In the neon sign-sculpture advertising “ We process Visas and Green Cards Here ,” Jamaican-born Cosmo Whyte points to an underbelly in the question of mobility — the freedom to move about the world is transactional . Just as it can easily be denied , it can also be bought , forged , exchanged , and bartered . Although the passport is physically absent in The Enigma of Arrival , Whyte activates its language . “ Visas ” and “ Green Cards ” are words entangled with the dreams , desires , and fantasies of many . They simultaneously call attention to the financial and legal toll , often a predatory enterprise , that can entrap the migrant body in a path to citizenship .
Frederick Douglass ’ s Passport Application , 1886 . Image courtesy of the National Archives and Records Administration .
Below the surveillance of the neon lights , a porcelain bowl painted with images of America ’ s founding fathers becomes a vessel for a photograph of notable African-American abolitionist Frederick Douglass . It is neatly nestled in indigoblue pigment . In his intervention of the porcelain ’ s political Americana , Whyte knocks out part of the bowl , leaving shards of George Washington ’ s portrait and remnants of indigo powder spilling out onto the floor . The Enigma of Arrival conjures the extraordinary feat it took for Douglass to secure a U . S . passport . Whyte , who in his own words , interrogates his own “ racialized as Black , gendered as man , migrant body ” in his work , ensures that the portrait of Douglass is unobstructed — a gesture that invokes the plight of the Black male to assert their freedom of movement . Long after he had become known for championing the rights of African-Americans , he , as were all Black people , whether free or enslaved , was still denied citizenship . By extension , his application for an American passport was repeatedly rejected . In 1886 , almost half a century after securing his freedom , Douglass finally received his first U . S . passport . He wrote in his memoir , The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass :
“[ They ] refused to give me a passport on the ground that I was not and could not be an American citizen . . . but I have lived to see myself everywhere recognized as an American citizen .”
Graced across the white platform and in front of the portrait of Frederick Douglass , Whyte places the dust of blue indigo . It is a stark reminder that prior to the emancipation of enslaved peoples , indigo was a common agricultural resource that was harvested and grown by Africans . In doing so , Whyte connects us to a long arc of history where justice has been denied .
— Jovan Osborne Arts Administration , Art Education
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