Naufus Ramírez Figueroa

In his performances, the Guatemalan artist Naufus Ramírez-Figueroa works with stories of violence from his home country. As a child he went into exile with his family in Canada, fleeing guerilla violence. Ramírez-Figueroa also works with the memory of several generations of his ancestors who worked on banana plantations and endured very hard living conditions. In this 2002 performance entitled Original Banana Republic, Ramírez-Figueroa covered his legs with 100 pounds of bananas wrapped with plastic film. The piece reflects the artist’s interest in the relationship between US imperialism in Central America and his own family history, through a link with the United Fruit Company. When he started to walk, the real and figurative weight of the bananas on his body made his movements slow and clumsy, almost stopping him from moving at all. Ramírez-Figueroa thus demonstrated the paralysing effect of neocolonialism on people in the region.