We Are Not Our Cruxes
We Are Not Our Cruxes was a multi-pronged project encompassing five hybrid community art-making workshops, art-based research, and interactive website. A total of 268 people signed up for the events, either in-person or virtually, with 101 total attendees. 68 attendees were either adult adoptees or former foster youth. While adoption is usually framed as a child-specific issue, it’s a lifelong journey, and the needs of adult adoptees are often overlooked.
adopted, adoptee, adult adoptee, Nicole Rademacher, adoptee Nicole Rademacher, foster care alumni, museotherapy
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We Are Not Our Cruxes

We Are Not Our Cruxes was a multi-pronged project encompassing five hybrid community art-making workshops, art-based research, and interactive website. A total of 268 people signed up for the events, either in-person or virtually, with 101 total attendees. 68 attendees were either adult adoptees or former foster youth. While adoption is usually framed as a child-specific issue, it’s a lifelong journey, and the needs of adult adoptees are often overlooked. “…Cruxes” centered the voices and mental health of those relinquished, strengthening community and providing healing through art therapy. Struggles and experiences shared from each workshop form the content to be presented through a web-based story repository that is in progress. This website is designed for viewers to discover connections of experiences of adult adoptees and/or foster care alumni through their artwork.

This project demonstrates the vital need for adult adoptee and foster care alumni spaces, research, and resources. Through art-making and community building, we’ve created new pathways for processing our experiences and strengthening connections. As we develop our web-based visualization, we continue making our stories visible.

See the presentation of the preliminary findings of the research conducted through this project. Thank you to Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, California, for their support through the IRB process.

Years

2023 - 2024 (events), research and interactive website ongoing

See

Video excerpt on YouTube

Presenters

Angela Gee, Badly Licked Bear, Benjamin Lundberg Torres Sánchez, Brian Stanton, Dot Todman, JaeRan Kim, Julayne Lee, Kayla Tange, Katelyn Leon Díaz, Laura Callen, Lesli Johnson, María Fernanda, Marie Gardom Lam, Santana Dempsey, Tia Terefe

Event Spaces

Baldwin Hills Branch Library, Club Creative, Michelle and Barack Obama Sports Complex, Peace 4 Kids

Funding

funded in part by the California Arts Council California Creative Corps Fellowship via Arts Council for Long Beach

website developer

Michael Manalo

Category

Community, Video

A split-screen video still showing workshop participants across an in-person and virtual session. On the right, two people raise their hands in a gallery space. A subtitle reads: 'Raise your hand if you're an adoptee.' A participant-made collage combining pressed dried flowers, torn strips of yellow floral and colorful geometric patterned paper, and cut text fragments reading 'Home County' and 'SURE,' displayed alongside an anonymized participant dataset describing their adoption background and identified struggles. Workshop participants seated at tables in a community room, focused on individual artmaking. One participant leans closely over a sketchbook in the foreground while others work in the background. A participant's hands assembling a mixed-media collage from magazine clippings, patterned paper, and tape on a worktable scattered with art supplies. A participant's hands cutting pages from a magazine at a worktable covered in clippings, collage materials, and cut letterforms. Three workshop participants seated at a table examining collage work in progress, with the artist leaning in to discuss a participant's sketchbook. A participant-made artwork depicting a dark silhouette of a human figure surrounded by multiple names written in red and orange marker in English, Korean, and Spanish, each followed by a question mark. A roomful of workshop participants simultaneously holding up their completed artworks toward the camera - for the participants who connected virtually to also see, displaying a diverse range of drawings, collages, and mixed-media pieces.