RAJI SCOGGIN

ABOUT ME

My name is Raji Scoggin, I am a senior at UC Davis and an Art Teacher in Woodland High School. I major in Art Studio and Psychology. My work is concerned with the concept of community building, specially in the context of empowering minority populations. Over the years, my projects have been characterized by a consultative process that involves community members from my neighborhood (a series of lower-income apartment complexes in South East Davis.) These projects are primarily focused on shared experiences around the concepts of migration, cultural genocide, prejudice, among others. In many cases, my medium of choice is very much the message itself, such as in projects involving adobe bricks, clothing from neighbors that carry cultural sensitivities, and even in sacred calligraphy. A thread that runs through these projects is a growing awareness of the inherent values in our Latino and minority communities; communities that favor the collective over the individual, that acknowledge the role of spirituality in everyday life, that value conversations of meaning where collective consultations often occur and where a collective vision is accumulated over time.