Coco Fusco’s New Public Project Brings the History of New York’s Migrants to the Streets
Since her standout performance and collaborative project The Year of the White Bear and Two Undiscovered Amerindians Visit the West, Coco Fusco has built a reputation for her unflinching examination of colonialism, the legacies of imperialism and migration, as well as the power dynamics that drive exclusion. As a 2023 Free Speech Defender Award recipient from the National Coalition Against Censorship, Fusco is known for her unfiltered approach, pushing for open dialogue around today’s most urgent issues. The Cuban-American interdisciplinary artist, writer and curator often works at the crossroads of visual art, activism, and anthropology using her platform to expose some of the societal dynamics that establish categories, hierarchies and disparities within communities. This approach has long informed her engagement with public spaces, making her latest commission by More Art in New York a natural extension of her work.
Timed to coincide with the upcoming national election and as part of More Art’s 20th Anniversary, Fusco’s newly unveiled video project, released on October 5, appears on LinkNYC screens across the city and focuses on the public perception of new migrants in New York. On the occasion of the release, Observer met with the artist to discuss how immigrants have shaped New York’s identity and how its vibrant culture thrives on the myriad contributions of its diverse communities.
“Almost everything in this country is made by migrants, but New York, in particular, has always been a very significant port of entry,” Fusco remarks during our interview. “We have a very high percentage of non-Americans living in New York. It’s probably half the city’s population, more or less.”
Titled Everyone Who Lives Here is a New Yorker, the project was driven by Fusco’s concern over current narratives framing migration as a crisis that threatens the city’s well-being, a portrayal often used to advance conservative political agendas. “There’s been a lot of controversy about the migrants’ arrival and housing them. The mayor said that the cost of housing them would destroy New York,” she recalls.
The video, now displayed on LinkNYC screens in Union Square, is a reminder that migration has been a constant since the city’s founding and is one of the defining forces behind its unique cosmopolitan character.
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To evoke this history, Fusco draws inspiration from the iconic photographs taken by documentary photographer Lewis Hine at Ellis Island, where many migrants first set foot in the United States. Between 1900 and 1914, waves of newcomers from Southern and Eastern Europe flooded into the city. “I studied those photographs; many of them are beautiful, they’re exciting as if they are ethnographic-type pictures,” Fusco explains. She then creatively recontextualized this visual legacy. “I chose a few pictures and then found newer immigrants and recent arrivals and created what looks like an old film, where the old immigrant comes on screen and then goes out, and the new one walks in and assumes the same position.” The resulting 30-second video is a powerful reenactment that bridges past and present, reactivating these memories to highlight how, both then and now, migrants are essential to New York’s growth and vitality.
“This is a city full of immigrants, and everybody who lives here is a part of the city,” Fusco says. “This is how I feel. I don’t judge whether you’re a New Yorker based on whether you speak with an accent or when you came here. Once you live here, you’re part of the city. You’re a New Yorker.”
Despite the short time frame allowed by the LinkNYC format, Fusco’s video poignantly embodies the past while proposing a vision for the future, retelling a story that must be acknowledged and repeated. By juxtaposing historical images with contemporary photographs, Fusco’s work draws attention to the continuities between past and present migration, challenging the narrative that migrants are a destabilizing force in the city’s fabric.
This timely project, which addresses such a sensitive topic in New York and beyond, was also shaped by Coco Fusco’s experience as a volunteer interpreter for legal clinics providing free services to asylum seekers since 2019. “I’ve been doing this interpreting work, and it’s been really interesting,” she shares. “I’ve learned an enormous amount about the asylum process, the story of the people coming in, the situations that trigger their departure from our home countries.”
Today, forty percent of New York City’s population is foreign-born, with immigrants strengthening the city’s workforce at every level and making essential contributions to its economy, gastronomy, linguistic diversity and vibrant street life. With just a few seconds of poignant juxtaposition between past and present images, Fusco’s video aims to remind the thousands who pass through this central junction of New York’s core identity, prompting reflection on what the city was, what it is, and what it should be. More critically, the video will remain on view at ten LinkNYC screens around Union Square until November 5—Election Day—when the nation will again confront questions about its identity and future.
Behind the project is More Art, a New York-based non-profit that fosters collaborations between artists and communities to create socially engaged public art and educational programs that inspire creative engagement with pressing social and cultural issues. The project was made possible with support from the Lambent Foundation, the Abakanowicz Arts and Culture Charitable Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts (with backing from the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature) and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council.
Coco Fusco’s “Everyone Who Lives Here is a New Yorker” is on view on LinkNYC screens in Union Square through November 5.