Beyond the expression of her being forced to hold her culture near without displaying it to an outside world, and a desire to comment on the alleged necessity of cultural conformity,
The Contemporary Art Modern Project is pleased to present our February exhibition in our North Miami gallery, Origin Not Found, featuring Haitian-American artist Laetitia Adam-Rabel. The exhibition runs February 3rd to February 26th, 2022 and is open to the public for viewing. Private appointments can be scheduled by emailing hello@thecampgallery.com.
The continual search for connection is one of the human mind’s needs; it serves as a continuous urge that we seek to fulfill. Integrating into a new society pressures us to assimilate away our origins and cultures, a necessary evil at times that is required to fulfill a so-called “social status quo”. Yet assimilation itself isn’t a comfortable process, one that leads to the individual’s surrendering of qualities of themselves that they may never fully regain. The loss is not always a metaphor for an emotional state, and can often seep into the physical realm by displacing personal objects that retain the qualities of one’s self, taking an even larger toll on the recovery of our original being. The trials and tribulations that come with this reclamation process extend far past our here and now, as the next generation sticks to the remnants of mismatched origins, beginning the journey anew.
For artist Laetitia Adam-Rabel, a reclaiming of the Haitian roots she left at the age of twelve has inspired her newest set of works in the solo exhibition, Origin Not Found. As a Haitian-American working in the culturally diverse Miami area, Adam-Rabel seeks to break the culture of assimilation that found her longing for a home she had barely begun to experience. Beyond the expression of her being forced to hold her culture near without displaying it to an outside world, and a desire to comment on the alleged necessity of cultural conformity, Adam-Rabel's work has transformed, aimed at introducing her daughter to a culture that she will inherit, and in turn pass down.
The debut of Adam-Rabel’s Faussilzation series, a term invented by the artist to refer to art objects which can be likened to historical artifacts, amongst a range of multimedia works serves as the basis for the exploration of a cultural identity she's building for a generation that is unaware of their origin. Nurturing a future yet to come is a driving force behind these works, which can act as found objects and cultural artifacts of a civilization lost to the same circumstances faced in the process of assimilating. Nowhere more does the embracing of one’s origin come through than by the imparting of culture through generations. The family photographic works of the Mother and Child series, featuring Adam-Rabel embracing her daughter and counteracting the losses of her assimilation.
