The Crossing

The inspiration for this art piece that I drew was the origin of my mother's time here in the United States, she grew up in a poor town in Michoacan, Mexico where there's no hospital, stores with imported goods from the big cities, no wifi, tv, and much of anything else one may see today. Apart from the poor background of the town, it was also around the time cartels started to grow in numbers and they liked the secluded towns. As time went on, the area started becoming dangerous and there was no future for residents there. Many decided to leave and my mother happened to be one of them. She had my older brother at the time and he was no older than a year. The journey would be too rough to carry a baby through, so as she arrived closer to the border she decided to send my brother with a known person on a plane, at the time security was not as strict so he went through without issue. She had to cross through rough terrain and dangerous rivers to be able to make it into the United States all while having the thought of her baby in her head. The one thing she had with her was a small suitcase with one change of clothes, she had to carry light else the journey would be harder. Although she couldn’t enter the expected way with how systems were set up at the time, seeing that border was her path to a new life. That is my inspiration for this drawing, my mother reaching the wall and it opening its doors for her to be in a safer and better place. She has her suitcase being dragged along with my brother in her arms, except the image of a baby in her arms was just a symbol of what many other mothers go through when coming to the US, whether they leave their children behind or take them on their journey. The plane above signifies my brother being on the other side in safety. The way I created this drawing was by showing in picture the reality of many immigrant mothers that may cross legally or illegally. To give them the image of being a human rather than aliens, and that is what I wanted to incorporate into my drawing. I wanted to go for a more old style art drawing sketch rather than a colorful drawing. The process many immigrants go through is short of colorful, many of them suffer so I felt that having a blank canvas would emphasize that emotion and undertone of the journey. I decided to incorporate symbols within the image to have different meanings, those meanings will be different for each person. For my mother it was knowing her son would be on one of those planes and reminding her of him. For others, it shows the emphasis the journey one takes to arrive in the US to be scrutinized, meanwhile someone is in a comfortable plane seat greeted with open arms. It carries the strength of family, as she walks her baby is still in her heart. Many immigrants are forced to leave families behind so family becomes a big part of their heart, and it carries through here in the US even with my family. Immigrant motherhood and border crossing art