“An American Girl” demonstrates how the arts foster compassionate communities. The vision is to create a visceral experience that resonates emotionally and employs a blend of artistic media, reminding viewers of their own family stories, exploring how migration and cultural blending shape our collective experience.

This family has come together over generations to create the artist’s beloved first grandchild. The narratives and imagery weave through the lives of a wide range of immigrants to the United States: Irish potato famine refugees and pre-Colonial English, including a signer of the Declaration of Independence; Welsh, Scottish, French, German; Russian, Romanian and Ukrainian Jews; and the descendants of Japanese-Americans incarcerated during World War II. This history includes a great-grandmother with Mohawk and Pequot heritage who established an Indian School with her husband in the 1850s. In a beautiful twist of fate, An American Girl’s family now includes a mixed-race Black/Native American/White sister and stepmother, and a Chinese-American stepfather.