Migration, Belonging & Memory as an Immigrant Artist
Sunday, November 16th | 3-5 pm
Moderated by Zoraida Lopez-Diago
Featuring Marielena Ferrer, Judit German-Heins, Viktorsha Uliyanova
This panel talk offers an intimate yet expansive look at how artists actively transform and reimagine socio-cultural landscapes, weaving together personal narratives and collective memory. In dialogue with each other's practices, the discussion invites the audience to reconsider the role of visual storytelling—not merely as archives of the past but as active forces that construct, challenge, and reimagine both historical narratives and potential futures.
Zoraida Lopez-Diago is a photographer, curator, and activist whose work centers the African Diaspora, focusing on gender, incarceration, migration, and climate change. She has exhibited across the Americas and lectured at Harvard University, the Tate Modern, and La Universidad de Antiquia. In 2022, she co-curated Picturing Black Girlhood, the largest exhibition on Black girls globally, and co-founded Women Picturing Revolution, co-editing Black Matrilineage, Photography and Representation. An environmental advocate, she co-founded Conservationists of Color and serves as Vice President at The Glynwood Center for Regional Food and Farming. She lives in Beacon, NY, with her family.
Marielena Ferrer is an artist and advocate whose practice explores art’s role in social change through political, public, and community engagement. Recipient of the International Sculpture Center’s 2023 Outstanding Student Achievement Award and the 2024 Ulster County Executive’s Arts Award, she creates works that bridge personal and collective memory combining social practice and object-making. Beyond her art practice, Marielena serves as Executive Director of Unison Arts in New Paltz and leads Humanamente, a diversity and inclusion consulting organization. She also sits on the boards of Family of Woodstock, and advisory boards of Arts Mid-Hudson and the Center for Photography at Woodstock.
Judit German-Heins is a Hungarian-American photographer. She creates handmade images using historical photographic processes to draw parallels between contemporary issues in women’s rights, immigration, politics, and history.Judit was the recipient of the Denis Roussel Award in 2024. She participated in groupshows domestically and internationally. Her year-long residency at the Erie CanalMuseum resulted in a 3-artist show at the Everson Museum of Art in 2025 titled “At Water’s Edge: Reflections on 200 Years of the Erie Canal”. She was a Critical Mass finalist in 2023 and 2019.
Viktorsha Uliyanova is a multidisciplinary artist and educator working with alternative photography,video,and fiber art. Her work explores impermanence, the notions of home,and cultural identity narrated through the prism of memory. Uliyanova’s practice is informed by her upbringing in the Soviet Union, political repression, and the immigrant experience. In her research,Uliyanova uses archives to explore neglected and overlooked histories .Her work has been exhibited at Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art, Baxter St., MOMA PS1, Participant Inc, Collarworks, among others. She is the recipient of NYSCA grant, Arts Mid-Hudson Grant,Women’s Studio Workshop SAI Grant, Sojourner Truth Diversity Fellowship. She lives in the Hudson Valley and teaches photography at SUNY New Paltz.