Firelei Báez Reimagines Historical Maps to Challenge Collective Memory

Artists have long used historical documents as a canvas to interrogate the narratives that shape our understanding of the past. Firelei Báez, the Dominican-born visual artist, has taken this practice to new heights with her exhibition “feet squelching on wet grass, nourished by uncertainty” at Hauser & Wirth in New York. The show reworks 19th-century maps and infographics, transforming them into vibrant, subversive works that question who gets to define history and how.

The Legacy of Emma Willard and the Power of Visual History

At the heart of Báez’s work lies the 1845 “Chronographer of American History,” a sprawling tree map created by Emma Willard, a pioneering educator and feminist. Willard’s illustration, which depicted American history as an organic, evolving tree, was intended to make historical events more accessible through visual storytelling. Today, the map remains a staple in textbooks, its imagery ingrained in collective memory.

But as Báez explains, such maps are not neutral. “They function as place makers and stand-ins for collective memory,” she says. “Yet they have been manipulated endlessly to perpetuate harmful hierarchies.” By reinterpreting Willard’s work, Báez critiques the myth of America as a self-sufficient, natural entity. In her piece “Not even unalterable limitations (or a transformational topology for remembering Willard’s Chronographer of American History), a milky white jellyfish with lanky tentacles emerges from the tree’s bark, its form a metaphor for “someone—or something—coming into being, unruly, mid-formation.”

Reclaiming the Archive: Báez’s Subversive Art Practice

Báez’s work is deeply rooted in archival research, but she approaches these materials with a critical lens. In one piece, she overlays an 1860 infographic by German cartographer Paul Ahrens with a cheeky close-up of a painted breast, reimagining the original topography as a symbol of female agency. Another work, “View From the Tower,” transforms a German forest map into a provocative commentary on power and perspective.

Her process begins with what she calls the “pour”—the moment paint first meets the canvas. “It is an index of my body and the architecture of the space that I’m in,” she explains. From this initial act, figures and narratives emerge, blending the spiritual with the scholarly. “I hate the word ‘woo-woo,’ but anyone involved in creation understands this feeling,” she adds.

Maps as Sites of Resistance

Báez’s reworkings of historical documents are not just artistic exercises; they are acts of resistance. By “rewilding” maps, she challenges the linear, often Eurocentric narratives they encode. For example, her 50-foot-long installation “View of Nature” overlays a 19th-century diagram of global climates with lush, overgrown vegetation. The result is a vision of nature reclaiming its dominance—a stark contrast to the colonial histories embedded in the original document.

This theme extends to her 85-foot mural “View of Nature”, currently installed at John F. Kennedy Airport’s Terminal One. The work, which will open in October 2023, features a sprawling landscape that mirrors the Dominican and Floridian environments of Báez’s childhood. “Horror is mundane,” she says. “The apocalypse is not a singularity. It undulates eternally.”

Art as a Mirror to the Future

Báez’s exhibition also explores themes of futurity. Her series of figurative drawings and bronzes depict hybrid human-mystical beings, suggesting possibilities for transcendence and transformation. “Her work is a declaration of refusal against the ending of a story,” notes art critic Sarah Lewis. “It acknowledges that it may only be beginning.”

By engaging with archives, Báez invites viewers to consider how history is constructed—and who is excluded from its pages. “Every painting is over a document that purports to contain the world or reality, all in one two-dimensional image,” she says. “It documents the hubris of the 19th century, as both archive and warning.”

Conclusion: A New Language for History

Firelei Báez’s work is a testament to the power of art to disrupt, reimagine, and reclaim. By transforming historical maps into sites of resistance, she challenges viewers to confront the biases embedded in the stories we tell about the past. As she puts it, “The future of the world, and