Children Of The Water
Children Of The Water | Puerto Rico 2021 | Morocco 2022 | Dominican Republic 2022 | Salvador Bahia, Brazil 2023
Children Of The Water (Bonao), featuring Patricia Encarnacion, Quiara Torres, Yaissa Jiménez, and Margarita Lila Rosa, 2022, from the Children Of The Water series
Drawing upon syncretic Afro-Caribbean religions and histories of slavery and colonialism, Yelaine Rodriguez uses a lush, tropical palette and intricate costuming to explore histories and futures of what might have been or could still be. Tasseled adorned with cowrie shells and indigo-dyed rooster feathers, each sitter seems to ask how history might have differed if colonialism, slavery, or Europe as a trope ceased to exist. In Children Of The Water, Rodriguez presents figures in or near bodies of water, wearing hand-embellished masks or white garments similar to those worn in Afro-syncretic religious ceremonial rituals. While the photographs show water in states of beauty, tranquility, and connection, they also remind us of the realities behind its geopolitical usages. The ocean, for example, is the medium for the slave trade, and these photographs consider how waterways and borders continue to separate migrant families in our present day.
Children Of The Water is an ongoing series that presently takes place in Black-centered neighborhoods in Puerto Rico, Morocco, the Dominican Republic, Mexico, and Brazil.