Josephine's Journalism Blog: Immigrant Arts Exhibit

By Josephine Wallace

August 15, 2018

Since July 18, The Corvallis Arts Center located in Central Park has displayed the exhibition “I Came from Far Away but I am Here Now,” a collection of multimedia pieces made by immigrants in Oregon.

Eighteen artists came together to display work from across the globe, from Europe, South America, Asia, the Middle East, and South Africa. The show takes up all of the main gallery, the walls covered in art ranging from paintings to pencil drawings to a collection of framed miscellaneous family objects titled “Before me… During us… After them,” constructed by an artist and Croatian immigrant, Elly Love.

The Arts Center curator, Hester Coucke, is responsible for making sure art is on the walls and has been working with the exhibition committee putting this show together for about a year now.

Given that the Trump administration has made this a focal point of discussion, Coucke and the rest of the committee found the idea to be relevant and valuable.

“At the art center, we feel it’s really important to show artwork that stands with two feet in society. In the bigger picture, it’s that we’re not… this isolated art-for-art’s-sake ivory tower but that we really make connections between what is happening in the world and how you can respond to that with art,” Coucke said.

“The goal of the arts center,” she said, is “not to tell you what to think, but that you should think-- And immigration is a part of that.”

The arts center put out a call to artists, giving them time to respond and create art if need be. Half of the artists were invited and the other half responded to the call.

Among selected applicants was Valeria Dávila, who submitted two photos from her “Winter Series,” depicting a snow-cloaked Corvallis. Dávila was born and raised in Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina, Dávila immigrated to the United States in 2016. “The Southern-most city in the world,” said Dávila, snow copiously occupies winter months in Ushuaia.

Dávila said that “... the locals warned me that snow here is very unusual. Therefore, when one wintry morning I woke up and opened the window I couldn't believe my eyes-- the garden was covered with snow. It was a moment of pure joy--magical--like suddenly being in Ushuaia again or inside of the scenario of one of my memories. I grabbed my camera, went for a long walk, and ended up producing this Winter Series.”

“Being part of the exhibition has been a beyond pleasing experience,” she said.

An immigrant herself from the Netherlands, Coucke wanted to be sure that different stories were represented. “There’s different races, different genders, different levels of education, different dreams and hopes and these are all individuals. That’s another statement we felt was important to stress -- that if you are an “alien” you don’t look all the same… You’re people.”

The People’s Choice Award was given to Artist and Photographer Greg Bal. Bal moved to Oregon four years ago from Iowa and migrated from India at the age of nine.

“A lot of what I think the immigrant population of the century is going through, regardless of where they’re from, are the same things that I experienced: discrimination.” Ball went on to explain the “fog” that is living in a new country without being able to speak the language.

Bal and Coucke both commented on the stress on the immigrant population due to the Trump administration-- and this reaches local terrain. Oregon Measure 105 will be voted on this November, determining whether or not Oregon will remain a sanctuary state. If passed, it will allow law enforcement agencies to use funds, equipment, and personnel to find and punish those in violation of the federal immigration law.

The intention and desire of the art exhibit, said Coucke, was to provide a basis for connection and to give immigrant artists a voice. “We feel that the more connected a people is, the better of a society that you can have and art is an excellent way of making those connections.”

Speaking to that same connection, Dávila said, All around the world immigrants face the image that they represent for others…a fantasized image that can be strongly rooted, and I think that getting to know the stories of those who come from afar generates empathy, bonding, and helps deconstruct that image.”

She continued, “There is also a plenitude we humans achieve by sharing, by bonding with others, and for the immigrant, this is crucial when it comes to relating to the new habitat.”

Coucke and The Arts Center encourage guests to “come and see the story behind people that all have something different to say about their experience, as being initially a stranger, an outsider, in a country.”

“I Came From Far Away but I Am Here Now” displays through August 31. The Arts Center is located in Central Park, Corvallis and open 12-5 p.m., Tuesdays through Saturdays.