Fig 3. Rivera, Diego. Leaving the Mine, 1923–1924, first floor, Court of Labor, east wall/west-facing mural in the Secretaría de Educación Pública, Mexico City. Photographed by Megan Flattley. presence as if to say, “You can look away, but we are here.” Just as Leaving the Mine exalts the work of the browbeaten in a public institution, the Immigrants Are Essential portraits reconstitute communal spaces as sites of veneration. They offer the public an opportunity to give due respect and remembrance to people consigned to the margins and whose contributions are often overlooked. Arguably, the hat of the laborer climbing up the ladder in Leaving the Mine resembles a halo (the hat of the laborer being searched has fallen to the ground, perhaps suggesting his criminality in the eyes of the overseer). Traditionally associated with sacred figures such as Madonna, Buddha, Constantine, Zeus, and Jesus, the halo has become a motif for divinity and holiness, as well as royalty and immortality, and suggests worthiness of veneration. Immigrants are Essential also appeals to this iconography. A round disk with intricate designs and rays emanates from each undocumented immigrant’s head. Of all the iconographic variations of halos,2 the most common are the 2 These variations are reflected in the variety of terms ascribed to the effect, for example, nimbus, diadem, and Hvareno – the last of these being particular to the Zoroastrian tradition of Persia that precedes Christianity. 14
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