Freedomland U.S.A. is a failed theme park upon which the Bronx neighborhood of Co-op City would be developed. It was open from 1960 to 1964, and Co-op City would open for its first residents (including my grandmother) in 1970. Many of the park's attractions were rooted in stereotypes about Native Americans, and it commercialized disasters such as the Great Chicago Fire. These were marketed as aspects of nostalgia and memory, important events that shaped “American history” – the epitome of a colonial project which ultimately failed.

 

In this project I take inspiration from an old wallpaper design that was in my grandmother's apartment and which was the backdrop of many of our family portraits, in order to reimagine the confines of what Freedomland could be.