![\"\"](\"https://s3.amazonaws.com/chigal/rich/rich_files/rich_files/2031/original/ccc-protest-banner-making-10-x2.jpg\")
By ALISON REILLY
\r\n\r\nI meet Aram Han Sifuentes on the first floor of the Chicago Cultural Center in the Garland Gallery. She is working at one of the tables set up in her public studio—a “workspace, workshop” as she calls it, with her young daughter Nara and her collaborator Verónica Casado Hernandez. On each of the tables is a sewing machine, scissors and assorted fabrics. Hanging above them are large, cloth banners with slogans like “America Was Never Great,” “Climate Change is Real,” and “We Are In This Together.”
\r\n","body":"ARAM HAN SIFUENTES CREATES A SPACE FOR DISSENT
By ALISON REILLY
I meet Aram Han Sifuentes on the first floor of the Chicago Cultural Center in the Garland Gallery. She is working at one of the tables set up in her public studio—a “workspace, workshop” as she calls it, with her young daughter Nara and her collaborator Verónica Casado Hernandez. On each of the tables is a sewing machine, scissors and assorted fabrics. Hanging above them are large, cloth banners with slogans like “America Was Never Great,” “Climate Change is Real,” and “We Are In This Together.” Across from their workstation, I see hundreds of postcards answering the question posted on the wall: “What does your banner say?”
Aram’s Protest Banner Lending Library offers those feeling taxed by a divided political system a space for creative expression. The project is part of the Chicago Cultural Center’s ongoing artist-in-residence program, which provides a stipend and dedicated studio space for artists who hope to interact directly with the public. Along with walk-ins, Aram, Verónica and their two other collaborators, Ishita Dharap and Tabitha Anne, often host school and community groups. Visitors are invited to imagine what their protest banner would look like and then, if time allows, they can make one of their own.
“We have all the materials, and we teach people how to make their own protest banners,” Aram says. “It takes about an hour and a half, so it’s a bit of a time commitment.” Sewing is inherently a slow process. In a digital world where political activism can mean copying and pasting a form letter to a representative, designing and sewing a cloth banner can be a radical exercise.
For Aram, the act of sewing is itself a form of resistance. After the 2016 election, she began making banners at home by herself and then started to invite friends over to create their own designs. Soon, she was hosting workshops at the Jane Addams Hull-House Museum and the Smart Museum. This past month she was invited to the Whitney Museum in New York to co-present a banner-making workshop with another Chicago-based artist, Cauleen Smith.
“Before any big protest we get a wave of people all wanting very specific slogans so we try to be good about keeping up with it. But there’s too much to keep up with these days!” Aram says. Although the banners have been popular for protests like the January 2017 Women’s March, they can be checked out for other purposes, too. “A high school teacher recently took one out to put in her classroom for a couple weeks.”
![\"\"](\"https://s3.amazonaws.com/chigal/rich/rich_files/rich_files/2032/original/ahs-sampler.jpg\")
Politics and sewing have always been intertwined in Aram’s life. Her mother, Younghye Han, was an artist in South Korea and ran her own art center. When Aram’s family immigrated to Modesto, California in 1992, her parents started working at a dry cleaner and Younghye became a seamstress. Like many in the garment industry, Younghye was paid per item, which Aram says, “leads to unregulated working conditions.” Aram learned to sew when she was six years old by helping her mother with small pieces. “For me engaging in the act of sewing is always about that history and social context.”
Aram has questioned her own status as an immigrant in her ongoing project, US Citizenship Test Sampler. In 2012, as she beganstudying for the United States Naturalization Test, she decided to hand sew the 100 questions and the answers onto a single piece of fabric. The questions range from “Who makes federal laws? (Congress)” to “During the Cold War, what was the main concern of the United States? (Communism).” The long scroll, which is still in progress, is now on display at the Hull-House, along with a collection of other needlework samplers.
After starting the project, Aram decided to start teaching other non-citizens how to create samplers. The idea is based on needlework samplers that were used in colonial America to teach children how to sew. “They would sew the alphabet and numbers and learn educational concepts,” Aram notes. “Adolescent girls from wealthier families would create another decorative, pictorial sampler to show her worth as a woman and as a wife to her potential suitor.”
![\"\"](\"https://s3.amazonaws.com/chigal/rich/rich_files/rich_files/2033/original/1ccc-protest-banner-making-183.jpg\")
Each participant that Aram has worked with chooses one question and answer from the test and sews it, along with their own decoration, on a square of fabric. The completed samplers are available for purchase for $725 each, the cost of applying for citizenship. The full amount goes directly to the participant to help cover any costs associated with the process.
Symbolically, the project speaks to the monetary value associated with immigrant labor. While working on her own sampler, Aram tracked the number of hours she spent working on it and estimated that after selling the piece, she had only made about $2 an hour. But, like the colonial samplers, the project functions on another level. “I teach people how to sew and depending on their needs I tutor English or we study for the citizenship test together.” The longer Aram spends with an individual, the more she is able to help them execute complex ideas for their sampler and better prepare them for their test.
US Citizenship Test Sampler also serves as a reminder of the uphill battles that people who want to become citizens have always faced. Even if they have prepared by studying, the cost of taking the test can be prohibitive. There has been a renewed interest in Aram’s project following the 2016 election, and many of the samplers have sold within the last few months. “It’s been really awesome because before the recent election the samplers that sold were more aesthetically beautiful, but now the ones that are selling are about need—either to apply for citizenship or get legal help, because a lot of my participants are undocumented.”
After her residency ends at the Cultural Center, Aram will travel to Washington D.C. for the month of June. As a Smithsonian artist research fellow, she will have access to the archives of American art. “I’m going to research recipes, which includes food and drinks, but also syllabi and templates for unrealized projects. I use the word recipe, but it’s really a very broad interpretation.”
![\"\"](\"https://s3.amazonaws.com/chigal/rich/rich_files/rich_files/2038/original/ccc-20protest-20banner-20making-205-x4.jpg\")
The recipes will become another piece of Aram’s work. “These banners, some were made by me, but a lot are made by other people who come in here or to workshops and then donate them. In a way this is a collection in and of itself. That [pointing to postcards on the wall] is a collection of many different people and their contributions. Ballots, needles, samplers, I think all of them are pieces from individuals that come together as a collection.”
The Protest Banner Lending Library at the Chicago Cultural Center is open Tuesday-Friday, 12-6pm through May 18, 2017. For more information visit aramhan.com.
Top image: Aram Han Sifuentes (Right) and Verónica Casado Hernandez (Left) in the protest banner lending library at the Chicago Cultural Center. Photo: eedahahm
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'younghy':472B,505B,515B","thumbnail":null,"editor_pick":false,"category_name":"Interviews"},"related":[{"id":13767,"title":"Anticipating a Season of Art: Five to Talk to – Nikko Washington","excerpt":"","body":"Fall offers a full slate of exhibitions across galleries and museums throughout the Midwest. Behind the scenes, many people in the community are working tirelessly to support artists and bring fresh perspectives to the public. We spoke with five insiders about what excites them now and what they anticipate next.
The following preview is one of five conversations that appear in CGN's Fall 2026 magazine. To receive a copy of the print edition click here.
![](\"https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1789517637/noxz9olp47gfneafz8xg.jpg\")
“I’m thrilled to further expand my artistic and design practice by introducing other mediums into the mix. I’m looking forward to watching the seasons change and devoting a lot of time in the studio as well. Fall/winter is my favorite time to create new works.
I have an upcoming solo show with VSG Contemporary that I am excited about. The work will delve further into the topics of cultural mythology and how these tales and narratives have helped shape my worldview.
Also, it wouldn’t be right if I left out my excitement for this upcoming season of Chicago sports.”
![](\"https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1788961823/s3lp0uull2s8mvd8funj.jpg\")
Andi Crist, Extension Cords, Glazed stoneware, chrome, Sizes vary 2021-present. Photo: Mikey Mosher
This interview is part of CGN's Fall 2026 issue. Purchase a copy or subscribe.
![](\"https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1788961824/mghrpnghxd9j9ko2dsjt.jpg\")
Andi Crist
BY ALISON REILLY
Andi Crist’s warm, engaging demeanor is evident in the first few minutes of our conversation. Generous with her time and forthcoming in her observations, she cares deeply about building relationships through her art making. Crist grew up in Birmingham, Alabama, devoured art classes, wrote songs and played music in high school, and moved to Chicago to study visual art at Columbia College. In 2024, she received her MFA from the University of Illinois at Chicago. She is a woodworker, sculptor, ceramicist, and conceptual artist, and she teaches at Illinois Institute of Technology. We discussed her multidisciplinary practice, her experience working as an art handler, preparator, and fabricator, and how she thinks about labor, creativity, and value in the art world.
CGN: You grew up in Birmingham, Alabama. How did that environment shape your point of view as an artist?
Andi Crist: That’s such a funny question. Nobody’s ever really asked.
CGN: Oh, really?
AC: Yeah, maybe because I never was super connected with the arts community down in Birmingham. I moved to Chicago in 2007, so it’s been 20 years since I lived in the South. I was definitely one of those art kids—one art credit was required in high school, and I graduated with like seven. I was surrounded by artists who had a big impact on me, because they were working artists. All my art teachers were trained in Alabama and then continued to teach and work in Alabama, which gave me this desire to try to expand my community outside of what I was familiar with.
CGN: Do you identify as a Chicagoan?
AC: My family still lives in Alabama, and I go back every year. I love being in Alabama. Maybe now being in Chicago for almost 20 years, I identify as a southerner living in the city. I carry on the social qualities of a friendly southern person [laughs].
CGN: You have a varied art practice—woodwork, ceramics, mold making. What drew you to those types of fabrication methods and that type of art making?
AC: My dad is a carpenter and a hobbyist woodworker, but his career was psychology, and my mom was a professor and an incredible craftswoman. I absorbed my mom’s model of creativity, which is to try a bunch of different things and not necessarily finish them but to try to learn as much as I can by just going for it. My practice over the years has become an exploration of conceptual elements of what makes art art and not just craft. Do you have to be a master craftsperson or a professional artist in order to make something that resonates with people?
I make a lot of work that references the mode of making and requires a variety of different media. I just finished teaching a ceramics production class where students learned how to produce molds, think about positives and negatives, and get into a level of production rather than just handicraft as a way to multiply their output.
I got into fabrication because I’ve always liked working with other artists. I have a background in theater and gallery work. I’m a voracious learner, and I like being able to share those skills with my community. Then I end up making work about that. It’s a self-feeding cycle.
![](\"https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1788961825/zzejqwibga5f5wk6einh.jpg\")
Andi Crist, Artist’s Ladder, 2023. Photo: Jeff Perlman
CGN: Thinking about your background as an art handler and preparator—how did you get to the point where you were making work about that experience?
AC: In 2010, right before I graduated from Columbia, I was living in a storefront in West Logan Square with my partner at the time. We started a gallery called Autotelic in the space and had to build it out using the worst tools with very minimal resources. Then we started curating shows there and that meant helping other artists figure out how to install their work in our unusual space. Eventually, I gained the reputation for knowing how to do that type of work. I started getting invited to work in museums and galleries.
The Holocaust Museum was the first museum I worked at, and as difficult as that subject matter is, that experience was really important to me because I was learning more about the larger world of gallery work. As an artist working as a preparator, you’re straddling both sides of that space. You’re really seeing how the sausage is made. You’re hearing all the conversations about artists, curators, the process of exhibition making. There is a lot of information you can gather about the economics of the art world by just being the person that has the know-how to touch and handle artwork. Eventually that started feeding into my art practice because I wanted to make work that was contributing to a conversation around art as a type of job. It fueled a methodology of seeing everything in the world as the result of a long line of processes that required effort and thoughtfulness by many hands.
![](\"https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1788961826/uv5bysb5fbne30gr5czh.jpg\")
Andi Crist, Fair Warning, 2025.
CGN: The title of your recent exhibition at the Cleve Carney Museum—Live, Laugh, Lo—sorry, not Live, Laugh, Love—Live, Laugh, Labor.
AC: [Laughs] That’s what everybody does.
CGN: I love the title—it’s perfect. You incorporate humor along with thoughtful critiques about labor and value in your work. What role does humor play? How does it help you connect with your audience?
AC: One of my biggest criticisms of art with a capital A is how easily it can be overly intellectualized. I think that’s why I end up making a lot of work that references things that already exist or have some kind of real purpose. It’s important to give people a foothold so there’s an obvious place to board that train of thought. As an artist—maybe this is me getting into a sweeping argument about what artists should be—but I personally believe in intellectual accessibility. Humor is a swift way to drop defenses and allow people to come in without feeling like they are not getting the joke or not understanding. I like to make work that can hold both of those things at the same time—it’s funny on the surface level, it’s kind of cheeky, but there’s also another way to look at it that is intellectually clever. There is a joy in the attempt to “get it”. Like the satisfaction of grasping how a crossword puzzle actually works.
It’s also so much a part of my personality. I take myself seriously as an artist, but my ego isn’t at the heart of it. It’s really something that I do because I love to make things, and I love to connect with other people. My parents raised me on puns, creating those language relationships between things and people and space. Understanding a joke is the same way that we understand art, and while neither of my parents would consider themselves artists, they taught me how to think about art.
![](\"https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1788961828/gnotyfijabr7e15kb6hm.jpg\")
Andi Crist, 69 Bananas
CGN: Your work, Artist’s Ladder, explores hierarchies, workplace cultures, and institutional values. What experiences shaped your reflections on these themes?
AC: The ladder piece distinctly represents the complicated relationship between front of house, back of house, and the hierarchy of labor. Who is the artist in those relationships? How much does another person’s knowledge and expertise contribute to the success of another artist?
There are enormous, industrialized art practices out there, warehouses full of people making things, and those people are also artists. When you make work that involves other people, it’s important to acknowledge their contributions. I’ve had complicated interactions with other artists who are like, ‘Hey, do you want to collaborate with me on this thing?’ but really they just want me to make their idea. I made Artist’s Ladder while I was in grad school at UIC, and it really represented my relationship with a lot of other artists, because I could be an actual support structure for them. Then it turned into this absurd physical thing. It’s extremely overbuilt with inlaid racing stripes made of exotic hardwood, and a butcher’s block-style plaid top. It’s not really like an FU as much as it is asking for acknowledgement of my skills and the essential support structures that exist.
CGN: I want to ask you about another piece, Five O’Clock Somewhere, a wool rug that resembles a children’s play mat. I work at a library, and it reminded me of rugs I see all the time. It’s a peaceful image of an office park with a large fountain surrounded by a parking lot. I’m curious why you chose a rug as the medium to depict that image.
AC: To me the heart of that joke was that it was a landscape. I wanted it to be physically traversable. And that was, I don’t want to say controversial, but it was something that I had to talk about a lot. The critique of that work was the fact that I didn’t want to hang it on the wall and turn it into a tapestry. I really wanted it to be a rug that people could walk on. When I showed that work at Chicago Artists Coalition for the New City Breakout Artists show. There was a lot of pushback about having it on the floor and allowing people to walk on it.
That, to me, was such an important conversation, because, in my mind, the fact that you could walk across it and traverse it was part of how I was thinking about the object. Rugs are utilitarian–they are floor coverings. When you make art that doesn’t do anything, you don’t get to participate in that part of the conversation.
I enjoy sparring around art like that. I am totally tickled by the pushback. The critique of display is exciting, and sorting through the politics of utilitarianism in art spaces is fun to me. And then—it was so crazy—we ended up showing it halfway on the wall and halfway on the ground.
![](\"https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1788961829/r1zylkwfw9rkw191skdl.jpg\")
Andi Crist, Five O’Clock Somewhere, on display at Live, Laugh, Labor: Thoughts on Usefulness and Other Myths at The Cleve Carney Museum of Art, 2025.
CGN: Oh, wow.
AC: I was like, this is the epitome of compromise! I had to build a structure so that it could hang that way safely.
CGN: I would say just put it on the ground if that’s what you want to do. It’s interesting that there are still very fixed ideas about the way that art should be displayed.
AC: That preparator part of it, that’s what I’m all about. I was having that conversation about what physically supports the work or what conceptually supports it in the way that it’s shown.
CGN: Have you always been a writer? How do your art and writing practices work together?
AC: I can’t say that I’m a writer, it’s probably the same way that it can feel weird to call yourself an artist. But I feel like I’ve always been relatively good at writing. The first time I ever did any kind of professional writing was contributing, a long time ago, to a website called eHow. The editors would send me a title, and then I would have to research how to do that thing. Then I would write out step-by-step instructions for how to do that.
I think that’s how I had to make myself think through my conceptual practice—I had to do the research, coagulate that into some kind of document, and then I would have stream-of-consciousness conversations with myself. “Why are we interested in this? Why would we make it this way? What would I want to talk about if someone were to ask me about this?” It’s almost like I was pre-interviewing myself.
I think the writing is just another way for me to process that idea before I put in all of the time and energy to actually accomplish it.
CGN: What are you working on right now? What projects do you have coming up?
AC: The biggest project that I have right now is my house. My family and I suffered a major house fire on New Year’s Day. We’ve been displaced since then and are navigating rebuilding our house. It was a total loss.
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Andi Crist, Single-Use Fireplace, 2025. Photo: Mikey Mosher.
CGN: I’m so sorry to hear that.
AC: Thank you. We’re all okay, but it’s been a really tumultuous year. I moved my studio into a storefront last summer, and so most of my, at least relatively recent, work is safe, and I still have all of my materials, but my home life is starting over. I just had my first full year at this space, and it’s got a little gallery built out in the front called Coming Soon. It’s beautiful with floor-to-ceiling windows on Division and Central Park. I’ve been inviting people into the space to try things out.
After teaching the ceramics class, I came into a bunch of nice slip casting molds, and I’m making some really playful, weird, ceramic stuff. I want to be open and not put too much pressure on myself. Having a big studio by myself is very expensive, so it’s easy to want to make it feel like it’s worth it. But if for now all I can do is make it a resource for other people, then that will be the thing I do. Be less selfish, but more selfish with my time. Saying I can’t do that, or I don’t want to do that. It’s not my nature to say no—I’m such a yes man. I’m learning how to be a yes man for myself.
CGN: That makes sense after going through something so traumatic.
AC: I have an amazing support system. Our friends started a GoFundMe. It was incredible. I’m so humbled and floored by how held I felt by Chicago. I can’t help but throw a little shout out to my Chicago people. I can see how people’s lives get totally ruined by this kind of tragedy. I feel so lucky. Chicago definitely showed its love back.
CGN: For your project Coming Soon, are you bringing in other artists?
AC: My philosophy is that I want to be involved as little as possible. I am thinking about it more as a hosted than curated space. I’m actively soliciting proposals or ideas for workshops, meetings, book clubs—I’m down for making it a resource, whatever that means. I don’t want to over-think it, I want it to be an intuitive and organic thing, which is why I call it Coming Soon—it can be a placeholder for anything. It’s exciting. Taking my hands off the reins is a good exercise for me.
![](\"https://res.cloudinary.com/dfafo598z/image/upload/v1788961831/gno5dhliwfnzpuaim78s.jpg\")
Andi Crist, Extension Cords, Glazed stoneware, chrome, Sizes vary 2021-present. Photo: Mikey Mosher
Fall offers a full slate of exhibitions across galleries and museums throughout the Midwest. Behind the scenes, many people in the community are working tirelessly to support artists and bring fresh perspectives to the public. We spoke with five insiders about what excites them now and what they anticipate next.
The following preview is one of five conversations that appear in CGN's Fall 2026 magazine. To receive a copy of the print edition click here.
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“Intuit Art Museum’s renovated, expanded spaces give audiences the chance to connect with art through daily art-making, third Thursday Art After Work, group Slow Looks designed to provide a mindful experience with a single work and upcoming conversations with sculptor Bill Brady (Oct. 3) and Dr. Mary Trent (Oct. 15), who curated our current exhibition on the role of scrapbook-making in Henry Darger’s art.
On view is the thought-provoking Monumental: The Sculpture of Dr. Charles Smith, which encourages guests to consider the lack of historical representation of African Americans and Black people in America. Dr. Smith’s memorials champion Black history and stories of everyday life he sees missing in mainstream narratives.
This fall we’re opening an exhibition of paintings by Karla Wong, an artist who immigrated from Oaxaca and who explores themes of life and death, gender identity and self-discovery.”