Pan de muerto y canelazo is a collaborative performance created with Gabriela Estrada and Pablo Lazala Ruiz, presented in 2024 as part of We Become an Island, an exhibition curated by Pablo Lazala Ruiz at Compound Yellow, Chicago, on Sunday, November 3.

This one-hour ritual performance and food installation featured homemade pan de muerto, canelazo, candles, fruit, flowers, and community participation. The evening before the event, we gathered at Gabriela and Pablo’s home to knead and bake the pan de muerto and prepare the ingredients for the canelazo. On the day of the performance, we arranged the food in a circle, warmed the canelazo over the fire, and invited attendees to join in its sharing, holding a minute of silence for the genocide in Gaza.

The work was rooted in our reflections on food sovereignty, discussing how colonization also enacted a form of gastronomic replacement, imposing European tastes and practices at the expense of native foods from Abya Yala.