05/27/2026
Congratulations to recent Amherst College graduate Rachel De La Cruz, who was awarded the annual Wise Prize for Studio Art, which is judged by Mead curatorial staff. Rachel’s work, “Untitled,” was selected for its conceptual and technical cohesion, as well as for the successful integration of paper casting, drawing, and collage.
Rachel’s artist statement:
I was barely a year old when my parents and I immigrated to the United States from the Dominican Republic in 2003. I have no memory of life on the island.
Although I have returned to the Dominican Republic several times throughout my life, my understanding of the culture has largely come from interactions with my parents and family.
The language, mythology, and traditions that I inherited from my parents are frozen at the moment of our departure. Culture can change over time, but my parents have handed me a fossil. Sediments of our collective family history that have gradually solidified into rock form. I have created a visual representation of this fossil, engaging with my culture as a paleontologist might—excavating, preserving, and interpreting.