a memory box from B. Amore's previous exhibit: An Italian American Odyssey
A few weeks ago we discussed how artists in Vermont are sharing the stories of the Mexican migrant farm workers who staff many of the local dairy farms. We highlighted The Golden Cage Project and The Vermont Folklife Center's new exhibition Invisible Odysseys: Art By and About Mexican Farm Workers in Vermont. This project, as the VFC describes it, centered around the artwork of local schoolchildren and also the migrant workers' own attempts to render their experiences into "memory boxes." This effort was lead by B. Amore:
Artist and writer B. Amore and brought paints, wooden boxes, and mixed media materials to Mexican workers so that they could engage in making three-dimensional representations of their personal journeys. Through participation in the project farm workers have told their own stories, in their own words, and through their own individual artistic expression.
The Wisconsin Public Radio program Here on Earth broadcast an hour-long discussion with B. Amore about the exhibition and her experiences working with this population--and it can be streamed from the show's site here. It's a wonderful discussion of how art can be used as a vehicle through which these migrant communities can tell a story that's much richer, and much more complicated, than the ways in which this issue has been framed in by politicans, pundits and larger media outlets.
