Launched in 2021, the Moody Project Wall fosters community and cross-campus student engagement with Houston-based artists through the creation of an original work of art installed inside the Moody’s award-winning building.

For the spring of 2023, local artist Bennie Flores Ansell created a site-specific multi-media installation centered on the experience of human migration. Incorporating more than one thousand of 3D-printed and ceramic wishbones, Swarm Migration takes the shape of a flock of birds. The intersection of avian flight and human migration, evoked by the installation, at once abstracts and personalizes the immigration experience. The artwork's thematic focus will be underscored by artist-led writing and drawing workshops for Rice students and a public call for migration stories. The documents created by these initiatives will be integrated into subsequent community programming.

The Moody Project Wall series is made possible by the Moody Center for the Arts Founders Circle. Swarm Migration is organized by Molly Everett, Assistant Curator for the Moody Center for the Arts.

Read on to learn more about Swarm Migration and Flores Ansell’s practice.

Swarm Migration

Comprised of more than one thousand of small resin and ceramic wishbones arranged in a pattern evocative of birds in flight, the installation showcases Flores Ansell practice of implementing imaging technology and light to explore cultural identity. For the Moody Project Wall, the artist used computerized tomography (CT) scans of her own collarbones—comparable to a bird’s furcula, commonly called a wishbone, which is essential to avian flight mechanics—to create her own unique wishbone prototype. Flores Ansell collaborated with Billy Baccam and Alex Ramos of Input Output to create simulations of the wishbones flying, modeled on the movement of flocks of birds. With the help of Rice University students through workshops and installation, Flores Ansell's Swarm Migration serves as means to express and gather stories of migration, specifically as related to the Filipino diaspora and Filipino history at the university.

Flores Ansell worked closely with the Anakbayan student group at Rice, collaborating with Filipinx students to conduct archival research at the Houston Asian American Archive on campus to illuminate the life story of Rudolfo Hulen Fernandez, the first Asian American student—and first student of color—at Rice (class of 1917). Archival images of Hulen Fernandez along with students’ stories are displayed as part of the final installation. Moreover, the title of the installation, Swarm Migration, references an eponymous poem by Luisa A. Igloria (b. 1961, Baguio, Philippines) that reflects on the Filipino diaspora.   

Visitors can also share their stories as a part of the art project.  An important feature of the installation is the opportunity for guests to submit their own migration stories at a writing station onsite at the Moody or online through this form. Flores Ansell will digitally archive all the stories at swarmmigration.online.com. The physical writings will be composted in a special Earth Day event on April 22, held in partnership with the Friedman Holistic Garden. Participants who wish to compost their stories will be able to return to the garden in early September to collect the plant growing from their personal narratives. 

The Artists

Bennie Flores Ansell was born in Manila, Philippines, in 1967, and spent her formative years in the United States. Since 2008, she has served as Professor in the Art Department at Houston Community College. She earned her MFA in Photography from the University of Houston (1999) and a BA in Photography from the University of South Florida (1998). In 1999, she was awarded an American Photography Institute Fellowship at New York University and has held several residencies, including at Asia Society Texas, the Houston Center for Photography, and the Houston Center for Contemporary Craft.

Flores Ansell’s work has been exhibited internationally, including at the International Center of Photography, New York; Festival De La Luz, Buenos Aires, Argentina; Daegu Photography Biennale, Daegu, South Korea; Uno Art Space, Stuttgart, Germany; and Patricia Conde Galería, Mexico City. Her work is represented in various public and private collections, including the Southeast Museum of Photography.

Input Output is a Houston-based artist duo comprised of Billy Baccam (b. 1989, Dallas, TX) and Alex Ramos (b. 1986, Mexico City, Mexico). Baccam and Ramos formed Input Output in 2018 to research, design, and develop interactive, digital-physical experiences utilizing new media art and technology. They are currently installing a major site-specific installation for George Bush International Airport that features live data sets abstracted as ribbons of light.