2025
cement, dirt
Silverio Villegas-Gonzalez, 38, had been fatally shot by a U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent shortly after dropping his children off at a school and daycare in the suburb of Franklin Park, Chicago, on September 12th, 2025. The agents were attempting to arrest him during a traffic stop in which he attempted to flee. As part of a massive immigration sweep launched by U.S. President Donald Trump, Villegas Gonzalez became the first casualty of the I.C.E. crackdown in Chicago.
The Non-place, or nonplace, is an expression coined by the French anthropologist Marc Augé to refer to anthropological spaces of transience where human beings remain anonymous and do not hold enough significance to be regarded as "places" in their anthropological definition.
In this piece, I explore the sidewalk as a non-place and question the human history that resides on cement curbs. This work focuses on the traces that remain on pedestrian walkways: trash, grime, and the footprints left by the boisterous traffic of the common city street. Sidewalk Remains is laser-engraved with the print of an anonymous body, forced to the pavement, handcuffed, and taken by I.C.E. The arrest becomes fixed in time upon the cement, displaying the permanent effects of Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids on immigrant and American families.