Getting to Know You
Archival pigment prints on satin paper, 2020
6.4 in. x 8.6 in. 56 pages
I am a first-generation immigrant from Italy. Recently, I learned my grandfather was a salesman in luxury textiles and would travel on his motorbike around the southeastern regions of Italy, ultimately, meeting my grandmother. This discovery made my passion for creating textiles clearer; my existence was made possible by the exchange of textiles.
I was not close with these grandparents. With a language barrier, I never heard stories about their lives in Italy and their migration to the United States. In hopes to gain a deeper relationship to my family and heritage, I began to interview my aunt while I read Embroidered Stories: Interpreting Women's Domestic Needlework from the Italian Diaspora. I learned that for Italian immigrants and their descendants, textiles (in particular needlework), represent a marker of identity, a cultural touchstone as powerful as pasta and Neapolitan music.
Getting to Know You is the beginning of an ongoing effort to record and organize stories and artifacts from my family to prevent their disappearance as time goes on. The book contains interviews with an elder that led me to understand domesticity and gender roles within my heritage. Thank you to my Aunt Angie for the late-night text exchanges that provided such important stories, and to both her, and my father’s cousin, James Suglio, for their archived photographs.
I was not close with these grandparents. With a language barrier, I never heard stories about their lives in Italy and their migration to the United States. In hopes to gain a deeper relationship to my family and heritage, I began to interview my aunt while I read Embroidered Stories: Interpreting Women's Domestic Needlework from the Italian Diaspora. I learned that for Italian immigrants and their descendants, textiles (in particular needlework), represent a marker of identity, a cultural touchstone as powerful as pasta and Neapolitan music.
Getting to Know You is the beginning of an ongoing effort to record and organize stories and artifacts from my family to prevent their disappearance as time goes on. The book contains interviews with an elder that led me to understand domesticity and gender roles within my heritage. Thank you to my Aunt Angie for the late-night text exchanges that provided such important stories, and to both her, and my father’s cousin, James Suglio, for their archived photographs.
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