2020
Massachusetts College ofLiberal Arts MCLA HT94 →
Hostile Terrain 94 is a multisite, interactive installation that illustrates, in stark terms, the violence of United States border policies by memorializing the thousands of people who have perished seeking to cross the US-Mexico border. MCLA’s Gallery 51 is one of over 100 sites worldwide hosting this exhibition, which will open in February of 2021. We are bringing this installation to our campus in order to bear witness to this violence, and to engage in a conversation on campus and in the community about immigration, belonging, and social change. In concert with HT94, Gallery 51 will feature the work of Sergio de la Torre, Chris Treggiari (Sanctuary City Project), and Trinh Mai, all of whom will collaborate with students, faculty, and the community on a series of workshops and experiences that examine identity, belonging, fear, and trauma.
2020
Blue Star Contemporary
San Antonio, TX →
The Sanctuary City Project invites the San Antonio community to reflect on their ideas, personal experiences, and histories with migration with call and response and additional activations out in the community. The exhibition in the gallery includes screen printed posters installed and for take away, a digital timeline representing qualitative and quantitative research surrounding the sanctuary ordinances and immigration issues, a video work compiling peaceful pro-immigration protests since President Trump’s election.
2020
Guerrero Gallery
San Francisco, CA
Lining a row of dusty pillars in an abandoned industrial warehouse on the fringes of San Francisco are a series of banners created by the Sanctuary City Project using community engagement to create a dialogue surrounding sanctuary cities and immigration issues. Seen in the context of this vacant yet once thriving hub of economic activity, messages such as “UNDOCUMENTED AND ESSENTIAL”, “A PILE OF BROWN BODIES” and “WHERE WOULD YOU GO BACK TO?” read as potent mantras that resonate with a moment in which people are pouring into the streets to demand justice, as the pandemic rips through communities and the very existence of the United States feels as if it’s teetering on the brink. Or perhaps this strange vacant space, interspersed with sincere statements that call for pause and contemplation, should serve as a metaphor or a cautionary tale for the future of a country whose legacy, leaders and policies perpetrate unthinkable violence on undocumented people across this country.
2019-2020
Seattle U Vachon Gallery →
The Sanctuary Print Shop bridges art and community: it is both a functioning print shop and an open space for engaging questions about immigrant rights. Visitors are invited to not simply take in the exhibition– comprised of prints, timelines and videos about sanctuary cities and immigration ordinances in the US– but to directly participate in silkscreen workshops and printmaking events, community conversations, and other public interventions held over the course of five months. In the tradition of printmaking for social justice, Sanctuary Print Shop: Seattle uses art and
design as catalysts for shaping the future. All are welcome here.
2018
The Museum of Contemporary Art
San Diego →
The Sanctuary Print Shop originated at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco, exploring the history of the sanctuary ordinance in the state of California. The next print shop opened at The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego. Again at MCASD we turned the museum into a space for collaboration, dialogue, and action, De La Torre and Treggiari invite visitors to raise their voice as they activate the print shop through a series of workshops and conversations with immigrants, lawyers, activist, and others. Also included was a video timeline documenting this history will examine San Diego’s relationship to immigration and a wheat pasted wall using the posters created at YBCA.
2018
For Freedoms Project →
For the For Freedoms project the Sanctuary City Project created the billboard, “THE COUNTRY OF THE IMMIGRANT IS HERE.” The billboard was located on Mission Street between 19th and 20th st in San Francisco CA.
2018
Minnesota Street Projects, re: home →
Sponsored by the Goethe Institute, re:home is a For Freedoms exhibition and community action that examines how the broad societal crises of sanctuary city, homelessness, and the flight of the creative class intersect in the San Francisco Bay Area.
2018
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Get With The Action →
Bursting into the public realm in the mid-1960s, the protest poster has been used all over the world to incite change and empower the voice of the people. This exhibition presents the political poster as a powerful tool for organizing and activating communities in response to some of the most pressing issues over the past 50 years, from the Civil Rights and Anti-War movements to social justice, immigration, environmental causes, and more.
Get with the Action, a title taken from a screenprint by the artist and progressive activist nun Corita Kent, explores the medium of the poster as a communication device — one intended to be publically displayed, produced en masse, and often ephemeral — to inform and energize a wide audience. The works on view, focused on the creative output of the Bay Area and beyond, highlight the power of applied graphic design and its utility in presenting information while rallying citizens around a cause.
2018
Silicon Valley Community Foundation →
The Sanctuary City Project was invited to create six Vinyl Wall Murals at the Silicon Valley Community Foundation. For this installation we used the six phrases:
This is a sanctuary.
The country of the immigrant is here.
Undocumented Unafraid.
Where will people go?
I am an immigrant.
Why did you come here?
2018
Thatcher Gallery, University of San Francisco, Quiet Spaces →
Sanctuary, a safe place of refuge, can be found not only in a physical place of shelter, but also in the vastness of nature or the comfort of home. It can be rooted in a memory, the peacefulness of solitude, or feelings of nostalgia. Quiet Spaces: Picturing Sanctuary in the Illustrated Book celebrates the many and varied ways in which the idea of personal and collective refuge is represented in image and text in modern illustrated books. Depictions of expansive landscapes, moments of seclusion, and gatherings of loved ones bring the notion of refuge to life. Through a range of printed illustrations and photographs, Quiet Spaces encourages the exploration of diverse experiences and perceptions of sanctuary through the lens of modern illustrated books.
2017
Institute of Contemporary Art
San Jose →
The Sanctuary City Project was invited to create an installation at the Institute of Contemporary Art, (ICA) in San Jose, as part of their On The Left exhibition. For this installation we included the Sanctuary Mobile Print Cart and also introduced a new wall mural with the phrase from the poster, “THE COUNTRY OF THE IMMIGRANT IS HERE.”
2017
Yerba Buena Center for the Arts,
San Francisco →
In pursuit of this mission, The Sanctuary Print Shop calls for the active participation of the public in creating and distributing powerful messages in support of immigrants’ rights. It facilitates do-it-yourself strategies and activities, including providing a space for visitors to create their own posters and prints in expression of their support for the San Francisco Sanctuary City Ordinance, and serves as a resource center and catalyst for public engagement in the movement to uphold immigrants’ rights.
The Sanctuary Print Shop at YBCA started with a series of questions dealing with immigration, such as:
• What would you tell an immigrant?
• When did you forget you were an immigrant?
• Have you seen an ICE raid?
• What is a Sanctuary?
• Do you anyone that has been deported?
• What would you do if you see an ICE raid?
After we received the initial responses, around 259, The Sanctuary Print Shop took eleven of the participants’ responses and turned them into original posters. The eleven posters are:
Not in my city!
This is a sanctuary
A sanctuary is a home away from home
The country of the immigrant is here
Undocumented Unafraid
Where will people go?
I am an immigrant
Why did you come here?
I am free to leave
A sanctuary is a quiet place
I am a refugee
