Fragile Cargo Installation

by Joy Nagy

“…Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" - Emma Lazarus,

The New Colossus, 1883 'The Golden Door Project' consists of 26 different language transcriptions of this poem onto Porcelain clay. Porcelain is fragile, the poem hand written onto crumpled sheets of clay echos the tenuous times we live in. The diversity of languages presented in this project represents my world as an American citizen. The reading of each translation has been recorded in the language of the countries from which each participate emigrated. Their voices presented in accompanying QR code. My intention is to celebrate America’s immigrate population and to underscore the richness and diversity of our nation. Friends and acquaintance provided translations for ‘The New Colossus’ in the languages of the countries from which they immigrated.