Culture and Knowledge
At the Mocha Celis, we ensure that people of the TTNB community are no longer objects of study and become producers of knowledge and meaning. That is, their own interpretation of the world through popular and collective production.
Learn about all of our community’s cultural initiatives and production of knowledge:
Publications
Con Nombre Propio
The Revolution of the Butterflies
Travar el Saber (“Trans-form Knowledge”)
MOCHA - The Documentary
El Teje Poético
Mocha Celis Comic Book
Interview Lohana Berkins
Lohana Berkins was an Argentine travesti activist who died in 2015. We talked with her, along with students from the Mocha Celis Popular High School, in the context of the “Research Methodology” class and the production of the MOCHA documentary.
Poetry
Jauría [Pack of Dogs]
Viviana González
Graduate of the Mocha Celis Travesti-Trans Popular High School
Member of the Mocha Celis Civil Association
Former President of the Student Union and Ttravesti-Trans Activist
Hungry, armed, violent
One dark path / one two-way highway / one ambulance / one long-distance bus / one local bus / two trucks / / one bicycle / five cars, all on the side of the highway / three of the latter waiting to be serviced in a dimension of a physical language, under a sky of a single color / two blinding lights / two of twelve thin legs, balancing, on / two red high heels / Suddenly / three deafening sirens / six rotating lights and A PACK OF BLUE DOGS hungry, armed, violent
/ four terrifying screams // two words that paralyze / six butterflies that, running, try to take flight / one of the six falls to the ground // two shotguns that fire into the air // two 9 millimeters that point and open fire / eight hands poised on four triggers // three of five blasts make impact / three perforations in a short sequined dress, silver and bloody // 20 gold suns flying in the air / 100 cries for mercy / 200 pleas for compassion. Ten broken bones / various pieces of torn flesh
/ One comb / one mirror // one red lipstick // one imitation Louis Vuitton purse / one body dragging itself / 1,000 groans of pain. An avalanche of extreme deathly silence that becomes the protagonist in a scene of blood
One long black bag / One dark transport truck and A PACK OF BLUE DOGS hungry, armed, violent
One house that waits / one candle lit before a prayer card / one empty bed / one picture frame // two unread poems in the drawer of a night table / one box of sedatives / one ashtray / four cigarette butts / 20 family pictures, in two albums / only one plate on the table / one small refrigerator with leftover boiled noodles, together with a quarter of a flask of coffee liqueur and a piece of lemon. One cold laboratory room / four beds // eight degrees below zero / two windows / one general light / three round reflectors / three clamps / two scalpels / two small saws / two needles / one roll of nylon thread/ meters of gauze and cotton // 15 sample jars / two liters of alcohol / three liters of formaldehyde / three pairs of latex surgical gloves / three surgical masks / three scrub caps / six surgical gowns /
One body with hips and buttocks injected with silicone // one penis / two breast implants // one peeled skin / 70 kilos of filleted meat / four liters of clotted blood / 300 muscles to be analyzed on a sheetless silver metal gurney and a PACK OF BLUE DOGS who pace from side to side, hungry armed, violent.
One office with low yellow lights / one narrow hallway / four walls / one ceiling with peeling paint / three typewriters with keyboards and no monitor // two eyes that gaze without seeing / one open mouth with no words, no sound, no breath /
As my soul looks down from above, my body, mutilated, lies below, and taking note in a fictitious statistic with the heading, one headline that doesn’t know us and describes us as unidentified and putting the stamp and signature at the end of a parallel inventory the same PACK OF BLUE DOGS hungry, armed, violent.
Tranny Momma
Alma Fernandez
Travesti Activist
Lohana
Hug me tranny momma, hug me
because the sirens scare me
Show me the steps in this dance
Because you already left in sparkles
And I still have to dance
Hug me tranny momma, hug me
The men come and go
the vultures eat your flesh
Even while you were alive they were killing you!
Hug me tranny momma, hug me
On this side everyone is crying because you opened my eyes
And I have a drum full of dreams
The sea snuffed out your warrior’s light
the sea goddess will take your hand
gorgeous well endowed consort seahorses will accompany you
until your hills and winds
Because I admired you and today I can’t help but feel this
TRAVESTI FURY!
Mocha Fest
The Mocha Fests are artistic events to raise funds and support students’ economic initiatives, make TTNB artists visible and celebrate diversity.
Present
This photo exhibit proposes getting to know TTNB people through their portraits and first-person stories. It is part of a research-action project that includes the exploration of portraits as an exercise in the transfer of power, and uses photography for TTNB people to show their life trajectories from their own perspective.