No Tresspassing: Artists Comment on the Migration Crisis

The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery at John Jay College of Criminal Justice of the City of New York University, No Tresspassing: Artists Comment on the Migration Crisis, Installation view, with Johnny Illescas's ceramic, fabric and filling works and Rodney Zelenka’s  mixed  media paintings, 2024. Photo courtesy The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery.

No Tresspassing: Artists Comment on the Migration Crisis
Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery
John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY   
860 11th Avenue New York, NY 10019    
Curated by Thalia Vrachopoulos
March 27 – May 17, 2024


By MARK BLOCH, April 24, 2024

The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery at John Jay College of Criminal Justice presents the exhibition No Trespassing: Artists Comment on the  Migration Crisis curated by Dr. Thalia Vrachopoulos.

John Jay College, on the frontline of the immigraton struggle following their generous initiative to freely provide its North Hall Space to serve as a processing center for asylum seekers, is presenting the show as part of an ongoing conversation  about  fundamental human desires for fairness, equality and the rule of law. The unique college, part of CUNY, approaches justice as an  applied art and  science in service  to society.

This exhibition collates art and artists of divergent cultures working in a variety of media, who visually address the ripple effect of legal and, so called- illegal migration and immigration that has developed in Europe and the U.S. in the last few years. Movement north from the Southern Hemisphere, the displacement of people through war as in the Middle East, Ukraine, and other hot spots around the globe, and poverty evident along the US/Mexico border crossings, not to mention politicians exploiting the issue for their own gain, have created an undeniable, un-ignorable refugee crisis that international non-profit organizations, philanthropic corporations and state universities like John Jay are actively struggling to combat. The various ongoing humanitarian catastrophes surrounding immigration and migrant communities require all of us to get on board to alleviate this impending emergency worldwide which will only get worse if it continues to be oversimplified at best or shrugged off which is much more dangerous.

Three silkscreen posters by Fares Alhalai. Photos courtesy of The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery.

In its diversity this art show examines not only migration but also the problems of acculturation in the adoptive countries. In one way or another, these artists explore, the idea of nationhood, and people clinging to their own customs and traditions like haunting melodies as well as the pivotal longing for a long-gone homeland clashing with the required obligation to adapt and synthesize foreign outlooks within a diverse web of constant change.

While some migrant communities or displaced ethnic groups stick to their own cultural and artistic values, others apprehend the new ideologies or creative stimuli of their host country, providing an attentive artistic community with fresh, profound ideas, and unique cultural perspectives, reminiscent of a tradition in art explored in previous eras. Alfred Stieglitz, Marcel Duchamp, and the Surrealist Kurt Seligmann who helped others to emigrate, as well as Mark Rothko, Willem deKooning, and many other European refugees to the United States who thrived after WWII, or more recent transplants like Ana Mendieta or Alfredo Jaar, each confronted being a stranger in a strange land at the same time their unique voice provided a beacon of hope to other outsiders thinking about digging up their roots and relocating to a future with new possibilities as well as new challenges.

  Marina Leybishkis, Ode to the Sea, 2018-2020, Video, sound, cellphones. Photo courtesy of The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery.

 
Marina Leybishkis from Uzbekistan, working on a residency and a Fulbright grant for artistic research, travelled to Greece to visit a reception and identification center on the island of Lesvos where she interviewed migrants whose voice eerily hang from the ceiling on cell phones. At the time, it was the largest refugee camp in Europe with people fleeing from all over including Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria. In front of a large video of a beautiful environment, the projected scene and the matrix of phones that shield it invite playful interaction but upon closer examination, the lone boat patrolling the invisible border between Turkey and Greece in the video is menacing and foreboding.

Ukrainian-born Olga Rudenko studied at the Art Students League and is interested in computer coding. She uses underscores and lower case letters to depict the code behind appearances, the causal back end of human social media. Her seemingly user-friendly paintings, including human hearts and the inclusion of a real t-square, depict stylized, almost corpse-like figures sporting emoji faces to evoke loss and trauma.

The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery at John Jay College of Criminal Justice of the City of New York University, No Tresspassing: Artists Comment on the Migration Crisis, Installation view, with Olga Rudenko's <!--oracle_of_delfi -->, <!--strong_woman_tender_wounds -->, <!--woman_with_big_heart -->, 2024. Photo courtesy The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery.

Panmanian Rodney Zelenka, inspired by the image of Andy Warhol's electric chair, decided to create ten paintings related to war and abuse of power. “It gave me the title ‘Electric chair for the assassins of the inocent,’” he said. Zelenka’s paintings, including in Spanish “La Silla Electrica Para El Asesino de los Inocentes” are packed with symbolic iconography.

Despo  Magoni has created paintings, books and works on paper throughout her long distinguished career in which she explores myth, women’s issues, history and current events. Nostalgic photos of family members float in collage space, focusing her signature abstract landscapes on poignant marriage between isolation and intimacy she brings to life.

Detail of Olga Rudenko's <!--woman_with_big_heart -->, 2024. Photo courtesy The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery.

Pam Cooper is a sculptress from the UK who studied at Pratt. Her 2016 piece Invisible is about unaccompanied minors and the vulnerability of El Salvadoran, Honduran and Guatemalan  children attempting to cross the Southwest border into the USA. The work features tiny white handmade abaca paper shoes hanging from chains tagged with stories and statements about problems experienced by both the children and government workers.

In addition to Laura Veles Drey's burlap and polyproylene mesh wall hangings and there were at least four videos including work by Ye’ela Wilschanski, Elli Chrysidou and Despina Meimaroglou in the expansive gallery space that the curator has turned toward the injustices of immigration.

Pam Cooper, Invisible, 2016, Handmade abaca  paper, thread, chains, & pencil. Photo courtesy The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery.

“Bring us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”



This simple quote is still working for Americans, after 140 years since we were gifted the Statue of Liberty from France. Ignoring it or doing a one eighty from this fundamental principle of our country doesn’t make anyone’s lives better. Joe Biden surprised the world when he recently called the bluff of Republicans and agreed to address the problem of immigration, the first new proposal on the matter in decades. Led by Trump pandering to those who love to hate and blame outsiders, the Republicans backed down on this, their favorite issue.

The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery at John Jay College of Criminal Justice of the City of New York University, No Tresspassing: Artists Comment on the Migration Crisis, Installation view, with Despo  Magoni's mixed media and collage on paper, 2024. Photo courtesy The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery.

 
Biden's action acknowledged that we can demystify common misconceptions about immigration by owning that it is not the volume nor pace of immigration that fuels disaffection but the willingness to accept, absorb, and manage new flows of people. The U.S. economy would flourish if outdated immigration policy were modernized and the number of immigration judges and staff to make quicker decisions on asylum were increased. We need to create more opportunities for people to legally immigrate to the U.S., not less. 



Despite the current feverish hysteria, building or expanding walls along our country’s borders is less popular than it was a few years ago. Not long ago an attempted ban on certain populations entering this nation based on their religion or when the children of potential immigrants were locked up in cages, the people of this country cried out and took action to stop it, undo it, and set right wrongs being committed in our names, just as we admitted that it was wrong, in the 1940s, to put people of Japanese heritage into internment camps.

 

Detail of Despo Magoni's The Grandparents. Mixed media and collage on paper, 2023. Photo courtesy The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery.



Such votes of disapproval, actions and statements of defiance by everyday Americans is something this country can be proud of. In short, we should all speak up for every stand to oppose and resist xenophobia and address this persistent issue.



With anti-immigration and ultranationalistic politics rising in countries across Europe, Asia and Africa, is nativist fervor outside of the United States caused by what they see happening within the United States? Yes. Just as we once inspired the world with our policies toward immigrants, the U.S. system, even today, works quite well most of the time but needs a reboot. We have learned that immigrants are a net gain for any host country, beneficial to any nation and we exported this idea before we exported our fear of immigrants.

The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery at John Jay College of Criminal Justice of the City of New York University, No Tresspassing: Artists Comment on the Migration Crisis, Installation view, with Laura Veles Drey's burlap, polypropylene mesh hangings. Photo courtesy of The Anya and Andrew Shiva Gallery.

Immigrants contribute to our communities in ways that go far beyond their positive impact on the economy. Anti-immigration doesn’t block just refugees but engineers, scientists, and artists just because they are here from the "wrong" country on a list or practice a "wrong" religion. Immigrant phobia isn’t just blocking these people but their kids and grandkids from growing up here—future Americans whose contributions we can’t begin to anticipate.



The participating artists in No Tresspassing are: Fares Alhalabi, Antigoni Kavatha, Despina Meimaroglou, Despo Magoni, Elli Chrysidou, Johnny Illescas, Kim Weston, Laura Veles Drey, Lydia Venieri, Marina Leybishkis, Olga Rudenko, Pam Cooper, Tom Haviv, Wm Tyler Morgan, Ye’ela Wilschanski, and Rodney Zelenka. WM