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Hospitality

Vanessa Lacaille is a French landscape architect interested in how citizens can recreate and reinvent architecture by themselves. For the MATZA EDGELANDS CÚCUTA, she focused on experiencing the border territory of Cúcuta and its social relations. As Vanessa Lacaille explains in her work for BLURRED LINES exhibition, security and HOSPITALITY are closely imbricated concepts that refer to the uses of space. She states that instead of relying on physical structures in the city, HOSPITALITY is related to the social and personal dynamics in border zones. The artist carried out individual interviews with people living in Cúcuta to understand the representations and future projections of space for them.

During her artistic residency, Vanessa Lacaille made audio and video recordings of the places she visited as a foreigner. In an ethnographic effort and as someone who does not belong to that territory, she experienced the locals’ HOSPITALITY by documenting its process. The importance of HOSPITALITY appears in her work in the territorial changes it creates, as well as the fact that it is shaped by people and not necessarily by the urban landscape or the political situation. This conclusion leads us to a new way of imagining the social contract in border zones, so that both inhabitants and migrants can feel safe, included and respected.