It has been nearly two months since the debut of Esperanza – a 15 foot animated farmworker puppet, who as her name reveals, embodies the hopes of farmworkers for dignity and freedom in the fields. Her first major public appearance came at the first-ever Farmworker Freedom Festival in Palm Beach, FL, which culminated in a powerful ceremony designed to bring the Fair Food Nation’s message of hope home to Wendy’s Board Chair Nelson Peltz.
Farmworkers, their families and their allies gathered in a gorgeous park across the street from Peltz’s beachside mansion, where they shared, framed by giant banyan trees, the hopes of the farmworker community for a future of partnership with Wendy’s — a partnership to empower workers themselves to monitor and enforce their own human rights through the expansion of the Fair Food Program to Wendy’s produce suppliers. The hopes were written down on bandanas, which were then tied together and draped around Esperanza. During this Pilgrimage of Hope, Esperanza stood squarely at the center of the park and looked toward Peltz’ mansion.
It was a spectacle months in the making.
From the earliest sketches of Esperanza to the hundreds of hours of clay molding, basket weaving, zip tying, engineering, paper macheing, painting, and fine-tuning, she was a work of art sprung from many creative minds and many dedicated hands.
And that was just the beginning for Esperanza.
As we make exciting plans for her next big event, we want to thank the fantastic artists who supported the Immokalee puppet team from as far away as South Africa and England and as close by as LaBelle and Naples. For your time, talent, creativity, and support, we want to send a very special thank you to Andrew Kim of Thingumajig Theatre, Adrian Kohler of Handspring Puppet Company, Mark Safford of Barebones Puppets, Danika Fornear Perry and Phoenix Perry of LaBelle, Tree and Erik with the Raow Raow Collective, and everybody else who had a hand in Esperanza’s creation.
Esperanza is also the latest in a long tradition of larger-than-life puppets and papier mache works of art to enrich and enliven the demands of farmworkers. Perhaps the most famous puppet made by the Fair Food Nation is the Immokalee Statue of Liberty, which depicts the Statue of Liberty holding a tomato bucket and tomato. She was carried by farmworkers and allies over 230 miles in 2000 as part of the March for Dignity, Dialogue, and a Fair Wage, and now lives on permanent display at the National Museum of American History in Washington DC.
Check out this slideshow documenting Esperanza’s construction, and stay tuned for her next appearance!
