Aram Han Sifuentes is a Chicago-based Korean American fiber and social-practice artist who uses sewing to empower immigrants across the country. Born in Seoul and brought to the United States at age five, she grew up in California’s Central Valley as the daughter of dry cleaners and garment workers, learning to sew from her mother at six. Her work inherits that cultural history: citizenship-test questions embroidered by hand, curtains carrying multilingual protections against ICE and police, garments that unfold into protest messages, and banners strangers can borrow for marches.

Her U.S. Citizenship Test Samplers project exposes the labor, cost, and arbitrary barriers built into the naturalization process; each sampler is sold for the application fee ($760), with the money going directly to its maker. The Official Unofficial Voting Station invites people legally barred from voting to cast symbolic ballots, while her Protest Banner Lending Library allows those who cannot safely demonstrate to send their words into the streets through someone else’s hands. Though her method is gentle, it is never timid.

Today, Sifuentes is working with Chicago’s HANA Center on Citizenship for All, gathering immigrants, youth, adoptees, and survivors of domestic violence to make traditional Korean nonggi banners. More than fifty workshops have turned personal stories into bright, public declarations of belonging. As immigrant communities face raids, detention, and pressure to hide, her work offers protection, visibility, and the courage of making together.