Toshiko Tanaka

My project intends to discuss the experiences of immigrant African women. Through this project I would like to explore the personal and interpersonal tensions that exist especially when identified as an immigrant, a woman and as black. Some examples of these tensions may be expressed as unspoken or spoken anxieties in social interactions. I hope to illustrate on a broader plane the tensions that come into play between a traditional culture and a foreign one. Graffiti and narratives are meant to intertwine to explore personalized social, economic and political commentaries of African women. And at the same time highlighting facets of identity such as race and sexuality: through an exploration of their experience as immigrants, experiences of race and sexualities surface; comparisons between two societal experiences serve to bring to life their imaginings and present issues of belonging. I would like these compositions to be as Tahir describes in her article “The Handwriting On the Ladies’ Room Wall” of bathroom stalls with graffiti text, functioning in the same way as confessionals. This aspect of text will become another component that will add a sense of anonymity to the “private musings over love, sex, religion, politics…” (Tahir 214). Graffiti is such a mundane aspect of everyday life in a way, from the scribblings on desks to the writings in bathrooms or the unique spray painted texts on walls, in this aspect it has a very poetic dimension because it seems raw and unfiltered. This is something I would like to portray in my compositions: messages that you are confronted with every day and yet remain subliminal, to encase them as an act of self-expression that is akin to signing your own name.

Toshiko Tanaka  ‘19

Advisors: Ahmet Atay and Marina Mangubi