I Often Think About How I'll Stop Bullets from Entering Your Body
2023
Oil and charcoal on paper

Memorial to Gun Violence: An AR-15 was Destroyed to Make this For You
2024
Fourteen cotton duck fabric panels dyed in iron and pigment made from a dissolved AR-15 made by A Rural Pen (Thomas Little)

As an immigrant and a daughter of a seamstress, I learned to sew at age six. It was not a choice but rather a necessity to help my mother earn a living.  Ever since, sewing has been an important part of me and has become my medium to investigate identity politics, immigration and immigrant labor, possession and dispossession, citizenship and belonging, dissent and protest, and race politics in the US. 

My art practice situates itself at the intersection of fiber, social practice, performance, and pedagogy where I create socially engaged and materially rich projects in an ‘art world’ environment accessible to the disenfranchised, particularly for dispossessed immigrants of color. I confront social and racial injustices to reimagine new, inclusive, and humanized systems of civic engagement and belonging. By creating participatory environments where safety, play, and skill-sharing are emphasized, my projects are collaborative and communal in nature and revolve around skill-sharing as a point of connection while highlighting individual experiences, politics, and voices. We share sewing techniques, to create multiethnic and intergenerational sewing circles, which become a place for empowerment, subversion and protest. 

For this exhibition, my artworks respond to the ongoing surge in gun violence and an alarming increase in hate crimes targeting Asian Americans. As the leading cause of death among children and adolescents, gun violence deeply impacts the safety and mental health of youth, including my eight-year-old child.

I Often Think About How I'll Stop Bullets from Entering Your Body. This series of body prints, created in collaboration with my child, utilizes oil and charcoal to press our bodies onto paper. We flatten and fold our bodies to simulate disappearing in the face of an active shooter – a scenario my child has been subjected to through school shooter drills. My partner and I attempt to cover our child’s body with our own. The title reflects the constant fear and vigilance we feel in public spaces amidst ongoing gun violence and the lack of substantial reform. 

Memorial to Gun Violence: An AR-15 was Destroyed to Make this For You is a monumental fabric installation made from iron and pigment produced from a dissolved AR-15. I was drawn to use iron not only for its historical significance as one of the earliest pigments and paints but also to evoke its presence in both weapons and blood. Artist Thomas Little dissolved an AR-15 into red iron oxide pigment, which I then mixed with water to submerge large panels of cotton duck fabric. It created irregularly dyed dark red panels, reminiscent of blood splatters and dried blood. Remarkably, the destruction of the AR-15 yielded approximately two ounces of pigment, sufficient to dye these expansive panels. This serves as a poignant metaphor for the impact of gun violence, wherein something seemingly insignificant possesses immense potency, capable of inflicting significant harm.

The public is encouraged to share their reflections, experiences, and opinions on gun violence by writing on paper with inks made from dissolved guns by A Rural Pen. These messages can then be pinned to the outer yellow layer of the fabric installation using safety pins.

About the artist

Aram Han Sifuentes is a fiber and social practice artist who creates participatory projects around themes of protest, voting rights, citizenship, and immigrant, racial, and economic justice. She is an adjunct professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Solo exhibitions of her work have been presented at the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum (Chicago); Hyde Park Art Center (Chicago); Chicago Cultural Center (Chicago); Pulitzer Arts Foundation (St. Louis); moCa Cleveland (Cleveland; and Skirball Cultural Center (Los Angeles). 

Han Sifuentes has facilitated workshops for her projects internationally including at the Whitney Museum of American Art (New York City); Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago); Museum of Fine Arts (Boston); Zeeuws Museum (Middelburg, Netherlands); and Vetenskaps Festivalen (Gothenburg, Sweden). Han Sifuentes’s art works are included in various public collections including the Renwick Gallery of Smithsonian American Art Museum, Design Museum in London, Herbert Johnson Museum of Art, DePaul Art Museum, and Wing Luke Museum of Asian Pacific American Experience. 

Han Sifuentes has received numerous awards including 3Arts Award, 3Arts Next Level Award, Map Fund, Joyce Award, Smithsonian Artist Research Fellowship, Center for Craft's Craft Research Fund Artist Fellowship, Asian Cultural Council's Individual Fellowship Program and Illinois Arts Council’s Artist Fellowship.