My project, A Dream of Pennies, is a performance-activist piece aimed at exposing the exploitation of immigrant workers in the United States. As part of the performance, I pick up pennies from the ground and place them in a bucket. The repetitive, slow movements are meant to mirror the back-breaking labor of immigrant agricultural workers who pick the crops that feed a large portion of the country. By replacing the croops with pennies, I tried to highlight the unfair wages that immigrant workers receive despite the harsh working conditions that they experience. I chose this topic because immigrant labor is important to the function of the country, yet they are frequently vilified and dehumanized. In chapter 5 of The Art of Activism: Your All-Purpose Guide To Making The Impossible Possible, the authors said, "It’s too often believed by activists that if people just had access to the same information that we do, they would become aware and act on that awareness. So we supply access: problem solved." With this project, I wanted to put their idea to the test, so instead of just giving people a piece of paper that told them about the exploitation, I created a visual experience that materialised my message and interrupted the public space, making the people walking around watch and acknowledge the issue. According to recent analysis, immigrants make up a disproportionately large share of low-wage-paying jobs, like agricultural workers who only earn $37,370 annually, compared to an average of $65,470 for all other U.S. occupations. Meanwhile, many immigrant farmworkers face wage violations. In a survey conducted in North Carolina, roughly 18% of all farmworkers and 45% of those without H-2A visas said that they did not receive legally mandated wages. These numbers highlight how immigrants are not fairly compensated for the jobs that they provide immense value they create. In the first chapter of one of the first things that the authors say is "If knowledge is power, and knowledge is now so freely available, then why does power still remain firmly in the hands of a few? Something is wrong with the equation." There is a lot of information available online that can be accessed with a simple Google search from firsthand sources that tell how immigrants are taken advantage of by their bosses daily; however, since the topics do not affect people daily, they tend to be disregarded, and instead focus on more issues that affect people directly. In my performance, I attempted to solve that by bringing the issue directly to the people. I performed outside an immigration center where immigrants can go to apply for services and lawyers. While performing, most people pass without engaging, only looking once or twice. Their glances help to strengthen the performance as they mirror the silence around immigrant exploitation. In chapter 4 of the book, when discussing culture, the authors state, "Culture is the operating system of humanity, and if we are going to change the way humanity operates, we need to be able to hack the culture." Although I tried to "hack" the cultural habit of looking away from the exploitation of immigrants by creating a visual representation, the performance only shows that more work needs to be done to raise awareness. This project is not directly related to my major, as I am majoring in accounting, but it does reflect my values and beliefs in social responsibility.
Artists and Projects that inspired my work
- Nomfundo Bala
- Diana Ocholla
- Thola Antamu
- Julia Nowicki
- Nadia Woodward
- Gita Galina
- Rise the Performance
- Inequality.org — “Four Charts on Immigrant Worker Exploitation in America.” Inequality.org
- “Wage, Wage Violations, and Pesticide Safety Experienced by Migrant Farmworkers in North Carolina,” PMC. PMC
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