Art and Design Commons^™

Standing On The Edge Of A Dream, Parto Ahmadpour Mobarake

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Standing On the Edge of a Dream delves into the intricate tapestry of lived experiences shaped by relocation, emphasizing the nuanced space that exists between reality and imagination. As an individual who has undergone the transformative journey of immigration, I recognize that the concept of relocation is like standing on the edge of a dream. This notion becomes a living structure, intricately woven with threads from our past, present, and future. My artistic exploration extends beyond my artworks, yet it remains deeply rooted in my personal narratives. The artworks in the exhibition continue to draw inspiration from personal memories and …

Fabricated Homogeneity, Kimberly Nam

Theses and Dissertations

My work examines the national identity embedded in the homogeneous culture of Americana, and how that’s infiltrated into the subconscious mind of an immigrant.

By altering and parodying vernacular imageries of Americana, my paintings discuss how they generate a sense of foreignness and reveal the false illusion of cultural homogeneity.

Di•As•Po•Ra: Displaced, Not Erased., Betty Álvarez

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is based on my artistic endeavors and research founded in my culture, family, the history of the United States government’s intervention in El Salvador, and the current political climate Latin Americans face today in the United States. I work within multiple mediums to resurrect pieces of my culture that are being forgotten or left behind due to assimilation. I accomplish this through revisiting and reinterpreting traditions. I aim to bring awareness of the Latin experience in a racially divided United States through artistic expression and my own personal experiences. My works are made to feel whimsical and playful, …

The Embroidered Tablecloth: How Locale Influences Eastern European Jewish Textile Production, Elena Solomon

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Recent scholarship frames craft as distinct from art and as an encapsulation of cultural expression at a given moment. Building on that framework, this thesis analyzes the shifting attitudes towards the production of handmade textiles among Eastern European Jews in the US in the twentieth century, as influenced by their migration. To demonstrate the textile environment at that time, this thesis examines pre- and post-migration primary sources and autobiographical writing, including Mary Antin’s The Promised Land, supplemented with interviews of first- and second-generation immigrants to Chicago. In contrast with stereotypes about craft as historically stable, defining craft as regional …

The Systemic Punches: Displacement Experience Of Vulnerable Immigrants, Eric Andre

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

"The Systemic Punches: Displacement Experience of Vulnerable Immigrants" focuses on the impact of systems of state control such as immigration laws, policies, and practices that have been institutionalized and that have marginalized immigrants. In my thesis, I pay specific attention to inhuman acts of exclusion and discrimination resulting from the systemic barriers perpetuated by xenophobic and nationalist ideologies.

From this standpoint, my thesis exhibition employs interactive space, which includes visual art (drawing, sculpture ceramics), projection, video, and sound, as a means to explore the effects of the exclusive and discriminatory immigration policies and practices. Furthermore, it is designed to explore …

Hybrid Being: Lonely Electrons And A Motherland, Yin Ting Lau

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis paper summarizes the contextual core of the artist’s graduating exhibition, as well as expanding upon certain concepts embedded within the artworks that are not fully explained within the show itself. Overall, this paper and its correlating show reflects on hybridity and its overlap with the immigrant experience.

Stranger’S Window, Nation’S Mirror, Kyoko Hamaguchi

Theses and Dissertations

In this text, I consider my identity as a Japanese immigrant in the United States during a global pandemic and its impact on my understanding of home as a liminal space. In particular, I discuss notions of home in relation to my work as an artist including two works that utilize the home-sharing platform Airbnb and three works that deal with the dichotomy of inside and outside.

Cumulative Grief, Xuan Pham

Masters Theses

A written thesis to accompany the M.F.A. Exhibition Cumulative Grief, in which the artist's personal and familial narrative explores the complexity and nuances of racial grief.

Homeland Insecurity, Amy Chen

Bachelor of Fine Arts Senior Papers

Homeland Insecurity is a project born out of a life’s worth of marginalization, internalized racism, and forced assimilation. It presents common experiences and emotions that are located between cultures, questioning what it means to inhabit a homeland that exists as a hybrid mental space. As I progress through life, my parents’ culture—my heritage—becomes more and more distant, yet like many non-white children of immigrants, I will continue to carry it in my face as a physical reminder of a life I do not know. Influenced by acculturation theory, my work explores this culture that never quite belonged to me to …

The Social Role Of The Artist, Gabino A. Castelan

Theses and Dissertations

Gabino A. Castelán, tells a personal story of loss that influenced his artistic practice. He embraced this narrative to create two projects “Practice of Everyday Life-205 (PoEL-205) and the formation of a temporary collective called, Cultural Workers. He presents two case studies of twenty-first century artists, whose projects have business models that allow them to function in social roles during political and social turmoil. "Conflict Kitchen" and "Rebuild Foundation" provide context about running for-profit and not-for-profit artistic practices. Castelan writes about these projects' influencing his artistic practice in general.

The Bronx Was Brewing: A Digital Resource Of A Lost Industry, Michelle Zimmer

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The Bronx: a bucolic oasis laden with history, a suburb within city-limits, an urban warzone, and thanks to the recent renaissance, a phoenix of progress rising from the proverbial ashes of the fires that burned through the borough in the 1970’s. But many people are unaware that the Bronx also brewed.
Uncovering the brewing industry of the Bronx tells not only the story of the lost industry, but it also communicates the narrative of the development of the Bronx. The brewers were German immigrants who developed a thriving industry by introducing lager beer to the United States by taking advantage …