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Curator’s Statement

Kanene Nwokeji ’26
Multiracialism

My initial goal for this exhibition was to celebrate the culture that multiracial people have made for themselves. Multiple racial identities often include intimate access to multiple traditions of cooking, clothing, and community. Often, mixed people exist at a unique intersection, able to build their own practices by merging existing traditions. Other times, mixed people are at risk of being rejected by one parent culture, the other, or both. In each of these cases, something new and very beautiful can be born. As I’ve worked on this curation, I’ve honed in on certain themes that are important to me. One is the multiracial childhood – I remember being six years old and my parents explaining to me what I was. I remember learning about interracial mixing in schools where I was the only version of me. The multiracial childhood is interesting to me because it is the beginning. The first moments where a child realizes they might be different. From here comes the academic writing on how nonsensical the idea of “pure” race is, the memoirs where mixed people navigate their parental relationships, the portraits and films attempting to tackle the expansive subject of ambiguous race, the constant and creative attempts at understanding. I’ve included such works in the collection, in addition to the children’s picture books that didn’t exist when I was in kindergarten. The simple gesture of drawing two parents of different colors on a page, and what that means for kids today. In reality, most people are mixed at some level of their ancestry. Race is a social construct and racial mixing is too, one that has tangible consequences. Sometimes these consequences are never on the same page with parents you try to emulate, or when trying to resolve in yourself the friction between your cultures of origin. Most of the time, though, it means unique forms of music, of storytelling, and of being. It’s the creation of a community greater than the sum of its parts. It’s me, Kanene Ellen Nwokeji, working on the present collection with the help of the friends I’ve found and the culture that we’ve built together. It’s the unstoppable flow of social change to make a moment like this possible, the sun gleaming through broken branches, and the new hope waiting for you in the morning.

Book List

Kanene’s collection, “Multiracialism”, launched on October 3rd, 2025, and will be on display in H-L Collection Highlights for the 2025-26 academic year, or can be browsed digitally here.

Bowdoin Orient Article