Restless Debris: Ruination, Multicultural Politics, and Post-Recession Visual Ar

This study examines how ruination functions allegorically in the work of Kevin Jerome Everson and Michelle Dizon. I argue that ruination in each of their practices must be understood as instances of pathological melancholia and as such their work yields insights into current challenges to multicultural solidarity. This study is also developed in conjunction with the exhibition Restless Debris, which focuses on class and racial politics attendant to ruin imagery in post-recession installation art between 2012 and 2014. This study is thus intended to advance the current discourse on the relationship between narratives of national decline, multicultural politics, and contemporary figurations of ruins in popular culture.