FOREWORD
The Woodmere Annual: 80th Juried Exhibition
Part of what makes the Annual exciting is that
is timely. Our jurors, Michelle Angela Ortiz and
from year to year, the different interests of our
José Ortiz-Pagán, issued a call to artists about
jurors attract different artists. In addition to the
immigration, its impact on individual identity, and its
many artists who are new to Woodmere every year,
consequences for our thinking about the nature of
we always learn something new about artists we
organized society around the globe. The response
already know and have worked with in the past.
from artists has been tremendous, and the exhibition
Marta Sanchez, for example, teaches in Woodmere’s
broadly stakes out a humanistic point of view.
studio program, and one of her retablo paintings
Rahm Emanuel, the former mayor of Chicago and former White House chief of staff, famously described immigration as the third rail of American politics, so potentially destabilizing are its complex ramifications across the spectrum of beliefs on the topic. In part, his point was that despite the constant movement of peoples across the planet,
recently entered our permanent collection. However, I was unaware of her Detainment series and am deeply moved. Predictably, I’m fascinated by Michelle and José’s selections of Marta’s work. I’m also thrilled to see Mikel Elam represented in this presentation; his work was a standout for me in the 79th Juried Exhibition last summer.
the value systems associated with positions on
Most of the artists you’ll encounter in the show are
immigration are so divergent as to be perpetually
new to Woodmere. The particular equilibrium of
explosive. Unless we are Native American, it is only
artists and their works were selected by Michelle
a few generations back that most U.S. citizens
and José in the course of a year-long process
know of forebears who were immigrants, whether
of consideration and thoughtful shaping of an
by choice or by force. This year’s jurors assert that
experience and an overarching message that builds
we can no more avoid this third rail than we can
an ever-richer understanding of contemporary
afford to romanticize immigration or capitalize on
dialogues in the arts of Philadelphia. As New York
it for political purposes. Instead, we must reckon
becomes ever more inaccessible to most artists’
with the ongoing acceleration of circumstances
budgets, Philadelphia is becoming a place of
that have resulted in the 300 million immigrants in
choice. Woodmere’s Annual is one of the structured
the world today. Thank you, Michelle and José, for
elements in the cultural cycle of the year that
making immigration the center of the conversation
nurtures this growth in creative vitality in our city.
among the artists whose work will fill the galleries at Woodmere this summer.
2
WOODMERE ART MUSEUM
