A synthetic garden of soft sculptures, crafted from olive-coloured fabric, blooms in Margarita Cabrera’s solo show ‘Secuelas: cuerpo, tierra, y mar’ (Repercussions: body, land, and water). Made to resemble indigenous cacti from the borderlands and arrayed in terra-cotta pots, works from her ‘Space in Between’ series (2010–ongoing) are constructed from second-hand uniforms formerly belonging to US border patrol agents. While buttons and logo patches remain fixed, fraying threads along the seams slip downward like vines.
Since 2010, the El Paso-based textile artist, who emigrated from Mexico as a child, has hosted embroidery workshops with migrant communities, teaching Otomí sewing techniques. Produced in these workshops, knotworks of multicoloured pictograms and words cover Cabrera’s sculptures, weaving transborder experiences into a rich tapestry of resilience.
While earlier pieces from this celebrated series focused on the US-Mexico border, the examples exhibited here – made between 2016 and 2024 – also incorporate the perspectives of individuals who have immigrated to Spain from Argentina, Chile, El Salvador and Pakistan. The plurality of voices is reflected in the range of handwork, from meticulous cross-stitching to roughly sewn outlines. Winding around the trunk of Arbol de Limon, in collaboration with M.F.D.F. (Argentina / España) (2024), from which dangle stuffed lemons adorned with images of planes and flags, is a Spanish text in tight needlework: quoting from Eduardo Galeano's book Mirrors: Stories of Almost Everyone (2009), it says that once, in a remote past, the world was a ‘map without borders, and our legs were the only passport required.’
I need to hover close to read across the stem of a neighbouring plant a lopsided annotation that calls for the ‘right to migrate’. On another fleshy leaf, I find a heavily worked illustration of a keffiyeh, raised in tufts of thread. Elsewhere, a figure is rendered behind bars, sewn beneath the official patch of the US border patrol. Embroidery isn’t a mere language of adornment; here, thick stitches evoke mending, strengthening and repair, adding additional structure to the fabric.
