Home Land Security

Home Land Security brings together works by 18 contemporary artists and collectives from across 12 countries to reflect on the human dimensions and increasing complexity of national security, including the physical and psychological borders we create, protect, and cross in its name. Rather than giving answers, Home Land Security is aimed at providing visitors with questions for personal contemplation, asking them to consider how fear of “other” (other nationality, other religion, etc.) has contributed to deep cultural misunderstanding, ethnic profiling, forced migration, and the building of barriers between individuals and nations. Through its inclusion of a diversity of voices and perspectives, Home Land Security encourages empathy within visitors for the “other” they might otherwise have never encountered or considered in a nuanced way.

Like all of FORSITE’s collaborative projects, Home Land Security is geared toward having an impact well beyond the exhibition run. By excavating the many and varied layers that comprise the military sites in which the exhibition is installed, and bringing them to light under a contemporary lens, Home Land Security is highlighting the significance of our country’s historic sites and parks as multifaceted places of transformation, healing, and learning. These sites are the keepers of important histories, and the intention of a project like Home Land Security is to infuse those histories with new and relevant life, encouraging a new generation of park stewardship. In fact, FOR SITE’s projects have proven so effective at this work that the Art in the Parks program is being considered as a model for the national park system nationwide.

FORSITE is also eager to support a rich afterlife for the artists and artworks featured in Home Land Security. For example, artist Alexia Webster is already planning to expand her Refugee Street Studios project. While in San Francisco for the opening, Alexia was struck by the international audience and the incredibly moving reactions of visitors seeing the exhibition. We are thrilled that she now intends to grow her project to include portraiture of refugee groups around the world. Additionally, she wants to create a searchable database to archive resulting portraits, providing a virtual home for the refugees’ uprooted lives and the hope of future connections.

Vision

Extending Home Land Security’s impact

To extend the impact of Home Land Security beyond this particular place and time, FOR-SITE seeks additional funds to: 1. Work with Díaz-Lewis and Human Rights Watch to secure additional venues for 34,000 Pillows. 2. Work with Alexia Webster to build an online digital archive of her Refugee Street Studios project. 3. Investigate opportunities to tour the exhibition to other historic sites.

FOR-SITE Foundation

Model and Strategy

Impact

Leadership

Cheryl Haines