Margo Machida
b. 1950, Hilo, HI
Untitled (Three Heads), 1987
Acrylic on paper
Courtesy the artist

Margo Machida’s Untitled (Three Heads) is a psychological self-portrait composed of disembodied heads and a dog in the foreground. It reflects the sense of liminality and displacement Machida experienced moving from Hawai’i to New York, exploring themes of fragmentation, spectrality, and vulnerability. The painting invokes cross-cultural associations such as the Moai statues with their rows of outsized heads from Rapa Nui (Easter Island), and the Native Hawaiian (kanaka maoli) ki‘i (tiki) figures from Puʻuhonua o Hōnaunau National Historical Park on the Big Island of Hawai’i, where Machida was born and raised.

Machida is a leading scholar, curator, and critic in Asian American art and visual culture. She co-founded the Diasporic Asian Art Network (DAAN) and Godzilla: Asian American Art Network.