In Puerto Rico, the coquí frog is a natural symbol of the nation. As in almost all nationalist movements of the 19th century, when most modern nations were consolidated, nature served as inspiration and a search for national identity. For example, the bald eagle in the United States, the golden eagle in Mexico, the maple leaf in Canada, and the roosters in Cuba are some of the symbols that are comparable to the Puerto Rican coquí. These symbols, however simple they may seem, express a deep connection between territory, population, and nature.
Even though Puerto Rico is still a property of the United States under colonial status, the Puerto Rican population has been involved in constant civic battles to protect these symbols from being erased. The island, with an area of only 5,325 square miles, systematically undertakes processes of national affirmation that highlight the tension between the natural protection of endemic Puerto Rican species such as the coquí, its beaches, its rivers, its tropical forests, and the industrial and touristic expansionist projects. Additionally, the country has seen a wave of privatization – enacted by local and federal laws – of public areas, where Puerto Ricans are excluded due to tax laws that benefit U.S. residents to the detriment of islanders.
The coquí, as ubiquitous on the island as its inhabitants, is a relatively small species of frog that takes its name from the onomatopoeic sound it makes, phonetically transcribed in English as [koh - kee]. It is almost impossible to visit the island of Puerto Rico without hearing the coquí sing. In more urban areas, this mainly occurs at night, when humidity increases, while in other areas, such as tropical forests or ponds, the sound is permanent. The song of the coquí is part of the soundtrack of Puerto Rican life, and the ecological impact of this species helps regulate the insect population and contributes to the growth of plant foliage. However, for many tourists seeking an artificial global resort environment, its sound is unbearable.
In the context described above, the coquí has become a metaphor for national resistance, and its presence marks the prevalence of Puerto Rican land over any type of colonial development, whose expansion threatens to destroy the ecosystem where the coquí thrives. Although the coquí population is not yet threatened, other species of Puerto Rican amphibians are in danger of extinction, such as the Sapo concho (concho toad), whose image has been popularized in Bad Bunny's new album, Debí tirar más fotos (I Should Have Taken More Photos). Bad Bunny's album resonates with the shared spirit of Puerto Ricans on and off the island regarding issues such as national life, musical tradition, environmental activism, and the desire for Puerto Rico to be the home of all Puerto Ricans.
In the context of María Cecilia Ferrer's exhibition Confío en la tierra (I Trust Earth), the coquí is a metaphor for clay and the earth that produces it. This metaphor sometimes works by contiguity and other times by analogy.
By contiguity: the coquí's preferred habitat is the tropical forest, where the soil is always moist and where there is a great diversity of multicolored clays and mud, which in turn are formed by the centuries-old decomposition of the foliage that the coquí has contributed to growing. In Puerto Rico, there is a direct relationship between healthy forests and coquí frogs; they are found one next to each other.
By analogy, the anatomy and color of the coquí frog resemble those of mud and clay; it requires moisture to keep its skin hydrated and healthy. Its core existence is regulated by the amount of water that is deposited in and around it. Like mud, the coquí is an amphibious species, and it is the interaction of water and organic matter that produces its form. For María Cecilia Ferrer, ceramic is the frozen form of the natural gesture that produces life: feet sunk in the mud, the song of the coquí, the color provided by nature.
However, the sentence “I trust earth” is more complex than the identification of person and nature as two objects; rather, it is a feeling of trust between two subjects. This means that the artist's vision does not exclude her human and transformative subjectivity, but adds to it the relationship that occurs when the earth becomes a subject that interacts with human needs, and together they create a balance. The essential condition for this relationship to occur is trust, the need for a declaration of acceptance and limitation. Ultimately, María Cecilia Ferrer's exhibition is a gesture as simple and beautiful as a respectful conversation between two sentient beings who have found an extraordinary and common language to express themselves. That language is art.