Any topic (writer’s choice)

Both Pacita Abad and Shahzia Sikander are international artists with a widely varying body of artworks. In these two pieces, I Thought the Streets Were Paved with Gold and Pleasure Pillars, they address the experience of moving between cultures in very different ways.

1. What do you see in these artworks? How do you, or can you, relate to them? How do you think they relate to each other and the themes of this class? Use class reading, Chapter 5, to discuss these artworks. Think about the concerns artists who are recent immigrants to the U.S. might express in artworks.

2. Now go online and see if you can find another contemporary immigrant artist working in the United States. Briefly introduce one of their artworks. Where are they from and how do they express their cultural heritage?