Finding the Drop House – Video from Recordings of an Immigrant + $20,000 Project Support!

Vincent Goudreau (Maui, Hawaii – Fall 2013) was in residence to work on his project Recordings of an Immigrant.  Juan Aquino, the immigrant for which the project is based, actually had a connection to the Grand Central Art Center / Orange County, CA  area— as a youth Aquino, now a US citizen, was originally smuggled into the US from Mexico in the trunk of a car, delivered by coyotaje to a drop house in Fullerton, CA.  In examining the overall project, Goudreau felt bringing Aquino to join him for a portion of the residency would be beneficial, GCAC agreed. Goudreau and Aquino decided they would use their time in residence together to search for the original drop house, over 30 years later.

Vincent and Juan, along with filmmaker/videographer Randy Mills and GCAC Director John D. Spiak, spent a number of days searching for a specific house in Fullerton, CA.  The following is an excerpt from Recordings of an Immigrant (an ongoing multi-disciplinary project), that documents that search.

Recordings of an Immigrant: Finding the Drop House

<p><a href=”http://vimeo.com/87921835″>Recordings of an Immigrant – Finding the Drop House</a> from <a href=”http://vimeo.com/user6123405″>vincent goudreau</a> on <a href=”https://vimeo.com”>Vimeo</a&gt;.</p>

During his residency, Goudreau was introduced, through a Director’s tour, to California State University, Fullerton alum Jeffrey S. Van Harte ’80.  Mr. Van Harte now sits on the Cal State Fullerton Philanthropic Foundation Board of Governors as Vice Chair and serves on the Finance and Investment Committee.  The tour allowed the opportunity for the artist to share his project in development.  As a result of this connection, Mr. Van Harte has donated $20,000 to CSUF’s Grand Central Art Center directed to Goudreau’s project, helping to realize the artist’s vision at  expanded levels.  Recordings of an Immigrant is developing into a multi-disciplinary artistic project resulting in a collection of audio recorded memoirs, a book, video, limited edition prints, exhibition and a future website.

On sincere gratitude to Mr. Van Harte for his generous support of the project, and his continued support of Grand Central Art Center and California State University, Fullerton.

Here are additional audio excerpts from the Recordings of an Immigrant project to date:

Revenge, from Chapter 5, part 2, titled Family

Sacrifice, from Chapter 2, titled Mexico

Legal, Chapter 3, titled South Central

Read more online about Vincent and Juan’s search, and the public program presented while in residence:
https://grandcentralartcenter.wordpress.com/2014/01/17/busy-end-to-2013-even-busier-beginning-to-2014-gcac/