Canción para Lupita, 1998

Francis Alÿs projects this animation in a very small format, the size of a sketchbook. The action is very simple and repeated ad infinitum: a woman pours liquid from one receptacle to another and back again in a never-ending process, a repetitive and futile gesture that interacts with the furniture and the music. The action is accompanied by the melodious words of the song Mañana, mañana (Tomorrow, tomorrow), suggesting that there is always hope in the future. The installation alludes to a non-productive use of time that becomes irreverent and poetic in a historical context obsessed with production. Moreover, as the title and the music suggest, it refers to a specific geographic and cultural world, and to the transfer and constant flux of cultures and lives.