.750 Mi tendencia ha sido hacia ignorar cualquier técnica que aprendí 00:34:05.750 --> 00:34:09.554 cualquier concepto, teoría del color, teoría de la composición, 00:34:09.554 --> 00:34:14.492 toda esta parafernalia que me ha atado por tantos años. 00:34:14.492 --> 00:34:17.228 Quisiera ni siquiera saber hablar, 00:34:20.498 --> 00:34:23.501 es un punto muy difícil por supuesto pero 00:34:23.501 --> 00:34:28.540 talvez algún día no llegue a ello sino que talvez algún día esté en ello. 00:34:33.378 --> 00:34:37.315 Lo que esencialmente compartíamos era estar en este sitio de invasores 00:34:37.315 --> 00:34:40.652 o de squatters para sobrevivir como artistas. 00:34:40.652 --> 00:34:43.721 Eso tenía otra figura muy fuerte 00:34:43.721 --> 00:34:45.190 que era no tener calefacción en invierno, 00:34:45.190 --> 00:34:46.624 morirse de frío. 00:34:56.434 --> 00:34:58.069 It was windy and very cold 00:34:58.069 --> 00:35:02.640 and the wind just whipped through the entire building. 00:35:02.974 --> 00:35:08.279 I'm not saying it was comfortable, but 00:35:08.279 --> 00:35:10.181 it was not too much for me. 00:35:10.181 --> 00:35:13.585 Pues yo viví ahí de vez en cuando 00:35:13.585 --> 00:35:16.754 porque primeramente ahí no había calefacción. 00:35:16.754 --> 00:35:20.125 Los inviernos ahí eran duros, duros, 00:35:20.125 --> 00:35:23.661 uy los inviernos ahí eran duros, el que se quedaba ahí... 00:35:23.661 --> 00:35:28.900 Las memorias del frío, cada invierno lo tenía que hacer no lo soporto 00:35:28.900 --> 00:35:32.070 no me pongas a hablar de eso, lo odio, 00:35:32.070 --> 00:35:33.771 era alérgico a la fibra de vidrio. 00:35:33.771 --> 00:35:37.842 Lo que yo hice fue que cerraba y hacía como cuartos 00:35:37.842 --> 00:35:41.579 de plástico muy grueso de este plástico industrial, 00:35:41.579 --> 00:35:43.915 y los cerraba y poníamos calentadores. 00:35:43.915 --> 00:35:46.217 Cada rendija tenía que ser cubierta, 00:35:46.217 --> 00:35:51.256 no podía entrar el frío, y no entraba, no, no bajo mi jurisdicción. 00:35:51.256 --> 00:35:54.526 Juan les hizo un loft a ellos, 00:35:54.526 --> 00:35:57.829 para que los niños durmieran porque el calor se sube 00:35:57.829 --> 00:36:03.668 y yo siempre trataba de decirles que eso era como una casita en un árbol y que… 00:36:03.668 --> 00:36:08.640 tú sabes los niños son fáciles de darles un poquito de fantasía 00:36:08.640 --> 00:36:14.012 para que no fuera como tan radical el choque 00:36:14.012 --> 00:36:17.715 comparado como vivían sus amiguitos 00:36:17.715 --> 00:36:21.619 y hacer que esto no fuera tan traumático para mis hijos. 00:36:21.619 --> 00:36:25.456 Pero obviamente también fue como algo que yo escogí, 00:36:25.456 --> 00:36:30.662 algo me ató a esto era un proyecto de vida muy fascinante. 00:36:31.863 --> 00:36:35.466 Y me daba muchísima libertad también. 00:36:36.034 --> 00:36:39.837 Yo tenía un apartamento espectacularmente hermoso, 00:36:39.837 --> 00:36:41.673 las vigas eran expuestas, 00:36:41.673 --> 00:36:44.442 osea yo tenía una vigas donde yo tenía mi telar 00:36:44.442 --> 00:36:49.280 porque hacía tapices, entonces yo utilizaba esas vigas para tejer. 00:36:58.957 --> 00:37:02.827 Yo tenía una mesa gigantesca donde se hacía tareas 00:37:02.827 --> 00:37:05.763 donde se hacía arte, donde se hacía de todo, 00:37:05.763 --> 00:37:09.334 entonces era pues muy hermoso 00:37:10.702 --> 00:37:16.941 y ellos realmente como que les gustaba mucho su casa. 00:37:23.014 --> 00:37:24.115 We lived here 00:37:24.115 --> 00:37:29.053 for 17 years without heat which is that's 00:37:29.053 --> 00:37:34.259 how I got into rescuing cats in the quantity I did. 00:37:40.565 --> 00:37:43.334 The cats would sleep on top of me 00:37:43.334 --> 00:37:45.803 and I stayed warm. 00:37:52.277 --> 00:37:54.145 The most I ever had 00:37:54.145 --> 00:37:59.150 at a longer time was like around 60. 00:37:59.150 --> 00:38:02.253 I can't believe that I did that now. 00:38:09.927 --> 00:38:12.196 I only have 15, 00:38:12.196 --> 00:38:16.601 you know, I had one cat named Kiwi. 00:38:16.601 --> 00:38:21.205 He was seven years old and he got this vicious cancer in his eye. 00:38:21.205 --> 00:38:25.043 I knew he was going to die and it was like heartbreak 00:38:25.043 --> 00:38:29.180 because this cat was like my husband, my soul mate. 00:38:29.180 --> 00:38:34.519 I never had an experience like this 00:38:34.519 --> 00:38:37.822 with another species before. 00:38:37.822 --> 00:38:40.058 And like we used to dream together. 00:38:40.058 --> 00:38:44.729 He'd sit in my lap and we'd have these incredible dreams together, 00:38:44.729 --> 00:38:48.399 when we would go to sleep. 00:38:48.399 --> 00:38:50.401 It's really horribly sad 00:38:50.401 --> 00:38:52.337 when they die, 00:38:52.337 --> 00:38:54.939 it's like losing a child or a lover. 00:39:06.617 --> 00:39:10.621 You can lay them out more aesthetically. 00:39:10.621 --> 00:39:13.558 These are the hardest ones to put in. 00:39:13.558 --> 00:39:17.128 This is so we recognize each other when we meet again. 00:39:17.729 --> 00:39:19.464 We all have earrings. 00:40:54.792 --> 00:40:56.928 Mi vecina queda embarazada, 00:40:56.928 --> 00:40:59.897 Marta tiene a su hijo Marcelo Gaia, 00:40:59.897 --> 00:41:02.099 en su apartamento con una partera, 00:41:02.099 --> 00:41:05.670 luego yo quedo embarazada, 3 meses después 00:41:09.474 --> 00:41:14.045 Y a mí siempre me había interesado el tema de tener los hijos en casa, 00:41:14.045 --> 00:41:18.549 todas las generaciones atrás, todos nacieron en casa. 00:41:31.095 --> 00:41:33.264 Paula y Marcelo nacieron acá 00:41:33.264 --> 00:41:39.103 y aquí se crió ella entre la comunidad 00:41:39.103 --> 00:41:41.772 muy similar a la que yo me crié. 00:41:41.772 --> 00:41:44.275 Eramos como una sola familia. 00:41:45.009 --> 00:41:47.411 My daughter was born in 1998. 00:41:47.411 --> 00:41:51.482 Her mom was Sarah, who was one of the early people who lived here. 00:41:51.482 --> 00:41:53.551 We'd been together for a bunch of years and we split up 00:41:53.551 --> 00:41:56.621 when she was about a year old and she moved out. 00:41:56.621 --> 00:41:57.955 So she spent, you know, 00:41:57.955 --> 00:42:01.726 nights here with me and nights with her mom since she was born. 00:42:01.726 --> 00:42:05.630 Her and Paula, who is about a year older than her. 00:42:05.630 --> 00:42:07.765 They call each other sister. 00:42:07.765 --> 00:42:10.067 Hay americanos de diferentes partes del país, 00:42:10.067 --> 00:42:15.006 de Portugal, Alemania, de México, asiáticos… 00:42:15.006 --> 00:42:19.310 Europeans, Americans and then folks from Latin America. 00:42:22.079 --> 00:42:26.584 Aquí en este edificio particularmente siempre hubo mucha discordia 00:42:26.584 --> 00:42:30.955 mucho enfrentamiento, había casi que dos partes, 00:42:30.955 --> 00:42:34.325 eran los hispanos y los blancos americanos. 00:42:34.325 --> 00:42:37.495 Yo me entendía con los 2, yo siempre tuve… 00:42:37.495 --> 00:42:42.833 osea pues con los hispanos porque pues eran mis amigos, la mayoría eran colombianos. 00:43:12.096 --> 00:43:18.135 El ser invasores era una posición anárquica muy fuerte. 00:43:18.135 --> 00:43:24.241 Yo creo en la anarquía cuando los gobernantes no ejecutan su gobierno, 00:43:24.241 --> 00:43:27.244 la anarquía debería ser el último punto 00:43:27.244 --> 00:43:29.113 para obligar a que las cosas funcionen. 00:43:29.113 --> 00:43:32.350 La ciudad tenia 100 000 edificios abandonados, 00:43:32.350 --> 00:43:33.384 una cosa exagerada, 00:43:33.384 --> 00:43:37.655 osea tienen forma de solucionar el problema de vivienda y no lo solucionan. 00:43:37.655 --> 00:43:40.391 Y la posición política de vivir en un capitalismo 00:43:40.391 --> 00:43:44.629 sin pagar nada pues eso era como un desafío no? 00:43:44.629 --> 00:43:49.533 Tener un apartamento en el centro de Nueva York sin pagar un peso, 00:43:49.533 --> 00:43:52.403 pues todo eso era como muy poético. 00:43:54.639 --> 00:43:57.742 Como vivir uno en contra del sistema. 00:44:12.890 --> 00:44:14.225 The word anarchist, 00:44:14.225 --> 00:44:17.528 got so twisted, like, a lot of people 00:44:17.528 --> 00:44:22.500 you say anarchist is somebody holding a bomb, you know, and it's bullshit. 00:44:22.500 --> 00:44:24.835 That's not what anarchy is. 00:44:29.206 --> 00:44:32.643 Había anarquía en el aspecto del primer movimiento 00:44:32.643 --> 00:44:35.479 que es ingresar a un sitio que no es tuyo 00:44:35.479 --> 00:44:38.683 y solucionar tu vivienda. Eso pues es un movimiento anárquico 00:44:39.684 --> 00:44:42.019 y para los que están afuera es anarquía 00:44:42.019 --> 00:44:47.158 pero dentro del edificio había reglas y una estructura que funcionaba muy bien. 00:44:49.660 --> 00:44:53.030 We got very organized among ourselves 00:44:53.030 --> 00:44:57.768 about doing the necessary work, how ever done. 00:44:57.768 --> 00:45:03.007 I remember finding a gigantic steel I-beam 00:45:03.074 --> 00:45:06.077 like from one of those scaffolding, on Broadway. 00:45:06.077 --> 00:45:09.313 I put it on my shoulder and walked it over here 00:45:09.313 --> 00:45:13.350 and that was like, what really did my back, I was doing that all the time. 00:45:13.350 --> 00:45:17.722 100 pound bags of cement, you know, running with them 00:45:17.722 --> 00:45:22.793 from a construction site, sand, you know, all the really heavy stuff 00:45:22.793 --> 00:45:25.996 you needed for the major work we were doing here. 00:45:25.996 --> 00:45:30.668 My neck is so badly destroyed, they want to 00:45:30.668 --> 00:45:33.137 remove some of the disks and 00:45:33.137 --> 00:45:35.873 then replaced them with titanium disks. 00:45:35.873 --> 00:45:39.243 And it's now not just three disks, but five. 00:45:39.243 --> 00:45:43.581 So it's a progressive degenerative 00:45:43.581 --> 00:45:45.149 spinal injury 00:45:45.149 --> 00:45:49.720 that I really did myself by lifting things the wrong way. 00:45:49.720 --> 00:45:50.521 I didn't know. 00:45:55.960 --> 00:46:01.265 El lugar ahí la 10 era muy favorable para nosotros porque teníamos muy buena organización, 00:46:01.265 --> 00:46:04.502 elemento que nosotros veíamos que empezaba a fallar 00:46:04.502 --> 00:46:08.005 nos poníamos de acuerdo y primero 3 o 4 00:46:08.005 --> 00:46:11.542 y luego los veíamos en la reunión y luego se iba para fuera. 00:46:11.542 --> 00:46:16.547 Como en 2 o 3 meses sacamos 8 personas que no contribuían porque 00:46:16.547 --> 00:46:20.084 en estos squats la cuestión es que el que no contribuye se vuelve 00:46:20.084 --> 00:46:21.819 un peso para uno, 00:46:21.819 --> 00:46:25.256 todo el mundo trabaja para todo el mundo y todo el mundo se beneficia, 00:46:25.256 --> 00:46:31.128 un sistema digamos socialista, anarquista socialista, 00:46:31.128 --> 00:46:36.534 pero uno tiene que aportar y tratar de darle a los demás, 00:46:36.534 --> 00:46:38.569 así los demás no le den a uno. 00:46:38.569 --> 00:46:42.006 En Puerta 10 encontrábamos muchos problemas, 00:46:42.006 --> 00:46:45.976 por parte de los mismos compatriotas, 00:46:45.976 --> 00:46:49.647 Hasta que ya no pude estar más ahí y me tuve que mover a Brooklyn. 00:46:49.647 --> 00:46:54.151 Eso fue tremendo porque había que salir así, si no ahí quedaba. 00:47:04.762 --> 00:47:07.431 We developed relationships 00:47:07.431 --> 00:47:10.134 in the early years of this building 00:47:10.134 --> 00:47:15.840 very similar to what like an army platoon develops 00:47:15.840 --> 00:47:20.177 like where you’re really close you know ‘cause your lives 00:47:20.177 --> 00:47:21.879 depend on each other. 00:47:28.652 --> 00:47:29.353 It's literally 00:47:29.353 --> 00:47:33.991 like a foxhole mentality ‘cause you're always under threat, 00:47:33.991 --> 00:47:36.360 you know, you have to be hyper vigilant. 00:47:36.360 --> 00:47:38.796 So it's kind of like being in a war, 00:47:38.796 --> 00:47:41.332 but it was a different kind of war, 00:47:41.332 --> 00:47:45.035 was the housing war, you know, 00:47:45.035 --> 00:47:48.572 and beautiful things happened as a result. 00:49:12.089 --> 00:49:12.957 The conditions, 00:49:12.957 --> 00:49:15.993 the living conditions were so harsh 00:49:15.993 --> 00:49:18.228 that, you know, I mean, and 00:49:18.228 --> 00:49:21.665 to have to work together on a continuous basis, 00:49:21.665 --> 00:49:26.937 you really have to be able to get along with the people that you live with. 00:49:39.583 --> 00:49:42.486 And my life took a different turn. 00:49:42.486 --> 00:49:46.757 So I eventually chose not to continue to participate. 00:49:54.765 --> 00:49:57.968 When I moved in here in the nineties, 00:49:57.968 --> 00:50:01.638 it was very hard. 00:50:05.876 --> 00:50:10.581 People were not nice to each other. 00:50:11.949 --> 00:50:14.685 It was better than some other places actually. 00:50:17.821 --> 00:50:18.889 We got a lot of work done. 00:50:18.889 --> 00:50:22.559 I mean, the the building people were committed to getting work done 00:50:25.396 --> 00:50:26.997 for years It was like this, 00:50:26.997 --> 00:50:29.933 people were constantly working on the building you know, 00:50:29.933 --> 00:50:31.969 and in ways it's like amazing, like why? 00:50:31.969 --> 00:50:34.772 And I also figured out through time 00:50:34.772 --> 00:50:40.210 how to, like, have better meetings, not fight as much, 00:50:40.210 --> 00:50:41.512 find different ways of being 00:50:41.512 --> 00:50:43.113 in community with each other. 00:50:46.050 --> 00:50:49.887 La entrada tenía una llave especial de seguridad, por supuesto, entonces 00:50:49.887 --> 00:50:53.524 no se dejaba entrar a nadie que no fuera conocido porque 00:50:53.524 --> 00:50:56.193 podía entrarse alguien de la ciudad, 00:50:56.193 --> 00:51:00.497 tomar fotos, y sacarnos, mostrar que el edificio no era seguro 00:51:00.497 --> 00:51:03.767 que por supuesto no era seguro, para evitarlo, 00:51:03.767 --> 00:51:07.071 entonces a través de esas pruebas legales y juez y todo el cuento 00:51:07.071 --> 00:51:09.706 podían sacarnos realmente sin mucho problema. 00:51:11.308 --> 00:51:14.211 Yo siempre he pensado que la casa es el templo, 00:51:14.211 --> 00:51:16.146 la casa es el refugio, 00:51:16.146 --> 00:51:17.848 en donde uno se esconde. 00:51:19.583 --> 00:51:22.186 y de repente tu casa no… 00:51:23.287 --> 00:51:29.126 Ese rinconcito que te está acogiendo 00:51:29.126 --> 00:51:31.929 no es tan seguro. 00:51:34.098 --> 00:51:37.868 Yo me gané la adjudicación de ese espacio por mi trabajo. 00:51:37.868 --> 00:51:42.106 Yo creía y todavía creo que entre uno más trabaje en conjunto. 00:51:42.106 --> 00:51:44.341 y trabaje duro pues las cosas son posibles 00:51:46.543 --> 00:51:51.682 Yo iba hasta con mi hijo, mi hijo tenía alrededor como de unos 8 o 9 años. 00:51:57.921 --> 00:52:01.391 Let traffic pass, you know, we’’ll have fun. 00:52:01.391 --> 00:52:06.196 We are not here to provoke, we are here to make a showing. 00:52:06.196 --> 00:52:10.334 Inclusive íbamos a rallies y mi hijo participaba en eso. 00:52:17.074 --> 00:52:20.144 Giuliani was like for the privatization of the City. 00:52:20.144 --> 00:52:21.211 He was for the City 00:52:21.211 --> 00:52:25.382 just being in the hands of private developers and private entities. 00:52:25.382 --> 00:52:28.852 And he took up a campaign against the gardens 00:52:28.852 --> 00:52:33.090 and gardeners and some of the gardeners got together and resisted it. 00:52:33.090 --> 00:52:38.428 They did demonstrations or whatever, and that made them his enemy. 00:52:38.428 --> 00:52:40.430 And it was the same thing with the squatters. 00:52:40.430 --> 00:52:43.500 So the squatters became kind of like an issue for him. 00:52:43.500 --> 00:52:45.035 Oh, I'm going to get rid of those guys. 00:53:07.824 --> 00:53:08.926 Umbrella House. 00:53:08.926 --> 00:53:11.695 The source of the name 00:53:11.695 --> 00:53:14.298 comes from a couple of different things. 00:53:14.298 --> 00:53:19.736 Geerte, the Dutch girl had this idea that this building 00:53:19.736 --> 00:53:24.708 could function as an umbrella organization for squatters. 00:53:24.708 --> 00:53:29.146 But we also wanted to be an artist work hotel. 00:53:29.146 --> 00:53:33.350 We figured a way to give back to the community 00:53:33.350 --> 00:53:38.589 is to open spaces for people to stay temporarily. 00:53:38.589 --> 00:53:42.826 They can work on their artwork in exchange for some work on the building. 00:53:42.826 --> 00:53:47.631 But it was also possibly because there were so many leaks in the roof. 00:53:47.631 --> 00:53:49.967 The building have been abandoned 00:53:49.967 --> 00:53:53.537 by someone who did not want the building to be squatted 00:53:54.004 --> 00:53:58.508 and not just remove the steps but made holes in the roof 00:53:58.508 --> 00:54:03.680 and then on each floor at the same points they had made holes. 00:54:03.680 --> 00:54:06.116 So when it would rain, it would literally rain 00:54:06.116 --> 00:54:09.753 all the way down to the ground floor. 00:54:09.753 --> 00:54:11.255 And if you were 00:54:11.255 --> 00:54:14.258 going to walk around, you would have needed an umbrella. 00:54:14.258 --> 00:54:16.393 There are holes in all the floors. 00:54:16.393 --> 00:54:19.596 Like literally the snow would come down straight 00:54:19.596 --> 00:54:21.098 down the staircase. 00:54:41.285 --> 00:54:45.055 Y de hecho al Ricardo, al Peñita se le ocurrió colocar 00:54:45.055 --> 00:54:49.393 sombrillas pintadas en las escaleras de incendio del edificio, 00:54:49.393 --> 00:54:53.330 lo cual hace bellísimo y la gente se para a tomarle fotos, 00:54:53.330 --> 00:54:57.868 la gente se para a mirar y a disfrutar algo diferente, algo muy agradable, 00:54:57.868 --> 00:55:02.606 la arquitectura transformarla en un performance. 00:55:02.873 --> 00:55:06.476 El movimiento era muy interesante pero era muy arduo, 00:55:06.476 --> 00:55:07.744 era mucho trabajo. 00:55:07.744 --> 00:55:10.047 Pero también se hacían sus rumbas, 00:55:10.047 --> 00:55:11.448 quedaron hasta documentadas. 00:55:51.855 --> 00:55:56.226 Umbrella House, nuestra casa y la casa de muchísima gente, 00:55:56.226 --> 00:55:59.563 especialmente de Ricardo que siempre su casa estaba llena de gente, 00:55:59.563 --> 00:56:04.501 la mía, enseguida, llena de gente en las rumbas pero no todo el tiempo. 00:56:51.281 --> 00:56:55.452 The whole revitalization of the neighborhood 00:56:55.452 --> 00:56:58.989 took place with people who were inspired. 00:56:58.989 --> 00:57:02.192 I think with the vision of the sixties 00:57:02.192 --> 00:57:03.794 to make a better world. 00:57:06.763 --> 00:57:12.903 Cuando llegamos los squatters, nosotros trajimos aquí música, 00:57:12.903 --> 00:57:15.105 trajimos arte, poesía, 00:57:15.105 --> 00:57:18.975 cogimos los jardines y los llenamos de flores. 00:57:18.975 --> 00:57:21.912 Eventualmente abrimos la Puerta 10, 00:57:21.912 --> 00:57:25.949 una galería, nos tomamos no solamente el apartamento de Juan Salazar sino 00:57:25.949 --> 00:57:28.919 en el frente había un espacio donde ponían las bicicletas y todo, 00:57:28.919 --> 00:57:33.723 limpiamos eso y lo tomamos como galería para exponer cuadros y todo. 00:57:33.723 --> 00:57:37.360 De Puerta 10 a Latinoamérica ’94 00:57:37.360 --> 00:57:40.397 A las 10 de la noche del 29 de abril 00:57:40.397 --> 00:57:44.968 nace Puerta 10 con la exposición de Mario Bustamante, 00:57:44.968 --> 00:57:49.739 todero, escultor y desterrado. 00:57:49.739 --> 00:57:55.145 Mario hacienda la placa, hicimos la placa ese día, en metal. 00:58:02.352 --> 00:58:05.388 Y es bien cierto pues lo pintorezco de aquél 29 de abril 00:58:05.388 --> 00:58:07.958 desembocó en fracción de meses 00:58:07.958 --> 00:58:11.428 en el salon Latinoamericano de arte. 00:58:11.428 --> 00:58:18.301 Sólo el catálogo del salón fué un descreste monumental. 00:58:18.301 --> 00:58:20.837 Este es del salón de artistas 00:58:20.837 --> 00:58:24.007 y ese es un dibujo de uno de mis tapices. 00:58:53.570 --> 00:58:56.740 Eramos unos dementes hermosos. 00:58:58.808 --> 00:59:01.244 Eso se volvió un escampadero maravilloso, 00:59:01.244 --> 00:59:03.780 hacíamos una fiesta de fin de año, 00:59:03.780 --> 00:59:08.018 entonces eso llegaba todo el mundo después de las 12, 00:59:08.018 --> 00:59:15.525 era como la fiesta de la cenicienta porque eso llegaba todo el mundo ahí 00:59:15.525 --> 00:59:19.529 y eran unas noches maravillosas y unas madrugadas impresionantes. 00:59:24.768 --> 00:59:29.506 Ahí conocí al maestro Rayo que iba con su esposa a esas fiestas. 00:59:30.173 --> 00:59:33.977 Hicimos un anfiteatro donde presentábamos teatro, 00:59:33.977 --> 00:59:36.680 hacíamos el festival de cine colombiano. 00:59:36.680 --> 00:59:39.783 El primer festival de cine colombiano de Nueva York 00:59:39.783 --> 00:59:45.422 nace con una organización que Héctor funda ahí en la calle 10, 00:59:45.422 --> 00:59:48.124 CODELA, coalición de artistas latinos. 00:59:48.124 --> 00:59:53.730 Él llegó a hacer 5 o 6 capítulos seguidos festivales. 00:59:53.730 --> 00:59:55.865 La primera película que se estrenó en ese festival fue 00:59:55.865 --> 00:59:57.634 Tiempo de Morir de Jorge Alí Triana. 01:00:05.809 --> 01:00:09.479 One day I came home at about 1:00 in the morning 01:00:09.479 --> 01:00:14.818 and the entire block was police barricaded off and what it happened 01:00:14.818 --> 01:00:17.821 was the abandoned building 01:00:17.821 --> 01:00:21.091 next to us had actually collapsed. 01:00:21.091 --> 01:00:24.327 The City came in 01:00:24.327 --> 01:00:27.097 to make sure that everything was safe and that they were going to have 01:00:27.097 --> 01:00:28.698 to demolish that building. 01:00:28.698 --> 01:00:33.870 People in the building knew that if we completely left our building, 01:00:33.870 --> 01:00:38.141 that very likely we would never get back in. 01:00:38.141 --> 01:00:43.079 They brought in the big crane with the wrecking ball 01:00:43.079 --> 01:00:47.384 and they were going to take down that building which caved in. 01:00:47.384 --> 01:00:52.022 But in the process they were going to hit our building with enough damage 01:00:52.022 --> 01:00:55.659 to make it so that we couldn't stay no matter what. 01:00:55.659 --> 01:00:58.328 So what we did during this time is 01:00:58.328 --> 01:01:01.498 we stood in our windows 01:01:01.498 --> 01:01:04.267 on that side of the building 01:01:09.773 --> 01:01:14.811 and the crane operator could not 01:01:14.811 --> 01:01:18.715 operate it anymore because if we were standing in the windows, 01:01:18.715 --> 01:01:23.453 if he hit us, we die and he'd be in trouble. 01:01:23.453 --> 01:01:26.656 We were able to convince the police 01:01:26.656 --> 01:01:29.759 to continue the demolition by hand 01:01:29.759 --> 01:01:33.096 instead of with the big mechanical claw. 01:01:33.096 --> 01:01:36.766 For three days we had a siege here 01:01:36.766 --> 01:01:40.737 where we would not leave the building and they could not get in. 01:01:42.305 --> 01:01:44.074 I was 01:01:44.074 --> 01:01:48.078 fairly sure we were not going to survive as a building. 01:01:48.078 --> 01:01:48.978 They quit. 01:01:48.978 --> 01:01:53.316 They just left after three days and we won. 01:01:53.316 --> 01:01:56.519 Many of the other buildings, squatter buildings in the East Village 01:01:56.519 --> 01:01:58.354 were evicted during that time. 01:02:30.487 --> 01:02:33.690 There were literally 3 to 4 hundred riot police 01:02:33.690 --> 01:02:36.559 with armored personnel carriers, 01:02:36.559 --> 01:02:39.362 snipers on the roof to evict 01:02:39.362 --> 01:02:41.297 these buildings on 13th Street. 01:02:41.664 --> 01:02:44.367 They're victims of injustice. 01:02:44.367 --> 01:02:46.836 It gives me sorrow. 01:02:46.836 --> 01:02:49.439 This can’t go on. 01:02:49.439 --> 01:02:51.875 It gives me sorrow. 01:02:51.875 --> 01:02:54.844 Things will change soon. 01:02:54.844 --> 01:02:56.846 It gives me sorrow. 01:02:56.846 --> 01:02:59.983 Don’t lose hope. 01:02:59.983 --> 01:03:02.852 It gives me sorrow.c 01:03:12.428 --> 01:03:16.432 Los invasores para el gobierno eran gente que estaba cometiendo un delito, 01:03:16.432 --> 01:03:18.868 osea que no querían tratar para nada con ellos, 01:03:18.868 --> 01:03:23.006 simplemente sacarlos por la fuerza de los edificios. 01:03:23.006 --> 01:03:27.310 En algunos tenía razón porque en algunos también había droga, tráfico..., 01:03:27.310 --> 01:03:32.949 bueno, no era tampoco tan puro el movimiento, obviamente había de todo. 01:03:32.949 --> 01:03:34.818 It that was actually under Giuliani 01:03:34.818 --> 01:03:38.888 that towards the end of his administration, 01:03:38.888 --> 01:03:41.591 he wanted to get rid of all the City owned properties. 01:03:41.591 --> 01:03:46.863 So he started the ball rolling on creating some kind of deal. 01:03:46.863 --> 01:03:51.167 When he was approached by UHAB, his administration 01:03:51.167 --> 01:03:53.469 kind of was like, okay, we'll work something out. 01:03:53.469 --> 01:03:56.573 So you have is goes back to the 1970s 01:03:56.573 --> 01:04:01.411 and was set up to provide technical assistance to homesteaders. 01:04:01.411 --> 01:04:04.547 Homesteading meant that people would apply to the City 01:04:04.547 --> 01:04:07.350 and the City will allocate them a building 01:04:07.350 --> 01:04:09.018 and then they would work on the building 01:04:09.018 --> 01:04:11.087 while not living there, for years. 01:04:11.087 --> 01:04:14.991 Homesteading was, you know, a good program, but it was very 01:04:14.991 --> 01:04:18.428 it required a lot of work and a lot of commitment and dedication. 01:04:18.428 --> 01:04:19.896 And the squatters 01:04:19.896 --> 01:04:22.465 kind of just said, you know what, we're just going to go ahead and do it. 01:04:22.465 --> 01:04:23.933 We're not going to go through these programs. 01:04:23.933 --> 01:04:26.669 And so two some extent there was 01:04:26.669 --> 01:04:29.072 tension between the homesteading community 01:04:29.072 --> 01:04:30.640 and the squatting community. 01:04:36.179 --> 01:04:38.348 The UHAB deal 01:04:38.348 --> 01:04:41.651 was started by a guy named Fernando 01:04:41.651 --> 01:04:44.020 who lived at 10th Street 01:04:46.623 --> 01:04:49.325 Entonces él les dijo que aquí habían niños, 01:04:49.325 --> 01:04:51.628 que habían familias entonces cuando él 01:04:51.628 --> 01:04:56.966 le planteó a UHAB este otro nuevo escenario, 01:04:56.966 --> 01:05:00.103 UHAB decidió que nos quería escuchar 01:05:00.103 --> 01:05:03.773 y decidieron aceptar los 11 edificios, los últimos que faltaban 01:05:03.773 --> 01:05:07.710 porque la ciudad quemaba los edificios para volverse a apoderar de ellos. 01:05:07.710 --> 01:05:11.581 UHAB developed a plan with our input you know basically. 01:05:11.581 --> 01:05:15.752 The buildings were going to be transferred to UHAB 01:05:15.752 --> 01:05:18.121 and then after development was complete, 01:05:18.121 --> 01:05:21.891 it would be transferred to the residents of the building. 01:05:21.891 --> 01:05:26.763 It happened in 2002 where the deal 01:05:26.763 --> 01:05:28.598 with the City was signed. 01:05:28.598 --> 01:05:31.367 And then we had to like, fix the building up, basically. 01:05:31.367 --> 01:05:34.504 And it wasn't until August of 2010 01:05:34.504 --> 01:05:37.106 that we became owners of the building. 01:05:37.106 --> 01:05:40.543 9 se rehabilitaron y quedamos 2 01:05:40.543 --> 01:05:42.245 que fuimos lo últimos. 01:05:42.245 --> 01:05:47.250 Este porque era el más dañado, el edificio lo quemaron 2 veces, 01:05:49.152 --> 01:05:53.756 hace unos 16 años más o menos. 01:06:05.034 --> 01:06:08.271 Este edificio es el lugar donde abro mis alas, 01:06:08.271 --> 01:06:10.940 es el lugar donde cumplo mis sueños, 01:06:10.940 --> 01:06:14.110 es donde he ido construyendo un pequeño monasterio 01:06:14.110 --> 01:06:16.913 y este edificio me ha permitido ser lo que he soñado, 01:06:16.913 --> 01:06:18.581 hacer lo que quiero hacer 01:06:18.581 --> 01:06:20.550 y vivir como quiero vivir. 01:06:24.754 --> 01:06:30.593 Cuando tuvimos la reunión, ya, nos legalizamos, 01:06:30.593 --> 01:06:33.563 yo subí tranquila 01:06:33.563 --> 01:06:36.032 pero cuando abrí la puerta del apartamento, 01:06:36.032 --> 01:06:38.568 empecé a temblar 01:06:38.568 --> 01:06:41.871 y le puse la mano a la pared, 01:06:41.871 --> 01:06:46.943 no sabía que me emocionara tanto… 01:06:50.947 --> 01:06:55.451 mira esa pared con la sombrillita y la… 01:06:56.019 --> 01:07:00.289 I need a break. 01:07:05.294 --> 01:07:09.766 Yo abrí las manos sobre la pared y le dije a la casa nos salvamos. 01:07:09.766 --> 01:07:12.602 Nosotros te salvamos a ti y tú nos salvaste a nosotros. 01:07:16.906 --> 01:07:19.142 For years we had lived never knowing 01:07:19.142 --> 01:07:24.013 whether tomorrow literally tomorrow you would be evicted. 01:07:24.013 --> 01:07:27.050 But once we began the legalization process, 01:07:27.050 --> 01:07:30.319 we really could feel like we didn't have to worry about that anymore. 01:07:30.319 --> 01:07:32.588 And for me, that was the biggest change. 01:07:32.588 --> 01:07:35.958 They owned the building which is just wonderful. 01:07:35.958 --> 01:07:38.961 That's what we did it all for, you know. 01:07:38.961 --> 01:07:43.066 I'm very, very happy to see that this is the result, yes. 01:07:43.066 --> 01:07:47.437 I didn't really want to go that route, but I was outvoted. 01:07:47.437 --> 01:07:49.439 But, you know, 01:07:49.439 --> 01:07:50.873 I didn't want it 01:07:50.873 --> 01:07:53.876 to become what it's become now. 01:07:53.876 --> 01:07:57.480 It was very difficult negotiating with Siobhan, but we did. 01:07:58.114 --> 01:08:01.851 Because I believed in like a really anarchist 01:08:01.851 --> 01:08:05.021 equal 01:08:05.021 --> 01:08:06.589 equality. 01:08:06.589 --> 01:08:12.595 Toda la hermandad de la cosa artística en este edificio era muy 01:08:12.595 --> 01:08:16.032 era muy mágica no? Era todo magia, además todo el contexto de todo el edificio, 01:08:16.032 --> 01:08:18.801 las fotos, la entrada , el piso, 01:08:18.801 --> 01:08:20.903 las escaleras que hicimos todas de cemento 01:08:20.903 --> 01:08:24.407 llena de muñecos, fotos, trastos viejos bueno, 01:08:25.074 --> 01:08:26.876 tenía magia el edifico, 01:08:26.876 --> 01:08:29.645 ahora es un edificio normal, 01:08:29.645 --> 01:08:33.850 la magia está escondida ahí, debajo de eso o dentro de nosotros. 01:09:26.602 --> 01:09:30.206 We had gardens in the side lots, originally. 01:09:33.476 --> 01:09:35.011 When that ended, 01:09:35.011 --> 01:09:37.780 then we started gardening on the roof. 01:09:38.281 --> 01:09:41.450 We had the idea probably led by Tauno Biltsted 01:09:42.952 --> 01:09:46.989 to actually have designed and built on our roof, 01:09:46.989 --> 01:09:49.425 technically what's called a green roof. 01:09:49.425 --> 01:09:52.562 For some reason it captured my imagination, 01:09:52.562 --> 01:09:55.631 the idea of a building sort of growing vegetables on the roof. 01:09:55.631 --> 01:09:58.701 I thought of it as a model 01:09:58.701 --> 01:10:03.239 for thinking about future kind of urban spaces 01:10:03.239 --> 01:10:05.741 and integrating sort of rooftops into buildings. 01:10:07.443 --> 01:10:09.145 We got the plans together. 01:10:09.145 --> 01:10:10.846 and we get the architect and the engineer. 01:10:10.846 --> 01:10:14.150 We structurally reinforced part of the roof 01:10:14.150 --> 01:10:18.254 by putting in new steel beams, going from brick to brick, 01:10:18.254 --> 01:10:19.889 a new roof over that. 01:10:19.889 --> 01:10:22.225 A special soil brought in 01:10:22.225 --> 01:10:25.995 to grow the vegetables in. 01:10:25.995 --> 01:10:28.664 Everyone in the building is welcome to come up 01:10:28.664 --> 01:10:31.133 and harvest those vegetables. 01:10:36.072 --> 01:10:38.808 And now we have 900 square feet 01:10:38.808 --> 01:10:40.910 of growing space on the roof. 01:10:40.910 --> 01:10:43.212 In the Container Garden. 01:10:43.212 --> 01:10:48.951 There is enough open space where people do go up there and do meditation, yoga. 01:10:48.951 --> 01:10:51.320 We also have community activities. 01:10:51.320 --> 01:10:54.423 We have small concerts up there, we have movie nights. 01:11:17.480 --> 01:11:20.816 Sí no quedé con nada, pero quedé con la satisfacción de 01:11:20.816 --> 01:11:25.554 haber colaborado en un movimiento, de haber participado en esto, políticamente 01:11:25.554 --> 01:11:29.892 haber participado en las marchas del barrio allá del Lower East Side, 01:11:29.892 --> 01:11:32.194 fueron momentos muy agradables. 01:12:04.393 --> 01:12:09.565 Tomaste miedo tantas esquinas lejos del lugar que preferías, 01:12:09.565 --> 01:12:13.269 todo tan equivalente a esa matemática triste, 01:12:13.269 --> 01:12:16.605 al afecto impalpable de tu maestra 01:12:16.605 --> 01:12:23.012 tanta soledad en tus brazitos, tanto y todo en un hombrecito tan breve, 01:12:23.012 --> 01:12:25.414 qué más podría pedir tu padre 01:12:25.414 --> 01:12:29.985 que no fuera tu perdón por saber de ti desde tan lejos. 01:12:41.097 --> 01:12:43.899 Uno tendría que ser como los pintores disciplinados 01:12:43.899 --> 01:12:46.168 que llegan al taller, 01:12:46.168 --> 01:12:49.839 organizan, no tienen que hablar pendejadas 01:12:49.839 --> 01:12:52.408 sino que se ponen a trabajar, se ponen a pintar. 01:12:54.643 --> 01:12:56.846 No necesitan si quiera esto. 01:12:57.880 --> 01:13:00.449 Entonces uno empienza a cuestionarse, 01:13:00.449 --> 01:13:04.854 o soy pintor y me gusta el alcohol, 01:13:04.854 --> 01:13:07.390 o soy un alcohólico que pinta 01:13:07.390 --> 01:13:10.726 o todas las anteriores. 01:13:37.987 --> 01:13:41.390 New York City for me is this building. 01:13:41.390 --> 01:13:47.363 I'm very grateful for it because without this building 01:13:47.363 --> 01:13:49.765 I wouldn't be here, but I also wouldn't 01:13:49.765 --> 01:13:54.603 have had the rich as richer life as I've had in New York City. 01:13:54.603 --> 01:13:56.405 Painting takes a lot of space actually. 01:14:48.424 --> 01:14:50.793 Veo viejos luminosos huesos 01:14:50.793 --> 01:14:54.497 maduros de cargar el peso de una vida apasionada. 01:14:54.497 --> 01:14:57.633 Veo mi cabello en fuego en mitad del invierno 01:14:57.633 --> 01:15:00.135 guardando con recelo en cada mechón 01:15:00.135 --> 01:15:04.807 lo aprendido, lo amado, tejido con paciencia y vigor. 01:15:04.807 --> 01:15:07.810 Veo a mis hijos regresando a mi para encontrar su historia 01:15:07.810 --> 01:15:11.380 claramente dibujada en las arrugas de mi piel. 01:15:11.380 --> 01:15:15.050 y recordarles cómo se siente caer con furia 01:15:15.050 --> 01:15:20.022 para haber ganado la capacidad de levantarse una y otra vez. 01:15:20.022 --> 01:15:22.958 He encontrado el privilegio de beber el té 01:15:22.958 --> 01:15:25.694 lentamente en una solitaria tarde, 01:15:25.694 --> 01:15:28.097 con un corazón danzante. 01:15:28.097 --> 01:15:30.533 Vieja reina de alas extendidas 01:15:30.533 --> 01:15:32.835 te miro, te abrazo, 01:15:32.835 --> 01:15:35.604 alma valiente, gloriosa 01:15:35.604 --> 01:15:37.273 has llegado muy lejos 01:15:37.273 --> 01:15:39.975 y tu belleza me quita el aliento. 01:15:45.614 --> 01:15:48.117 My daughter, she is a very present, 01:15:48.117 --> 01:15:53.589 strong, intelligent you know, and self-reliant young woman. 01:15:53.589 --> 01:15:55.291 She knows how to be in the world, 01:15:55.291 --> 01:15:59.695 and she understands part of that as being, how she was raised. 01:15:59.695 --> 01:16:02.665 And the fact that she was raised in a way 01:16:02.665 --> 01:16:05.301 where the rules were made by 01:16:05.301 --> 01:16:08.070 her and the people around her, 01:16:08.070 --> 01:16:09.805 not by society in general. 01:16:21.650 --> 01:16:22.751 Do not obey. 01:16:22.751 --> 01:16:27.056 It would be my message, but claim your right to live your life 01:16:27.056 --> 01:16:28.757 the way you see fit. 01:16:28.757 --> 01:16:31.493 I was 24 years old at the time, 01:16:31.493 --> 01:16:35.698 so I lived there from 1988 01:16:35.698 --> 01:16:38.400 through 1991, 01:16:38.400 --> 01:16:43.138 and in the end I chose to really focus more on my art. 01:17:19.074 --> 01:17:20.075 I never regretted it, 01:17:20.075 --> 01:17:23.946 but I was very disappointed ‘cause it was a big dream of mine. 01:17:23.946 --> 01:17:28.884 It was shattered and it really put me into a depression 01:17:28.884 --> 01:17:30.719 there for a while. 01:17:43.365 --> 01:17:47.836 Do what's in your heart and don't worry about the rest of it. 01:17:49.805 --> 01:17:51.173 Still here. 01:17:51.173 --> 01:17:52.241 Can't believe it. 01:17:52.241 --> 01:17:54.376 I can't believe it. 01:17:55.277 --> 01:17:57.146 I kind of think 01:17:57.146 --> 01:18:01.650 I may only be here ten more years on the planet, but, 01:18:01.650 --> 01:18:05.187 you know, we'll see how that goes. 01:18:13.362 --> 01:18:16.565 Héctor, yo digo que fue uno de los que más trabajó 01:18:16.565 --> 01:18:18.600 y más luchó por que ese edificio fuera de ellos. 01:18:19.935 --> 01:18:24.006 Es uno de los personajes más valorados ahí de ese edificio 01:18:24.006 --> 01:18:28.177 porque Héctor murió ahí, Héctor murió ahí en ese edificio. 01:18:34.783 --> 01:18:37.853 Al fallecer Héctor pues yo quedo con la mayoría de mi pietaje 01:18:37.853 --> 01:18:41.857 y él tiene otra cantidad de pietaje que desafortunadamente 01:18:41.857 --> 01:18:46.128 se quedó en la casa de él, donde él murió, sí. 01:18:47.029 --> 01:18:50.432 Camila te muestro el taller, mira, 01:18:50.432 --> 01:18:53.569 este es parte del taller, el taller es grande, 01:18:53.569 --> 01:18:56.338 ésta son las máquinas que hay en el taller, mira 01:18:56.338 --> 01:19:00.008 esta máquina es antigua pero es muy buena. 01:19:11.520 --> 01:19:14.857 Para mí la vida siempre ha sido como una experiencia, 01:19:14.857 --> 01:19:16.225 como una aventura, 01:19:16.225 --> 01:19:19.261 si estoy aquí bien estoy bien, sino me voy para otra parte, 01:19:19.261 --> 01:19:22.231 porque es que la vida está en todas partes. 01:19:22.231 --> 01:19:25.734 El día que me tengo que ir, yo no nací aquí, pues yo, 01:19:25.734 --> 01:19:27.636 osea yo estoy aquí de paso. 01:19:37.012 --> 01:19:40.349 Hoy, y suele pasar que muchos días son hoy 01:19:40.349 --> 01:19:42.785 mi alma, mi casa y la vida 01:19:42.785 --> 01:19:46.288 son habitaciones oscuras donde soy un infante en abandono 01:19:46.288 --> 01:19:51.460 que ve a dios como una luciérnaga y lo sueña como un sol. 01:19:51.460 --> 01:19:54.863 Talvez él es quien me levanta la mano en un estadio lleno 01:19:54.863 --> 01:19:59.701 y yo ciego, sin bastón, sin lazarillo. 01:19:59.701 --> 01:20:02.171 Suele pasar que mi alma es un mar agitado 01:20:02.171 --> 01:20:04.740 y en el papel guardo la soledad. 01:20:04.740 --> 01:20:06.809 Suele pasar como hoy 01:20:06.809 --> 01:20:10.145 que quiero empezar a despedirme de los amados amigos 01:20:10.145 --> 01:20:13.816 y me apuro a escribir un testimonio poema antes que nada. 01:20:13.816 --> 01:20:19.788 Ese punto de luz me hace sostenerme guardar la esperanza y reflexionar. 01:20:19.788 --> 01:20:24.126 Hoy es domingo, está llegando la noche y tengo soledad, 01:20:24.126 --> 01:20:26.528 sí eso es. 01:20:28.831 --> 01:20:31.867 Bueno esta es la casa de Richie, 01:20:31.867 --> 01:20:35.404 donde creo que vivió sus mejores años creo yo 01:20:35.404 --> 01:20:38.607 como poeta, 01:20:38.607 --> 01:20:40.943 aquí creo que se hizo 01:20:40.943 --> 01:20:44.580 y aquí dejó de existir, físicamente. 01:20:55.958 --> 01:20:58.260 Nos dejó su mujer, su esposa 01:20:58.260 --> 01:21:00.462 una mujer amorosísima 01:21:00.462 --> 01:21:07.135 Celebrating Poe: 10 years without Ricardo 01:21:07.135 --> 01:21:11.340 Lo que a mí me tocó de Ricardo fue un poquitico no más, 01:21:11.340 --> 01:21:15.077 un pedacito y ya hasta el final. 01:21:15.077 --> 01:21:19.948 También encuentro lo importante que ha sido Ricardo, 01:21:19.948 --> 01:21:21.550 que fue Ricardo 01:21:21.550 --> 01:21:24.987 para muchísimas personas en 01:21:24.987 --> 01:21:29.391 determinar qué era lo que querían o iban a hacer en la vida. 01:21:29.391 --> 01:21:35.864 When I die I will be a poem for peace. 01:21:37.099 --> 01:21:39.201 No queda nada, 01:21:39.201 --> 01:21:43.505 después de la última palabra quedará acaso un punto. 01:21:43.505 --> 01:21:49.811 Lleno de todo, hasta silencios como en la bella muerte. |
Distributor: Pragda Films
Length: 86 minutes
Date: 2021
Genre: Expository
Language: English; Spanish
Grade: College, Adult
Color/BW:
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Closed Captioning: Available
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