Northern Manhattan is a community shaped by refugees and immigrants from all over the world. In this timely exhibition, sixteen artists from Central and South America, the Caribbean, Asia, Canada, Europe and the Middle East reflect on what it means to create a home away from home. They explore themes such as belonging, memory, identity, nostalgia, and the intertwining of cultures. They examine place, identity, displacement, and fragmentation and they question the politics that continually surround their experiences. We invite you to view their works and to read and listen to their compelling and unique stories.
on view July 23 – August 31, 2022
ARTISTS: Yael Ben-Zion, Gal Cohen, Franck de las Mercedes, Rose Deler, Felipe Galindo, Takashi Harada, Shinsuke Higuchi, Lilia Levin, Rafaela Luna, Rosa Naparstek, Eva Nikolova, Palén Obesa, Sky Pape, Kaé Sato, Elizabeth Starčević, Yasuyo Tanaka
Baggage, oil on canvas, 42″ x 48″, 44″ x 50″ x 3″, 1994
Golden Venture, oil on panel, 24″ x 18″, 1993
Still Live with Nicaraguan Vase, watercolor, ink, gouache, pastel on paper, 37″ x 29.25″, 1989
These pieces are decades old and embody something of my own experiences, including my awareness of others who immigrated here or attempted to do so. “Golden Venture” references the fatalities and suffering after a ship, illegally bringing people from China to the US in 1993, ran aground in Queens. My work still involves how difference is perceived and affects various systems, even though I’ve focused on abstraction for over 25 years. I like to think that being an immigrant enhances my understanding, adaptability, and sensitivity, both creatively and as a person.
Washington Heights, Then and Now / El alto ayer y hoy, wool and cotton, 54″ x 34″,
Nov. 9 2016 And Now What? / ¿Y ahora qué? – wool, cotton, plastic, 35″ x 35″, 2016
No To The Wall / No al muro, wool and cotton, 35″ x 40″, 2018
My pieces depict my concern with the impact of war, climate change, natural disasters, and political upheaval on the world, while reflecting the changes I have seen in my neighborhood over my lifetime in Washington Heights.
4th of July (View from the South border), digital gicleé print, 16″ x 20”, 1999
New Immigrant, digital print of watercolor artwork, 24″ x 28”, 1999
Battle of Fifth Avenue, digital print of watercolor artwork, 24″ x 28”, 1999
Manhatitlan Codex, ink on bark paper, 20″ x 24”, 1999
As an artist and as an immigrant I’m always integrating my Mexican background and my adopted homeland’s culture. It is a constant learning experience. I use the universal languages of art and humor to celebrate cultural differences. Diversity inspires me. In my on-going project “Manhatitlan” (a word I coined merging “Manhattan” and “Tenochtitlan”, the ancient Aztec capital)
I explore, through humor, the encounter of Mexican and American cultures in the context of the immigrant experience in New York, underscoring ethnic traditions in this era of multiculturalism and globalization.
From ‘Notes on Nowhere’ #1, acrylic on canvas, 55″ x 58″, 2020
From ‘Notes on Nowhere’ #2, acrylic on canvas, 31″ x 23″ inches, 2020
In The N.O.N (Notes on Nowhere) series, I explore the collective memory of houses that shaped my childhood landscape, and no longer exist due to gentrification processes, culpable neglect and lack of preservation. Showcasing layers of architectural renderings of demolished historical houses, vegetated wildlife and broken landscapes, the paintings reflect upon a memory of a place which has transformed or no longer exists.
Re-thinking the Way I Feel About Myself II, acrylic on canvas, 40″x 40″, 2018
The Eye Sees Only What The Mind Is Prepared to Comprehend, mixed media on canvas, 68″ x 56”, 2022
Rethinking the Way I Feel About Myself, mixed media on canvas, 24″ x 24”, 2018
I am constantly exploring human perception. What divides peoples and creates a negative image based on characteristics of race, ethnicity, gender or simply, physical appearance. Shortly after moving to New York, I became more aware of the great differences that we live with on a daily basis, related to biases that persist in our thoughts and I began to represent them in my artwork through the female figures of color.
Unruly Fashion, acrylic and ink block on canvas paper, 24″ x 30″, 2021
Procesión, acrylic and ink block on canvas paper, 24″ x 30″, 2021
Pan Blanco, acrylic and ink block on canvas paper, 24″ x 30″, 2021
My work examines the emotional, spiritual, and developmental fractures in family dynamics incited by war, trauma, the disintegration of family through migration, and loss. Taking a critical view at the influence that sociopolitical and cultural issues can have on emotionally impaired families, I often reference my own childhood, history, current events, and pop culture. Each work is constructed from an inventory of visual fragments such as: drawings, journal pages, old family photographs and found ephemera.
Rosebush, mineral pigments, Sumi ink, Nikawa glue on canvas, 60” x 60” x 2.5”, 2017
Rosebush at Night, mineral pigments, Sumi ink, Nikawa glue on canvas, 24” x 48” x 1.5”, 2017
Colored Leaves I, cray pastel, gesso, on Kozo paper stretched over wooden panel, 24” x 6” x 2”, 2017
Colored Leaves II, cray pastel, gesso, on Kozo paper stretched over wooden panel, 24” x 6” x 2”, 2017
Colored Leaves III, cray pastel, gesso, on Kozo paper stretched over wooden panel, 24” x 6” x 2”, 2017
There are always hardships for all the people. However, there is always hope for all the people. No matter what we are.
Sky (Odyssey), Japanese Sumi ink, mineral pigment, metal powder, mica, Nikawa glue, on canvas, 24” x 48” x 1.5”, 2018
Yume, Japanese Sumi Ink, mineral pigments, gold leaf, Nikawa glue, on Japanese mulberry WASHI paper mounted on a wood panel, 30 3/8” x 8” x D 1.5”, 2016
Smoky Quartz, Japanese Sumi ink, mineral pigment, metal leaf, metal powder, mica, smoky quartz stone, thread, Nikawa glue, on canvas, 18” x 30” x 1.5”, 2018
In my artwork, I express the trajectory and hope created by history and memory, a world that can overcome and connect to various boundaries on the Earth.
Siberia: Flower Photo Set, mixed media, 16″ x 25″ x 5”, 2018
Not Broken, mixed media, 12″ x 12″ x 2.5″, 2018
Passport II, mixed media, 15 ” x 12″ x 2”, 2018
Passport I, mixed media, 12 ” x 5″ x 2”
Being a displaced person, a refugee from World War II, living in a displaced person’s camp for five years before immigrating to the United States has informed my entire being to search for what makes human beings capable of the cruelty that destroys themselves and each other. As part of this quest, I have had to look at the ways this has affected me personally, the tender tendrils that live inside me, to even begin to understand how it lives in the world.
Under This Sky, black and white photograph, digitally printed on Japanese paper, 65” x 41.5” (16 panels, each 7.5″ x 10”)
All Things Are Linked: Hotspots, embossed printmaking, paper cranes made from dyed world map, burned edges, 27.25” x 39”
The immigrant experience freed me from preconceived notions I acquired in my home country, and helped broaden my perspective to see things from multiple angles. I’ve been able to see what I couldn’t see before, and began to express my transformation and discoveries as themes. The immigrant experience influences the creation of my artwork, my own rediscovery, and self-formation.
Aluminum Coat, mylar, yarn, wire, sewing notions, dimensions variable
Aluminum Coat, mylar, yarn, wire, sewing notions, dimensions variable
Aluminum Coat, mylar, yarn, wire, sewing notions, dimensions variable
Aluminum Coat, mylar, yarn, wire, sewing notions, dimensions variable
My immigration story is deeply imbedded into my soul and work. My grandmother came first. My mother, sister and I came after, and by the time we arrived in New York, she had an apartment for us, work for my mother and most important, green cards for all three of us. Nonetheless, it was a struggle, one that they were willing to go through. I weave through the experiences of my grandmother and mother, seamstresses, and the strong shoulders I stand on.
Disruption, linocut on paper, 19 ½” x 25″, 2022
Memorable Memories, screen print on paper: 15″ x 22″, 2022
By addressing patriotism and cultural identity, I comment on the hybrid society of immigrants living in the United States who struggle with cultural assimilation, language acquisition, and racism from a first-hand experience. My works often highlight the contrasts between the person I was back home, and the person I have become after leaving, commenting on all aspects of my identity, including my values, ideologies, and opinions.
The News I, pen and ink, 8″ x 10″, 2022
No Words (But We Must Speak), pen & ink, 9″ x 12″, 2022
No Words and Too Many Words, pen & ink, 9″ x 12″, 2022
Call to Action, pen and ink, 8″ x 10″, 2022
No Words Only Memories, pen & ink, 9″ x 12″, 2022
Most immigrants, I think, have two homes. Whether we can visit the country we left, negotiation of belonging and identity is a life-long process. What to feel when the country you left and never stopped loving is split by a senseless war, is back in the hands of a tyrant? What to feel when children are being killed, when freedoms are taken away from women, when profits destroy the land in the country that took you in, the country you trusted? I feel despair, loss, I hear a call to action, I try to find hope.
Iceberg, acrylic on canvas, 20” x 16”, 2021
Human After All, acrylic on canvas, 20” x 16”, 2021
I’m Not A Thing. I’m A Human Too, acrylic and oil on canvas, 58” x 48”, 2020
The Middle Way V, acrylic on canvas, 70” x 58”, 2013
I am an abstract painter. Living in a diverse community, I became more flexible in my view. I will keep contributing to a different way of seeing the world.
Pavlovo III, ink on drafting film, 25” X 40”, 2022
Pavlovo II, ink on drafting film, 25” X 40”, 2022
Pavlovo I, ink on drafting film, 25” X 40”, 2022
I work in drawing, printmaking, hand-drawn animation, and camera-less photography exploring themes of remembrance and identity in relation to place. The relationship between geography and memory has been the central preoccupation of my art-making ever since immigrating to the United States from Bulgaria in 1992. My works, created from memory and inspired by Balkan vernacular architecture, often contemplate transformation and destruction through the prism of landscape and the cityscape.
Indian wedding, c-print, 20” x 20”, 2013
Sari scarf and doll house, c-print, 30” x 30”, 2013
We also decided that it was important to us that the kids know and are proud of their Indian heritage. We figure they will get the American-ness from just growing up here. We decided that we wanted the kids to learn Hindi and to visit India regularly.
We each get to experience a different culture from what we grew up with. We have a much wider set of experiences than we could have had if we were each married to someone from our own ethnicity. So many aspects, big and small—food, getting to visit India or Oregon—but also realizing that despite our upbringing across the world, there were a remarkable number of similarities. It is pretty scary how similar our parents are and how similar our experiences were growing up.
—Aditi and John
Pagnes, c-print, 20”x20”, 2012
Passing, c-print, 30”x30”, 2012
Being mixed did not truly become a source of conflict until after I moved back to the U.S. at about nine years old. It was in the U.S. that I first encountered the racial system of hypodescent or the “one-drop-rule.” I recall my mother warning me not to advertise the fact that I was ‘one-eighth’ because people might see me differently. I recall feeling very different from my classmates in the predominantly white upstate New York; and uncomfortable with the way they either inflated (“you’re my black friend!”) or dismissed (“You don’t like Usher? I’m blacker than you!”) my race. In the rare occasion when I was around other people of color, I felt a strong pull of identification; as though I recognized myself and my family within them, and I wanted deeply to be known by them… something that was always one-sided, as, because of the low-visibility of my race, people of color rarely see themselves back in me.
The discrimination I face as a low-visibility or “passing” person of color is very different from what visible and dark-skinned people experience, to the point of being incomparable. Racism is a structural social system of inequality with a long, cumulative history and a pervasive psychological effect on the lives and experiences of all people who live within it. As a “passing” person of color, I am able to avoid the majority of the structural race discrimination in this country. Where I experience racism is in the more internal and interpersonal level. I hold an awareness of myself as a person of color that inhibits my assimilation into racially hostile spaces that may otherwise include me.
For a mixed person (or any person haunted by questions of racial, cultural, or other identity “authenticity”) the question of indicating identity through dress, language, etc. is always tinged with a sense of anxiety, especially when the presence or absence of these indicators could be the entire difference in how one is perceived. I find myself asking questions such as ‘Will this be misread as cultural appropriation? Will it seem as if I am asserting my blackness so forcefully as to risk erasing the reality of my whiteness? Will I be treated with more, or less respect walking down the street with my hair wrapped or wearing a pagne? What am I erasing by not wearing it?’
—Aja
Four Mothers, c-print, 20”x20”, 2013
I’m the French + Scottish, c-print, 30”x30”, 2013
I grew up in Paris. My parents had both moved [there] in their late twenties. My father came from a small town in southwest France. His family was originally small farmers in the Pyrenees but my grandfather had gone away to become a policeman in town. My mother grew up in Oran, Algeria. Her family was Sephardic Jew. They were working class, lived in a small apartment in the Jewish quarter. My great grandmother was very observant, which created conflicts with the rest of the family who was not. The only exposure I had to religion growing up was going to my grandmother’s to eat North African food for the important holidays.
—Jeanne
Growing up in a different country, I know firsthand the challenges of creating a new home away from the place you know. In my art I focus on how this shapes our lives, and how regardless of our differences there is still a lot that connects them.
This gallery explores work that reflects the challenges of the world and calls us to action.
This gallery explores work that reflects and represents our communities local to global.
This gallery explores work that offers solace and contemplation in a challenging time.
In these unprecedented times of political shifting and a worldwide pandemic, women continue to lead the way.
Sharing the personal is an act of courage. Women artists are visionaries, warriors, healers and connectors. This exhibition is an invitation to reflect on the issues that bring us together.
