Keyvan Shovir, Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here, Michael Arcega, Sarah Farahat
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Bonny Nahmias, Robin Lasser + Adrienne Pao, Weston Teruya
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What lies in the space between colonial power and indigenous resistance, between the diaspora and the
homeland? What is the space between us and them, between here and there?
Working with the familiar trope of landscape, the twelve artists and art projects in Betweenscapes
visualize the in-between as a site of resistance and criticality through both traditional media and
conceptually-driven installations. The objects on view address unresolved histories such as the
protracted impact of colonialism and its relation to migration. Others pose rhetorical questions about
home, difference and community-building through transnational alliance. All the works are set against
actual and conceptual landscapes.
Betweenscapes does not romanticize resistance. Instead, artists challenge those committed to this work
to recognize the complex and sometimes contentious results of alliance-building across communities,
often starting with themselves. Sarah Farahat uses performance and self-portraiture to consider
narratives of immigration set against the backdrop of settler colonialism and manifest destiny in the
United States. Weston Teruya turns his sustained study of a 1969 photograph of Third World Liberation
Front founders into a large-scale paper sculpture of fists united in a symbol of solidarity. Along the way,
he highlights what is silenced, absented and lost in translation.
At different turns, the works in Betweenscapes evidence practices of archiving, autobiography and
fictionalizing. The varied processes suggest that more than answers, questions may arise from the in-
between. In spite of that discomfort, those questions must be addressed if we are to move toward a
sustainable existence.
Artists: Michael Arcega, Rea Lynn de Guzman, Sarah Farahat, Henry Francisco, Anahita Hekmat,
Robin Lasser + Adrienne Pao, Means of Exchange, Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here, Bonny Nahmias,
Eric Nodora, Susana Eslava Sáenz, Azin Seraj, Keyvan Shovir, Weston Teruya
Curated by Kathy Zarur and Roula Seikaly
Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center and Kearny Street Workshop
Hosted by SOMArts Cultural Center
May 2018
homeland? What is the space between us and them, between here and there?
Working with the familiar trope of landscape, the twelve artists and art projects in Betweenscapes
visualize the in-between as a site of resistance and criticality through both traditional media and
conceptually-driven installations. The objects on view address unresolved histories such as the
protracted impact of colonialism and its relation to migration. Others pose rhetorical questions about
home, difference and community-building through transnational alliance. All the works are set against
actual and conceptual landscapes.
Betweenscapes does not romanticize resistance. Instead, artists challenge those committed to this work
to recognize the complex and sometimes contentious results of alliance-building across communities,
often starting with themselves. Sarah Farahat uses performance and self-portraiture to consider
narratives of immigration set against the backdrop of settler colonialism and manifest destiny in the
United States. Weston Teruya turns his sustained study of a 1969 photograph of Third World Liberation
Front founders into a large-scale paper sculpture of fists united in a symbol of solidarity. Along the way,
he highlights what is silenced, absented and lost in translation.
At different turns, the works in Betweenscapes evidence practices of archiving, autobiography and
fictionalizing. The varied processes suggest that more than answers, questions may arise from the in-
between. In spite of that discomfort, those questions must be addressed if we are to move toward a
sustainable existence.
Artists: Michael Arcega, Rea Lynn de Guzman, Sarah Farahat, Henry Francisco, Anahita Hekmat,
Robin Lasser + Adrienne Pao, Means of Exchange, Al-Mutanabbi Street Starts Here, Bonny Nahmias,
Eric Nodora, Susana Eslava Sáenz, Azin Seraj, Keyvan Shovir, Weston Teruya
Curated by Kathy Zarur and Roula Seikaly
Asian Pacific Islander Cultural Center and Kearny Street Workshop
Hosted by SOMArts Cultural Center
May 2018