Zac Hacmon

Lives and works in New York, NY, USA

Artist statement

As an interdisciplinary artist, I explore socio-political conflicts through architecture. I investigate the use of architecture as a tool for division or as a measure to generate identity. My recent socially engaged projects involve collaborations with non-profit humanitarian organizations such as the RDJ Refugee Shelter in West Harlem, Humane Borders, and Casa Alitas Program in Tucson, Arizona. In 2020, I initiated an Art & Healing workshop at the RDJ Refugee Shelter which led to my collaboration with Alexa, a transgender woman and an asylum seeker from Nicaragua She had to flee her country after the 2018 protests and is currently waiting for her immigration status trial in New York City. This one-year collaboration concluded in a sound/sculpture installation at the Hunter East Harlem Gallery as part of the group show Sanctuary City, 2022. My projects illuminate human rights and social justice for refugees and asylum seekers, particularly within the LGBTQIA+ community. My work follows those rejected by social structures and deprived of legal belonging to their homeland. Seeking to advance the concept of Arte Útil/Useful Art. My interdisciplinary practice spans ethnography with socially engaged projects to address the identity of the invisible asylum seeker. I created a system with a practical and beneficial impact on individuals at risk. For example, with the LMCC Creative Engagement grant 2021, I provided my collaborator with social support, honorarium, translation,...

Artwork