“We Come in Peace”

The tone is set in this ambitious publication’s title, “We Come in Peace” : a pronouncement that embodies a cruel irony of historical, ethical and political proportions. Seventeen artists from throughout the Americas and of Native, African and European ancestries demonstrate the persistence of history as a source of inspiration and an object of interrogation. The breadth of national, racial and linguistic representation ensures that the narratives revealed are marked by a multiplication of accounts, an examination of types and stereotypes and a presence of facts and individuals erased or decontextualized by an official History. Artists’ statements, in English and French and in their original language, provide the reader with direct access to the genesis of each artist’s project. Countries represented include Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Mexico and the United States.