From the walls of a physical home to the broader definitions of cultural and national identities, home can be bounded and boundless at the same time. What are the physical, psychological, and virtual boundaries of home? How does home change across personal, socioeconomic, political, racial, and transnational contexts? How do place, spatiality, and identity impact the ideals and ideologies of belonging?
HOUSE X HOME is a computer-based video installation that explores the private and public constructs of house and home. Interpretations of home vary from a physical dwelling, homeland ties, relationships with friends and family, cultural identity, feelings of comfort or familiarity, or a combination of many factors. While home is distinctly personal by nature, it is also shares linkages to the omnipresent forces of diaspora, transmigration, globalization, and more recently, information technology.
This project asks members of different diasporic communities to reflect and express their concepts of home. As the members speak about home, their own drawings of home will then be projected onto their bodies. This methodology allows members to construct their personal three-dimensional maps, connecting people, place, and story—maps that are not bounded by linearity or geographic constraints. Within the constructed, virtual space of the computer screens, the installation serves as a platform for these diasporic strangers to meet and share an intimate conversation that transcends temporality and social boundaries.
METHODOLOGY
I interviewed seven individuals, representing diverse immigration generations, racial and cultural identities, nationalities, and geographic locations. Amongst the group, two identified as first-generation or an international student, three identified as 1.5 generation, and two identified as second-generation. The group encompassed six countries of origin and possessed citizenship from five countries. Five were fully fluent in more than one language, and two had limited proficiency in a language besides English.
GALLERY
REFLECTIONS
What is home? Home is a little yellow house in Silicon Valley and a temporary dorm room in Claremont. Home is the familiar twangs of the Ningbo local dialect. Home is the delicious food that abuelita cooks from the recipes passed down for generations. Home is the expansive ocean and its soothing, calming rhythm. Home is being surrounded by people who love you. Home is dedicating life to something that spreads joy and good vibes. Home is constantly fluxing. Home is a place. Home is not a place. Home is anything and anywhere, yet it can also be nothing and nowhere.
On creativity. While I had not intended to ask questions about creativity, a surprising number of interviewees mentioned the role of creativity and art in their lives, whether it be participation in creative outlets or consumption of creative works. Multiple individuals talked about shedding tears over literature and poetry related to their diasporic identity, while a few others wrote short stories or poetry pieces to heal from their personal traumas. While I was reading Flusser’s Writings, I vividly recall a passage on how transmigrants “should be considered role models whose examples we follow in case we are sufficiently daring. Certainly, only the expelled and the emigrants can allow themselves such thoughts...for emigration is a creative activity, but it also entails suffering” (92). While I had originally doubted the last sentence as an overgeneralization, I now see the profundity of it. Just as home is integrally tied to lived experiences, creativity is rooted in identity development and expression. It is not a mere coincidence that this project on identity and belonging eventually evolved into an exploration of the participants’ creativity.
The simple question of “What is home?” has sparked and inspired a plethora of creative works and critical theory since the beginning of human history. Home is rooted in time, place, space. To exist is to claim a home. To claim a home is to exist. Home is the diaspora; home is the human condition.