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Hector Esrawe and Ignacio Cadena

Los Trompos

Scottsdale Public Art activates outdoor public spaces throughout Scottsdale with the temporary fall installation, Los Trompos: 10 brightly colored, interactive “spinning-top” sculptures created by award-winning Mexican artists and designers Héctor Esrawe and Ignacio Cadena. Los Trompos has been taken into the City of Scottsdale’s Public Art Collection and will be on view throughout the City of Scottsdale.  They are currently on display at Scottsdale Quarter and Scottsdale Civic Center Plaza.

Functioning as both artwork and rotating seating spaces, each sculpture acts as a gathering place for relaxation, social interaction and entertainment. The public can engage with the Los Trompos sculptures at various locations across Scottsdale’s downtown, and as time progresses, the sculptures will travel to different locations around the city and eventually join together at the Scottsdale Waterfront for Canal Convergence 2018.

Esrawe and Cadena, two of the leading designers in Mexico today, found their inspiration forLos Trompos in the form of a spinning top, a toy popular with children around the world. The colorful material used to create each “top” is made from fabric woven in a traditional style by Mexican artisans. The fabric is stretched over the “spinning-top” structures to seat several people at once. By working together, visitors can spin the tops on their bases to add motion to their interaction with the structures.

Information about the artists:

Esrawe is the founder of the cross-disciplinary design firm Esrawe Studio that develops furniture and interior design solutions for commercial spaces. He is inspired by traditional Latin American design, architecture and folk art, and his works are playful, sometimes humorous, and organic. Cadena is owner and creative director of CADENA+ASOC. CONCEPT DESIGN, which combines art and science using painting, graphic design, photography, sculpture, video, marketing, architecture and industrial design to generate award-winning works. Esrawe and Cadena brought their design firms together more than six years ago to form E + C, and through their collaboration of style and engineering, created Los Trompos.

Poem by Eloisa Amezcua for Four Chambers Press Poetry Reading at Canal Convergence:

LOS TROMPOS

como el pájaro azul
a girl less than half my age
warbles in a pitch barely audible
to those who do not listen
as she spins, is spun
on a life-size spinning-top
in the center of the plaza
azul como la piedra preciosa
the strips of fabric interweave
into a color I do not know
the name of as those willing
to take a spin nestle
into the entwinement
azul azul es el mar
and you, love, are an ocean
of land away from me
a country of which I know little
except the 3,000 miles
we drove on hot days to find
a new home and did you know
there are 4,068,000 miles of roads
we have yet to drive together
I told myself this would not
turn into a love poem
but I spin, am spun
para ti mi canción es azul
I watch the children
as they spin, are spun
in this space that is usually
empty and my need to fill
everything uninhabited
with something of beauty
or purpose, or are those not
the same thing anymore
these children play
careless to everything around them
would it be fair to have one
of my own or rather of our own
who do these children belong to
or why do some think they do not belong
in this ocean of land we have created
or allowed to exist as if we had been
asleep for the past 238 years
or centuries even
azul azul como el cielo
the color of the ocean
is only the sky’s reflection
and these children throw back
their heads in laughter
as they spin, are spun
and they do not absorb
the walls we are building
to keep others out or to keep
ourselves in—it makes no difference
the day’s light has faded
into someone else’s tomorrow
adiós azul azul

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