Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Passe Pas: Rethinking The Passport, Miriam E. Bankier

Scripps Senior Theses

Filled with national symbols, stamps and basic identifying information, a passport can obscure the humanity behind the individual passport holder, inverting it from a symbol of citizenship and belonging to one of marginalization and xenophobia. In today’s political climate, the meaning of art has become intersected with politics and the law. Using the very tools and some processes of passport production, i.e. mixed media and printmaking techniques, my work responds to and disrupts the bureaucracy and impersonal settings involving passports and identification documents. I draw from my own experiences and privilege as having Austrian, Italian, and American citizenship, as well …