Those waiting for refugee status and those waiting for the demolition of their people and land to cease, their voices are heard and being carried in San Diego, at UCSD. We can feel their pain, but our privilege is also felt and used to advocate. This piece explores how we can use the shared fight to bridge the gaps created by borders, the borders that create refugees. From the river to the sea.
The photos from the Aljazeera article we read spoke to me so clearly and due to all the organizing and research on the solidarity between the Palestinian and Latine people being done in the past month—and historically for decades—I instantly drew similarities of my people and the Palestinian children in the photos. Both of which have found refuge in San Diego but are also subject to border crossing their homes first. The shared struggle is just amplified by the children who find themselves in the middle and that is part of my inspiration for this piece. I used a collage style and overlapped our similarities—the border walls, but with resistance mural art, and the ocean, a part of our cultures but it’s freedom still restricted. Blending the oceans together so you cannot see where the Pacific starts and the Mediterranean ends. The image of Palestinian children on the beach in Gaza sandwiched between the borders, drawn on halos to represent the growing death toll of children in Gaza. Above them I represent hope in the form of a sacred heart, the hope we need to continue the work we’re doing. Drawing from a quote from the article, “Running into the sea, yelling, screaming – letting it all out so that one can have the energy to keep on persevering.” Salvaging the humanity of refugees and those affected by war, appealing to our empathy is the way community may heal.