The Stage Experience

Taxilandia - Stage Experience, created by Modesto Flako Jimenez, immerses its audience in the flavors, sounds, sights, and dynamic history of a neighborhood confronting social stigmas and the realities of gentrification. Weaving a dramatic, performative ‘tapestry’ that interconnects generations, social classes, races, and cultures, Taxilandia complicates our notion of what it means to be a local, an immigrant, or a resident of a place, challenging us to answer: “What is my personal roadmap of home?”. Taxilandia -Stage experience is an adaptation of the NY car experience developed from Jimenez’s conversations over nine years driving a taxicab and premiered at the Baryshnikov Arts Center in February, 2020.

Originally developed in Jimenez’s own neighborhood of Bushwick, Brooklyn, the piece was inspired and drawn from his nine years driving a taxicab and his documentation of conversations with passengers, residents, locals, and immigrants to the neighborhood.