Multiculturalism is the jewel of America. Diversity is like facets of a diamond, the more facets, the more brilliant. When you eliminate and deface those facets, dehumanizing “the other,” you have a pane of dirty glass left, the jewel is harmed.
The photographs taken by Julia Cumes and Lipe Borges of people who have emigrated to Cape Cod that are being shown in the current “Invisible Threads: Portraits and Stories of Our Global Neighbors” exhibition at the Cape Cod Museum of Art are jewellike. (Though the metaphor not of jewels but of threads tying us together is their intention.)
Whether the migrants, many of whom are now citizens (but all of whom are legally documented) came here by marrying a beloved American; through the arduous visa process; lucking out on the green card lottery; seeking political asylum; or travelling from Latin America through the Darien Gap to the Mexico/United States border, those pictured in these striking, almost life sized photographs accompanied by panels of write ups encapsulating their compelling stories, were escaping poverty, threats to their wellbeing because of their political ideology, gender or sexual identity, discrimination, danger, and in at least one case, torture. They faced economic hardship and occasional prejudice in the US, too, some living in other places before they settled on Cape Cod where they at last found a supportive safe haven and settled in. Many struggled and succeeded, sometimes over years, in bringing family left behind to join them.
Many work menial jobs to support themselves like, the photojournalist from the Democratic Republic of Congo, who escaped his country’s political repression and works as a grocery stocker, a driver and freelance photographer. Some have managed to start and run their own businesses like the Afghan woman who taught high school chemistry and now is a “surgeon” for alterations of clothing, the Jamaican designer, or the Chinese Indonesian who supplies sushi to grocery stores. (One, I know well: she has run Four Winds, with her late husband of 27 years, for decades. It’s a leather emporium in Eastham, featuring some Native American goods, some goods she crafts; always with a warm welcome and a place to find deer hides, beads, belts, foot ware, and books.) Many give back to their communities: one man in his eighties still care-giving for people with disabilities, another created community youth programs, yet another is involved in charity work.
Many have been helped by and are part of their faith community. All, despite their struggles, the hardship of not speaking a language, or sharing a common history, are resilient, courageous and thankful to feel safe in their new country.
Or were thankful to feel safe. As the museum’s art director Benton Jones told me, the exhibit was conceived two years ago, “well before the surge in xenophobia across our nation…before the current political climate made celebrating our global neighbors as equals, as not separate from ourselves, as people to look up to, became controversial.”
The exhibit is cinematic in scope. The photos gleam with a rare clarity of lighting. All the humans (and many pets) along with their families, babies, sons, daughters, grandchildren — look directly at the audience, individual eyes showing pride, defiance, humor, or warmth. Their hands, Jones points out, often intertwine or rest on something dear to them in their journey. Cumes occasionally reflects a person in a mirror nearby or includes a photo of them at a different stage in their life in her images. They are from Haiti, Brazil, Belarus, from Kabul, Costa Rica, the Philippines, El Salvador, the Ukraine and elsewhere. Some wear home-country traditional clothing, a Balinese shirt, a Moroccan kaftan, some wear American.
Cumes first interviewed people for their life story, asking five questions of each, why did you leave your country, what was your process of getting here to the US and the Cape, what has been the most challenging thing about being here, what has been the best thing about coming here, what are your hopes and dreams for the future. Then, with collaborator Borges, she scouted locations for the shoot, often in the subjects’ homes, but sometimes elsewhere as under an ancient weeping beech tree; setting a stage in the chosen locale, selecting objects, furniture, clothing that were important to that story, photographing them, trying always to let their subject’s voice speak without imposing her own construct on them. (Cumes notes that unlike her photojournalism where you keep it real, these photos are more deliberately constructed, to better tell the particular story.)
While Cumes shot, she and Borges collaborated on every aspect of the compositions, with a shared vision — and Borges, who had helped Cumes find the subjects, also helped establish a compassionate sense of trust. They accomplished the unique clarity and colors of the mise en scenes using a new lighting system which they share, and colored gels, along with the occasional GoBo to project images onto the setting, as with a church window projected into the room of the Jamaican designer whose faith keeps him afloat. Colors of clothes, objects, of lighting, warm or cold, are especially important in setting the tone of the emotional context.
Borges ran a photography school in Brazil and settled on the Cape only a few years ago where he says he feels incredibly supported and has found friends and family. Cumes is an immigrant too, originally from South Africa. When she was around 13 a newspaper left a blank frame where Nelson Mandela, then imprisoned, should have been, because newspapers were not allowed to show photographs of him. She says, “I realized how powerful must a photograph be for the government to be so afraid of the impact it will have on those who see it.” Later she saw photos in her psychologist mother’s drawer of young Black people she was counselling who had been tortured for their anti-apartheid activism. Given a camera Cumes became obsessed with shooting, developing, printing film, even building her own small dark room.
After getting her masters in photojournalism, she interned at the Cape Cod Times; it was supposed to be just for three months. Then 9/11 happened and a job she was on her way to shut down. She queried and got work as a freelancer with the Boston Globe, A.P., local publications, I.F.A.W. and others including the New York Times — and stayed on the Cape shooting whatever she could — weddings, commercial work. And never left. It’s been 24 years. It took her five years to find her community on the Cape, but she has, and indeed was the Arts Foundation of Cape Cod 2024 Artist of the Year. She’s never lost sight of why she became a photographer in the first place, the wish to tell stories of social justice which could change the consciousness of her audiences. These projects include animal rescue, the transgender experience, “stories of disempowered women” in countries around the world, and many others which have been displayed and praised well beyond the Cape. (See her website juliacumes.com for more.)
This project of “Invisible Threads” in particular, she hopes can “project an emotional resonance, which might shift a few closed hearts. What really motivated me to do this project was the realization of how deeply Cape Cod’s economy depends on its global workforce — not only to fill critical jobs, but also for the enormous cultural contributions they make to the region. And yet, despite how essential they are, this community often goes unrecognized, especially in the context of the larger national dialogue about immigration. That disconnect is what catalyzed the project: I wanted to honor their presence, highlight their stories, and bring visibility to the vital role they play in shaping both the fabric and the future of the Cape.”
This exhibit couldn’t come at a more important time. With the Trump administration causing misery by abducting, imprisoning, and deporting people who are here lawfully, people with no criminal records, without due process, treating immigrants in the cruel and inhumane ways of dictatorships America has formerly condemned, defying every tenet of democratic Constitutionality, it is critical to recognize immigrants as fellow human beings. As Jones commented, “We are honored to play a part in humanizing our international neighbors as vital contributors to our society, economy and community.”
The exhibition is already up for prestigious awards, will next be shown at the Cahoon Museum of American Art in Cotuit, Massachusetts, and with 14 new photos, will become a book to be published by Daylight Books in 2026.
(“Invisible Threads: Portraits and Stories of Our Global Neighbors” continues through November 9 at the Cape Cod Museum of Art, 60 Hope Lane, Dennis, Massachusetts. For more information, call (508) 385-4477 or visit ccmoa.org.)