I made the lights for the lightboxes
The installation combines multiple light boxes made from etched and hand-painted photographs with an animation on video screens. It draws from first-person accounts to tell the stories of four people who moved to Philadelphia and the challenges they faced in making it their home.
Photo michelle gustafson for NYT.
“ARRIVAL AND BELONGING” (2021) IS A TWO-PART PROJECT COMMISSIONED BY THE PHILADELPHIA ART MUSEUM AS PART OF THE “NEW GRIT: ART & PHILLY NOW” EXHIBITION.“ARRIVAL AND BELONGING” IS A LARGE-SCALE MULTISCREEN VIDEO INSTALLATION WITH LIGHTBOXES AND A SERIES OF EVENTS HIGHLIGHTING THE EXPERIENCES OF COMMUNITY MEMBERS THROUGHOUT THE CITY. OVER AN EXTENDED PERIOD OF INTIMATE CONVERSATIONS, ORTIZ GATHERED THE STORIES OF FOUR PHILADELPHIANS WHO REPRESENT A WIDE RANGE OF LIVED EXPERIENCES AS IMMIGRANTS AND MIGRANTS: FATU GAYFLOR, A WEST PHILADELPHIAN FROM WORLALA, LIBERIA, WHO FLED THE FIRST LIBERIAN CIVIL WAR; JAMAAL HENDERSON, A RECENT RESIDENT AND A PROMINENT LOCAL ADVOCATE FOR HOUSING RIGHTS FOR THE HOMELESS; CARLOS TORRES, A NORTH PHILADELPHIAN WHO LEFT PUERTO RICO FOLLOWING THE DEVASTATIONS OF CLIMATE CHANGE; AND EPIFANIA ORTIZ, A SOUTH PHILADELPHIA RESIDENT—AND THE ARTIST’S MOTHER—WHO EMIGRATED FROM COLOMBIA. USING FIRST-PERSON TESTIMONIALS, PHOTOGRAPHS, AND PAINTERLY ANIMATIONS, ORTIZ PERSONALIZES THESE FOUR ACCOUNTS AND HUMANIZES THE STRUGGLE AND CHALLENGES OF FINDING HOME.
(PRODUCTION TEAM: JOSE MAZARIEGOS, GRALIN HUGHES, JUSTIN GELLER)