Roosevelt Avenue: Contested Terrain, Neighborhood Center, or Border?
Participants in the Heart of Corona Initiative
Credit: Queens Museum of Art
- The Heart of Corona Initiative is a precursor to Immigrant Movement International.
- The Heart of Corona Initiative is comprised of artists and residents of Corona who converge to create a collection of small projects aimed to call attention to the issues that the community faces, as well as build ties within the community.
- An example of a community building project is Stephanie Diamond’s This Is What I Eat (2007); this is a cookbook filled with recipes for ethnic dishes that may be shared between the largely Hispanic immigrants of Corona. Projects like this allow the immigrant community to establish trust with one another. Once this sense of solidarity is established among peoples that quite often face issues such as discrimination, the art can take a more politicized form.
Stephanie Diamond’s “This is What I Eat:” A Cookbook Created by the Community in Corona
- One such politicized form of art took hold in Hector Canonge’s Muros Distópicos / Dystopic Walls. Canonge worked with a team to build a wall dividing the Western Union in Corona Plaza; the wall symbolically represents the border between the U.S. and Mexico. Canonge brought the residents of Corona together making the wall interactive; the residents posted stories of their immigrant/immigration experience on one side of the wall, while the other side is filled with pictures of their experiences as “American.”
Sketch for Hector Canonge’s “Dystopic Wall,” erected in Corona Plaza
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