In addition to English, 18th Street Arts Center is pleased to additionally present Re-Homing Instincts in Spanish, Hebrew*, Farsi, Jamaican-Patois, Brazilian Portuguese and Pashto, the languages of each participating artist's origin. Click the flags below!
*The Hebrew translation was updated on May 22 after it was brought to our attention that there was an error in translation.
Português Brasileiro
Español
فارسی
עִברִית
Jamaican Patois
Pashto
Homing: An animal’s inherent ability to find its way home.
Living in a place. Occupying an environment that coexists with the rest of us, which eventually becomes ourselves. How do we inhabit this place that we call home? Planet Earth is the mother of everything and everyone, but we humans have a unique way of relating to it. Repeated stories of forced displacement between tribes and animals, and the migration of birds and people from the south to north and east to west, are some of the ways how life occurs cyclically in the here and now.
The exhibition Re-Homing Instincts explores how artists become not only participants in modes of living in this place but also storytellers. Through a selection of contemporary immigrant and first-generation women artists who have strong roots in LA, the exhibition addresses how they traditionally heal their bodies by eating the geosphere itself, the emotional scars that are left after leaving one’s land of origin (Diaspora), and the mode in which immigrants find a new home when connecting with new people in these new places.
Participating Artists:
Portrait by @emily.lang.
Photo by Saige Kristian.
Note from the Curator:
As an immigrant myself in the US, I have encountered in multiple occasions the mistreatment and misunderstanding of my own culture and the systemic powerlessness that such actions inflict. How might one heal from such pain and build empathy between cultures? I take the example of brave women who, through art, inspire generations of immigrants in the US to remain strong and to tell their stories regarding any previous misinformation prevailing in this new context. Either through shared experiences of such frailty, through the re-enacting of the crosspaths between cultures, or through the expressed and honest invitation for contributing to continue writing a new “us in here,” a portion of this web of shared wisdom will be highlighted in the exhibition entitled Re-Homing Instincts. The show will be featuring six artists from various places around the world who, in the same way as me, have chosen Los Angeles as a place to settle, making it a second home after leaving behind the land that gave us birth. Intertwined stories of displacement and re-homing will be shared and written as a way to sensitize historic misunderstandings that set people apart.
-Frida Cano
On View April 22 - June 17
18th Street Arts Center, Airport Campus
3026 Airport Avenue, Santa Monica, CA
18th Street Arts Center recognizes and acknowledges the first people of the ancestral territory on which its two sites have been built. With respect to their elders, past and present, and future generations, we recognize the Gabrieleño Tongva – who are still here – and honor, with gratitude, the land itself and those who have stewarded it throughout the generations. We honor and respect the many indigenous peoples still connected to this land on which we gather, and we commit our work in service to and in alignment with these values. Please consider supporting the Gabrieleño Tongva at https://tongva.land/donate/
This exhibition is generously supported by the Andy Warhol Foundation, Santa Monica Cultural Affairs Division, Los Angeles County Department of Arts and Culture, California Community Foundation – LA Arts Fund, Perenchio Foundation, and 18th Street’s generous Board of Trustees and community of donors.