COVID-19
What do young Americans look like? This question has become provocative in an era in which the president and his supporters have made it clear who does and doesn’t matter in their country. Vesna Kittelson, an artist who grew up in Croatia and has long lived in Minneapolis, paints a different picture than that offered by the white supremacist imagery of MAGA. In her slightly larger than life cutouts, a broad range of Americans pose for their tenderly detailed portraits, each as much an individual as the other. Eleven of them will be on display at the Weisman Art Museum this fall, in a presentation postponed since April due to the museum’s pandemic closure. Since then, the need for the citizens (and officials) of the United States to not just look at but to really see one another, to acknowledge the humanity of people who look different than the image in the mirror, has only grown. Kittelson’s "Young Americans" series, populated by Rica and Harvey, William and Areca, Geovanni and Kara and others, can only help.
—Lori Waxman 2020-09-21 10:43 AM