Federación Venezolana de Bobsleigh

The “altarpieces” and characters from this body of work are from a series which I began a couple of years ago titled: Federación Venezolana de Bobsleigh. The ongoing series fulfills a lifelong fantasy of piloting the make-believe Venezuelan bobsleigh team at the Winter Olympics. The metaphor that the bobsleigh suggests is a dizzying, winding, high-velocity descent from the top to the bottom that mirrors the cycle of Venezuelan prosperity and hyper-inflation. The 4 veiled athletes represent my brother, parents, and myself, and are a play on the term “resident aliens” who navigate a dangerous course between two countries.

The work is inspired by the 1993 film, Cool Runnings, which tells the story of the Jamaican national bobsleigh team reaching the 1988 Winter Olympics and reinforced my love for the sport at a young age. Thirty years ago when I watched the movie, and even today, I am still moved by the uplifting underdog story and how an unthinkable turn of events has the potential to bring joy and put a spotlight on a Caribbean country. I wonder at times if Venezuela had a bobsleigh team that qualified for the 2026 Winter Olympics how much celebration and pride would ripple throughout the country, and offer the Venezuelan diaspora something to cheer for.

The architecture of the monumental woodcuts are borrowed from the traditional aesthetic of altarpieces created by late medieval Italian painters Giotto and Ambrogio Lorenzetti. Reinterpretations of 16th-century engravings by Theodor de Bry depicting expeditions into South America are also folded into the narrative. The prints illuminate figurative mark-making of iconic landscapes in

Venezuela inhabited by Spanish conquistadores, English explorers, oil tankers, and mythical figures like the king of El Dorado. The large scale of the woodcuts signify the grandeur associated with religious work, and as a result, lends authenticity to the veracity of the satirical and constructed allegories. Together, the fantastical imagery conveys the push-and-pull of a homeland affected by a migration crisis, political turmoil, and the plight of abundant natural resources. They retell well-known historical lore, point to past and present global commodities and economies, and map out my ancestral, personal, and religious experience activated by the persona of a time-traveling, Venezuelan-American bobsledder.