In Between Portraits Maggie Navracruz

Identity is rarely fully legible through one label alone, and self-identification is often at odds with how individuals are categorized by others. This tension is especially evident for those navigating mixed-race and diasporic ethnicity in present day society, and the practice of creating art provides a way to process and express the multiplicity of experiencing such identities. The ever-growing availability of publicly curated art data now makes it possible to study these saturated expressions of identity through both institutional archives and the artists’ own words. Exhibitions curated around identity provide an entry point for the selection of the modern and contemporary artists considered for this research and the opportunity to compare this study’s aggregated data against the curation of artists within the exhibitions selected. Combining data from open access museum archives, public artists’ statements and interviews, and artwork titles, this project examines the relationship between the art and the artist, the experience of art and identity in the age of modern and contemporary art, and how these topics are characterized within the context set by both artists and institutions.