Last-Minute Preview of Media Arts at Luminaria (2)

Tonight’s the night Luminaria lights up downtown. Here are three more media art installations I won’t be missing.

Guillermina Zabala is the media arts director at SAY Sí. Her students are known to take the gold in student film competitions; they often produce work of finer craft than non-student films. At Luminaria, though, it’s Zabala’s art that takes center stage.

Located at the Tower of America’s waterfalls, Zabala’s project is a three channel video installation of “light writing,” dealing with language and identity and inspired by the multi-facet culture of San Antonio.

Her canvas is a water fountain constructed by 15 columns, which frame the multiple video productions. Projected on each screen will be a series of video portraits of San Antonio citizens. People, such as musician Henry Brun and visual artist Vincent Valdez, look straight at the camera; and then with their index finger, they write in the air a word that represents them. The word is lit and becomes "light writing."

The piece is titled "I, Me, Light," based on the George Harrison song, “I, Me, Mine.” Harrison’s song is a critique of the material body as our false self and of material possessions as temporary. Zabala’s piece responds: despite our material coverings, we're full of light.

Ray Santisteban, when he’s not working on his loving portrait of Taco Heaven, is a veteran documentary filmmaker with a penchant for historical subjects. For over a decade, Santisteban has been working on a documentary that charts the history and legacy of the Rainbow Coalition, a groundbreaking multi-ethnic coalition that rocked Chicago in the 1960s and forever altered the political landscape of the United States.

For his Luminaria installation, Santisteban again entwines historical legacy with contemporary activism. Behind the Instituto (#47 in the Pink Zone), Santisteban’s video, previewed below, will loop. "I can see the light at the end of the tunnel," for example, is a quote by Lyndon Johnson regarding the American-Vietnam War.

At Luminaria, no potential for audience is neglected. Even the bike valet is adorned, and Mistah Pete is the media artist featured in the Green Zone, #46. Pete collaborated with visual artist Alfredo Lopez Jr. to create a process-and-product multimedia piece. Pete filmed Lopez painting on plexi-glass; they include shots through the glass, a "canvas-eye-view" of the painting. Pete and Lopez will display the painting with the video projected onto the back of it.