Details

Subject(s)

• Watercolor painting—21st century [Browse]
• Collage, American—21st century [Browse]
• Cocaine industry—Colombia—Pictorial works [Browse]
• Coca—Colombia—Pictorial works [Browse]
• Drug control—Social aspects—Colombia [Browse]

Rare books genre

• Artists' books [Browse]
• Accordion fold format [Browse]

Summary note

Eliana Pérez’s newest book, Coca, is the second in her series about her home country, Colombia. It continues her evocative exploration at the bloody intersection of poverty, violence, and a global market economy, this time focusing on cocaine production and trade within Colombia’s borders. A 24k gold leaf river bisects the cover, one of many scarce natural resources exploited and polluted to produce one of the world’s most valuable commodities. Extending the accordion-bound pages forms a coca plant, speckled with blood-red fruit. The foliage is first rendered in verdant watercolor, then the dulled green of collaged US currency, and finally devolves into a white-on-white ghost of South America’s most revered and potent medicinal plant. On the reverse, the red of the coca fruit stains through the paper, a reminder of the persistent, inescapable violence that plagues the campesinos, social leaders, and Indigenous communities. The final spread holds a short text outlining the impact of coca farming on the environment and the Colombian people. The accordion binding allows the pages to be drawn out for display measuring 7′ 11″. --Booklyn WWW site, January 24, 2023.

Notes

• Colophon lists date as 2023; Booklyn WWW site (viewed January 24, 2023) lists date as 2022.
• Princeton copy 1 Copy number 4 of 10, signed by the artist.

Source acquisition

Princeton copy 1 Purchased in part with funds provided by the Program in Latin American Studies (PLAS).

OCLC

1365104188

Statement on language in description

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