“You don’t look like the rest of your family.” This is what my best friend said to me after meeting my family for the first time. This is the first time that I had become acutely aware that, from an outside perspective, I don’t “look like” I fit in with the people who are closest to me.
I’m half Mexican, but being raised exclusively by my mother’s white family, I have never had a connection to my Latin heritage. I maintain hazy memories of the few times my abuela visited when I was a small child, but that is the closest thing I have to a connection with the culture. I never learned Spanish– I don’t even know for certain what part of Mexico my ancestors came from.
Because of this, I almost feel like I’m appropriating a culture just by looking Latino. Part of me feels I don’t deserve to have a Latin surname. But this feeling is exactly why the “Lost and Found” Exhibition on display in the University of Central Missouri’s Art Center gallery spoke to me. As long as I have been aware of my heritage, I have felt a tension between my experiences and the assumptions of others. This exhibition perfectly captured the similar experiences that other Latinos have faced, grappling with cultural in-betweens.
On Jan. 13, the Department of Art and Design held a panel discussion featuring artists from Migrating Assembly for Stories and Art, a Kansas City-based collective of artists as part of the Kleppe Visiting Artist Lecture Series. This panel discussion coincided with an exhibition featuring the collective’s work titled “Lost and Found” on display in the Art Center gallery.
The Migrating Assembly for Stories and Art is a collective of Latino artists that use visual mediums to showcase their unique identities and experiences. The panel discussion focused on the struggle of being a person cast to the margins in one way or another. The artists spoke earnestly about their experiences living in America as people with Latin heritage who, throughout their complex life journeys, have been disconnected from their culture.
They went on to explain that the idea behind the exhibition, “Lost and Found,” was to highlight the parts of their identities that have been “lost” and what they have “found” through the process of trying to reconnect with their cultures. Their use of juxtaposing ideas to describe an inner, personal tension between competing emotions earnestly captures the feeling of being stuck and uncertain about your culture.
Through experiencing this art, I find that this feeling is shared by others, and being unsure about where you stand can be an identity in and of itself. I had never encountered anyone who had shared this experience until attending this panel discussion and observing the art showcased in the gallery. I’ve come to understand that the concept of identity is not static but a continual journey.
This exhibition has led me to realize that the process of reconnecting with your culture and exploring your identity is not about reaching a perfect understanding but honoring the attempt to create meaning from the in-between.
