LEE CANNAROZZO

Immigrant:  A person who comes to a country to take up permanent residence.

Migrant: A person who moves regularly in order to find work especially in harvesting crops.

In 1910 a congressional committee known as The United States Immigration Commission published a report concerning immigration to the United States. This invasive study, which contained many of the anti-immigrant statements that we hear today, became a foundational document for U.S. immigration policy. A policy that strove to shape the ethnic makeup of the country through the implementation of an immigration quota system that was design to stem the flow of “races” deemed undesirable. Though over a hundred years have passed since the USIC report was published, the language that we use to talk about immigrants has continued to devolve, exemplified in the contemporary use of the politically charged term migrant to refer to Central American immigrants to the U.S,

Your Grandparents/Their Children, is a work of art comprised of a bound edition of Vol. I of The USIC report and a neon sign in a color scheme that corresponds to the flags of the United States of Mexico and the Republic of Italy. The neon sign which alternates between spelling immigrant and migrant, is presented in order to allude to the continuity between the anti-immigrant rhetoric of the early 20th century and the rhetoric of today. The USIC book, which comprises the interactive part of this work, allows viewers to physically touch history and read the study’s findings. As viewers look through the bookmarked sections of the USIC report, my hope is that they consider their own immigrant story, and develop a sense of compassion towards this most recent generation of immigrants seeking asylum in United States.

The work was inspired by a conversation I had with the late Ed Fuentes before he passed. If you lookup Ed's art work, you'll understand the connection/homage.

The flour milling operation of The Russell Miller Milling Co., was formerly based in The American Elevator located in the southern part of Buffalo, NY in a complex know as Silo City.   The mill, which no longer houses industry, currently exists as both a monument to the former economic prosperity of Buffalo and the city’s subsequent fall from grace.  The people that served as the lifeblood of this site were union members, and their participation in organized labor connects them to a moment in time when the working class people of the United States came together to demand the labor rights we enjoy today. 

Monument To Labor was built inside the former shipping/receiving portion of The American Elevator.  In response to the resonate nature of the space, Monument To Labor is a stage, built from scavenged scrap wood found throughout the site.  Printed on the surface of the the stage are directions describing how the work is activated.  This process requires the participant to scan a QR code with a smartphone which then redirects them to a YouTube link for the song “The Farmer Labor Train” by Woody Guthrie.  By playing the song and placing ones phone on the stage, a ghostly reminder of the American labor movement comes forth. 

Paradise II was recorded at a shooting range in close proximity to the Jean Dry Lake Bed during the summer of 2017. The work alludes to the perpetual aesthetic transformation of Las Vegas and the city’s pervasive culture of ephemerality. This ephemeral nature is exemplified in the gun culture of informal shooting ranges in the Mojave Desert and the implosion of historic resorts spurred on by the arrival of Steve Wynn in the 1990s.

Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here was an exhibition of two complete editions of Salvador Dali illustrated artist books: The Divine Comedy and The Decameron. The prints contained within these limited edition volumes were presented in the West Gallery of The Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art in the spring of 2017.  The pages of the artist books were turned every few days, revealing 110 illustrations throughout the course of the exhibition. The month long Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here film series accompanied the exhibition, providing patrons of the museum with an opportunity to see a selections of films by Salvador Dali and Luis Buñuel, along with two Italian cinematic portrayals of The Divine Comedy and The Decameron.

Template is a repurposed news rack located on the corner of Flamingo and Swenson in Paradise, NV.  Contained within Template are copies of Ch 16.08 of the Clark County Code; the section of Clark County's civic code that pertains to the placement of news racks on public right-of-ways.  * (Update) In 2018 Template was impounded by the unincorporated township of Paradise. Its current whereabouts are unknown. *

Copyrights is a series of ephemeral sand drawings located in various desert environments outside the city of Las Vegas, NV.

NTS is a multimedia work of art comprised of an ephemeral sand drawing, video documentation, and a motion reactive electronic lightbox. The video was shot at the Jean Dry Lake Bed in the summer of 2017. The work is meant to illuminate the extensive impact that four generations of nuclear testing at the Nevada Test Site had on the culture, health, and environment of the American Southwest.

Not So Subtle Intrusion was a weeklong site specific installation in the print making studios of The University of Nevada Las Vegas. The work attempted to engage students in calling into question the ecological implications artistic production.

Disconnected: The Creation of An American Phenomenon was an exhibition of temporary installations that utilized artifacts from The Neon Museum, The National Atomic Testing Museum, and the personal collections of past and present residents of the Las Vegas Valley. These temporary installations focused on expressing the experience of growing up in Las Vegas during the latter half of the 20th century, when the city’s population swelled and expanded at an unprecedented rate. The exhibition was held at the Donna Beam Fine Art Gallery in the summer of 2016.