Origin Stories
Origin Stories is a community-based artistic project exploring concepts of identity, isolation, assimilation, difference, and family. This project documents a multi-year process conducted with marginalized communities in Southern California and Iowa. Originally designed to empower adopted and fostered people to record their unique histories, this 2-hour workshop invites participants to work in groups to create a story using visual prompts. The stories are shared with the entire cohort of participants. Then individually each participant creates at least one card (by drawing, tracing, collage ...) that visually illustrates something from the collective story, i.e. a character, the plot, the resolution, a problem along the way. While at first the workshops were presented only to adopted and fostered people, the workshops were expanded to artists, particularly female-identifying artists and artists who feel marginalized, and the general public. Additionally, for other workshops in Los Angeles, I invited co-facilitators who were not adoptees but told their “origin stories” as they related to social belonging that may intersect with their social positions in the society (immigrant identity, queer, ethnic minority, etc). The cards created in the workshop reflect not only remembered and imagined pasts, but also stories that have been passed down in their birth, adopted, or chosen families; stories that have been whispered from one woman to another; and imagined futures. Each card becomes part of another deck that is printed and used in future workshops.
Origin Stories, Bitter Party, Jerri Allyn, Santana Dempsey, Nateene Diu, Chelo Montoya, Jeanette Yoffe, MA, MFT, adoption, adoptee, Nicole Rademacher, Veridian Community Engagement Fellowship Award, Rema Hort Mann Foundation’s Artistic Community Engagement Grant Los Angeles.
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Origin Stories
Origin Stories was a multifaceted series of community workshops, including presentations by artist-collaborators, a small concert, an exhibition tour, and an exhibition of artworks created by participants. In this work, I drew from my social-emotional arts education, where participants were invited to create stories via a series of visual prompts after presentations and intimate conversations. Individually they each made at least one “inspiration card,” which served as a visual prompt in subsequent workshops. I stimulated dialogue about how we received our own origin stories and engaged participants in art-based activities to recreate their histories. Origin Stories challenged established narratives, promoted connection, and empowered the participants to envision new stories about themselves.
While at first the workshops were presented only to adopted and fostered people, the workshops were expanded to those marginalized by mainstream society, whether through race, gender identity, immigration status, or sexual orientation.
Collaborators: Bitter Party, Jerri Allyn, Santana Dempsey, Nateene Diu, Chelo Montoya, and Jeanette Yoffe, MA, MFT.
*This project was partially funded by the Veridian Community Engagement Fellowship Award and the Rema Hort Mann Foundation’s Artistic Community Engagement Grant Los Angeles.
Collaborations
Self-Help Graphics & Art, ONE Gallery/MOCA Pacific Design Center, California African American Museum, 18th Street Arts Center, University of Northern Iowa + AMP Youth