“American Archipelago” on View at Gallery One

A new installation by multimedia artist Marie Alarcon is now on view at Gallery One’s Art Vault in City Hall. American Archipelago grows from Alarcon’s ongoing exploration of myth, memory, and cultural inheritance. Gallery One and the Art Vault are open and free to the public Monday-Friday 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Developed during the artist’s 2021–2022 Roswell Artist-in-Residence program, the work continues her use of video, sculpture, and textile in a setting shaped to feel both intimate and ceremonial.

This installation has transformed the Art Vault into a “threshold space” — a kind of archive or chamber that viewers witness rather than fully enter. Through both physical and digital materials, the piece maps a network of fragmented histories and island connections, reflecting on the legacies of colonization and how they continue to shape diasporic identity.

The exhibition includes a digital performance by Alarcon’s recurring persona, Papi Leon, described as a minor deity of the diaspora: part pirate, part zombie, part oracle. This character helps animate the space and invites viewers to consider how ritual, imagination, and cultural memory can serve as tools for resistance and healing.

“Papi Leon represents all of the diasporas affected by U.S. global intervention,” said Alarcon. “They are patron saints of syncretic culture and expression.”

While rooted in Alarcon’s own multicultural background — including ties to Haiti, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines — the work invites broader reflection on displacement, memory, and survival.