Wednesday, June 20, 2018 – 6:00PM to 8:00PM
Gallery 400
400 S. Peoria St.
Traversing Departures is a public discussion between artists Yvette Mayorga and Alexandria Eregbu on forms of processing personal transnational narratives of migration to the U.S. Sociologist Xóchitl Bada (UIC) will join Mayorga and Eregbu as a moderator. Bada’s research on Mexican American philanthropist innovators and Black and Brown intersectional relation development will serve as a backbone to examine Mayorga and Eregbu's projects as a social byproduct of movement.
Traversing Departures is a conversation that digs into common ground between Black and Brown femmes, asking is it safe to assume an allyship or similarity. Through Mayorga, Eregbu, and Bada we are able to see the full scope of individuality, research, and methods of self-fashioning.
About the participants:
Yvette Mayorga is an interdisciplinary artist and educator. She uses confection, industrial materials, and the American board game Candy Land as a conceptual framework to juxtapose the borderlands of the U.S. and Mexico. Mayorga has presented her work at The Vincent Price Art Museum, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, EXPO, LACMA's Pacific Standard Time, The Chicago Cultural Center, The National Museum of Mexican Art, University of Indianapolis, The Arts Incubator, Roots and Culture, Weinberg/Newton, and forthcoming at Gallery 400, Ukraine Institute of Modern Art, & Lubeznik Center. Mayorga received her MFA in Fiber and Material Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Alexandria Eregbu is a visual artist, independent curator, and educator. At her core, Alexandria is most passionate about re-imagining 21st century possibilities for artistic practice through service and creating viable support structures that promote both sustainability and accessibility for artists and communities engaging the arts. As an artist, Alexandria’s multi-faceted practice has illuminated pathways to the coasts Portland at the Pacific Northwest College of Art, the Contemporary Arts Center in New Orleans, Pioneer Works in Brooklyn, and throughout the Midwest from the Milwaukee Art Museum, The Luminary in St. Louis, the South Side Community Art Center, Chicago Cultural Center, and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago. Eregbu received her BFA in Performance and Fiber & Material Studies from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Xóchitl Bada is Associate Professor and Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Latin American and Latino Studies Program in the University of Illinois at Chicago. Her research interests include migrant access to political and social rights, migrant organizing strategies, and transnational labor advocacy mobilization in Mexico and the United States. Her first book, Mexican Hometown Associations in Chicagoacán: From Local to Transnational Civic Engagement(Rutgers University Press, 2014, translation to Spanish by El Colegio de Michoacán, 2017) demonstrates how and why emergent forms of citizen participation practiced by Mexican Hometown Associations (HTAs) engage simultaneously with political elites in Mexico and the United States.
The event is presented in conjunction with Out of Easy Reach on view through April 27-August 5.