Our Positions

Map of Reciprocity began as an exercise of asking for permission. I approached friends and strangers asking for access to dye plants on their property. I used the plants to dye silk for this “map” of Lawrence. While making it I considered the ways in which our lives are entangled with plants and animals as well as humans. For instance, one of the plants used, pokeberry, is almost exclusively spread by birds who eat the berries. Through the process of asking and natural dyeing with local plants I was placed in community with the human and more-than-human others around me.

The image of me as a baby in Haiti is a motif throughout my work. It represents who I am, was, and will be. In this piece I reimagine the Haitian coat of arms as myself, utilizing the colors found on the current flag (after 1986). Here I position myself directly at the Heart of the flag. I am Haitian-born. My physical position is the only thing that has changed. It is titled PIERRIL for my Haitian first name.

The image of me as a baby in Haiti is a motif throughout my work. It represents who I am, was, and will be. In this piece I reimagine the Haitian coat of arms as myself, utilizing the colors found on the flag from 1964 to 1986. Here I position myself directly at the Heart of the flag. I am Haitian-born. My physical position is the only thing that has changed. It is titled SANON for my Haitian last name.

The image of me as a baby in Haiti is a motif throughout my work. It represents who I am, was, and will be. In this piece, I position myself as the 50 stars, juxtaposing the image from me in Haiti with my present position as a naturalized U.S. citizen. I’m A Star.

In my work, fluid and sci-fi “creatures” learn from their non-human companions. I look to all the animate species surrounding me for relief from the intensely gendered and capitalist present. Living between Kansas and Missouri, I speak to the lost and critical connections between my body and the local environment. Spending time outside, I realize a greater kin I have been neglecting: the birds, water, animals, and plants that also call this place home. I imagine a world where bodies are more than their physicalities and the wisdom of the more-than-human beings we share this world with are prioritized over profit.

In a painting it can be hard not to alter imperfections when there is complete control of the image. I have always struggled to accept my features in a place where I often feel so different. I have learned to accept and embrace what makes me unique. My release of expectations always creates more exploration and desire to discover form. This perspective places me in a space farther from self but closer to truth.

This piece, based on the poem “The Orange” by Wendy Cope, displays how our outlook on life can be influenced by something mundane, like an orange. Someone in their lowest moments can be convinced that their life is worth living, simply because of an orange. The position the orange plays in that person's life is monumental. The position of mundane things—clouds, sunsets, smiles—can convince someone to continue their existence. It is our duty as humans to assume our position as a metaphorical orange: to do or be something so simple, that we impact each other in a profound way.

This work addresses the themes of place and memory. Based on childhood photographs in my mother’s home country, Lebanon, my position on place and the concept of homeland is challenged, hence I never feel grounded to a single space or identity. The ironic image of the closed gates from these photographs speaks to the notion of being unable to easily access a land that is deeply rooted in your family's history. With their backs turned to the viewers, the children are in constant search for something, something the viewer cannot provide in their position.

Collaged pieces of Turkish-made fabric and images corresponding to symbols of destruction and migration allude to the displacement of Syrian refugees who have found solace in Turkey. My Syrian background comes from my father’s side of the family, who thankfully left Syria before the civil war, but conversations about the war were essential to our knowledge on identity. I want viewers to think critically on their current knowledge of the Syrian civil war, and the difficulty of taking on a new identity due to one’s displacement.

Part cryptid sighting and part divine visitation, the Moche (pre-Incan) hero Ai Apaec appears before you. Ninth Street Crab God is a reflection of my multifaceted position as student, academic, artist, and Brown Peruvian of Mochica heritage. I’m currently doing a residency at Art Emergency (located at the end of Ninth Street) where I’m processing what it means to share my immigrant story from a place of not only trauma but power. This work is an attempt at challenging my audience to reconsider the usual circuits of "good immigrant" effect, to behold my abyss and this unexpected, sacred mentor.

I liken the experience of moving away from home to the creation of a lava tree mold. When lava encapsulates a tree, it can burn the tree but leave behind a cavity. This inevitable force is both a symbol of destruction and creation. Thus cast away continues to speak towards my experience of what it feels like to have to leave home. I know there is still a part of me that is connected and remains despite this departure but I hold onto some reassurance that there are aspects of myself that will remain.

Kīpuka means “variation or change of form.” In geology it is an area of land that has been surrounded by lava flows. The vegetation that grows within this area serves important ecological purposes like acting as a place of refuge for animals and plants to thrive. They also assist in recolonizing areas with newer lava flows and in a sense offer a form of isolation and protection for native animals and allow organisms to evolve. This print is meant to represent myself in the present, away from my home in Hawaiʻi, and for the future, while acknowledging my new home in Kansas.

Upheaval is defined as “a violent or sudden change or disruption to something.” I view my decision to move away from my home in Hawaiʻi and attend graduate school in Kansas to be a major disruption from the comforts of familiarity. For this print, I took inspiration from the old pahoehoe lava flows, the colors of the lava rock at Hawaiʻi Volcanoes National Park, and how all that I carry with me that makes me both kānaka maoli and kamaʻāina is embedded with me despite whatever huakaʻi (journey) I need to endure away from home.