ART + IMMIGRATION
For many, the Statue of Liberty is the beacon of the land of the free, the country of immigrants. While immigration is frequently described as the transition to a better life, it is also filled with loss, isolation, and discrimination. From 18th century citizenship restrictions to white settlers to recent rhetoric about immigrants “bringing drugs and crime,” our history as a country of immigrants is complex and difficult. Yet as the US will become, within the next several decades, a minority/ majority country, we need to reframe our understanding of immigrants’ cultures, religions, and stories. Artists help us along by exploring immigration from multiple perspectives. Some embody the experience of the newcomer, filled with a sense of loss yet hopeful for a better life, while others reflect the multi-generational view within the effort to belong to a society which may or may not fully embrace you.
Danh Vo (Danish, b. 1975)
The sculpture, one of 250 fragments that together form a full-scale replica of the Statue of Liberty, embodies both the isolation of immigration and the fragmented, imperfect nature of freedom. By reproducing the statue’s thin copper skin, Vo emphasizes the monument’s material and conceptual fragility, and by extension, the malleability of its meaning.
Accession Number: 2018.1.19
Title: We The People (Detail)
Date: 2011-16
Medium: Copper
Rights: © Studio Danh Vo
KEYWORDS
immigration; Statue of Liberty; freedom; global economy; cultural exchanges.
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Albert Bierstadt (American, 1830-1902)
Bierstadt is best remembered for this grandiose, idealized landscapes of the American West, documenting white settlers’ westward expansion. While we do not often think of white Americans as immigrants to the trans-Mississippi West, this sketch, likely made in preparation for the painter’s first monumental painting of the Rocky Mountains and depicting the Shoshone inhabitants of the area, prompts us to consider it.
Accession Number: 1991.9
Title: Shoshone Indians Rocky Mountains
Date: 1859
Medium: Oil and gouache on paper mounted on board
Rights: Public domain
KEYWORDS
American West; American Indians; Native Americans; cross-cultural encounters; immigration.
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Jacob Lawrence (American, 1917-2000)
Lawrence represents the famous revolt on the slave ship La Amistad, which eventually resulted in the slaves earning their freedom and returning to Sierra Leone. Contributing to the nascent abolition movement in the US, the event remains a symbol of Black resistance to oppression. This and other works reference historical events while also questioning the nature of immigration and its relationship to slavery’s forced migration.
Accession Number: 1995.26
Title: Revolt on the Amistad
Date: 1989
Medium: Silkscreen
Rights: © 2020 Jacob Lawrence/Artist Rights Society (ARS), New York
KEYWORDS
race; slavery; history; abolitionism; American history; Black resistance; immigration.
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Sandra Ramos (Cuban, b. 1969)
Ramos explores her deeply felt yet ambivalent relationship with her country of birth. The artist’s alter ego, a young girl dressed in a uniform reminiscent of the youth organization of the Cuban Communist Party, is shown trying to escape the island by any means possible. Is freedom unattainable? Or is it not what one hopes for?
Accession Number: 2014.01.2
Title: Aquarium
Date: 2013
Medium: 3D video animation
Rights: Image courtesy of the artist
KEYWORDS immigration; exile; Cuba; freedom; communism.
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Jose A. Figueroa (Cuban, b. 1946)
This photograph captures both the personal and universal impact of loss as a result of immigration. Recording the emotional departure of the artist’s own mother, Olga, from Havana, it shares a private memory by situating it within the broader history of exiles and refugees from Fidel Castro’s Cuba.
Accession Number: 2014.1.50
Title: De la serie Exilio. Olga, La Habana
Date: 1967
Medium: Silver gelatin print
Rights: © José A. Figueroa. Image courtesy of the artist
KEYWORDS
family; immigration; exile; displacement; memory; documentation; Cuba.
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Annu Palakunnathu Matthew (British,
b. 1964)
The animation in these portraits helps us visualize the generational transition from immigrant to native within families. By personalizing family histories, the artist asks us to empathize with the protagonists beyond societal stereotypes of immigrants.
Accession Number: 2018.1.8
Title: To Majority Minority
Date: 2014-15
Medium: Digital Animation on iPad
Rights: Image courtesy of the artist and SepiaEYE, New York
KEYWORDS
immigration; stereotypes; assimilation; majority/ minority.
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Jay Lynn Gomez (American, b. 1986)
Gomez takes images of luxury living from the pages of glossy magazines and paints onto them the ghostly figures of those too often invisible–construction laborers, landscapers, nannies, and other unrecognized workers. By the simple act of adding them in, he gives them a voice.
Accession Number: 2013.41
Title: Portrait of an Affluent Family
Date: 2013
Medium: Acrylic on magazine paper
Rights: © Jay Lynn Gomez
KEYWORDS
immigration; domestic workers; income inequality; empowering; manual laborers; stereotypes.
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Guillermo Galindo (Mexican, b. 1960)
This sculpture is a sound-making assemblage of objects collected by the artist at the US-Mexico border. Left behind by immigrants trying to cross into the US, the objects highlight the human aspect of the immigration crisis. The title is a play on words combining the Spanish zapato (shoe) and gramofono (gramophone), suggesting that the sound made by the assemblage tells the story of the person who once owned the shoe.
Accession Number: 2018.20
Title: Zapatofono
Date: 2012
Medium: Shoe, gravel, wooden handle, amplified wooden tray
Rights: Image courtesy of the artist
KEYWORDS immigration; US-Mexico border; material culture; family; policy. VIEW
OBJECT FILE
ADDITIONAL WORKS
Guillermo Galindo, Ropófono, 2013
José A. Figueroa, De la serie Exilio. Despedidas en calle 17. La Habana
(Part 1), 1965-1967
José A. Figueroa, De la serie Exilio. Homenaje, La Habana, 1993
Purvis Young, Golfcourse of America, 2002
Raphael Soyer, Woman, 1979
Isaac Julien, Emerald City, 2013
