Matrulla

Since 1971, Pablo Díaz Cuadrado has been living near Matrullas Lake, a dam nurtured by the Matrullas River, in Orocovis, a town located in the Central Mountain Range of Puerto Rico. The name Orocovis means ‘memory of the first mountain’. Pablo’s kitchen inclines over this first mountain; the wall is the hillside reinforced with river stones. In this place Pablo plants and stores ancient grains and seeds, accumulates materials with possible and unpredictable future uses, supervises the decomposition and reconstruction of everything that surrounds him; raises bees and prepares himself for the moment when water and food will no longer be available. The film approaches the physical structures, time, and symbolic value of Pablo’s project as well as the site as a whole, as an assemblage; not from a political and aesthetic vanguard, but from a rearguard that quietly picks up the debris of progress and tests alternative ways of living.

Last update 8th May, 2017.