Ms. Chornesky's latest project, "Something Borrowed, Something New," uses photography and oral histories to explore Italian immigration to the United States from a uniquely female perspective.

In the decades following World War II, women have immigrated with their relatives or alone. They have come hoping to find better opportunities for their families as well as for themselves.

Through photography and oral histories,
the artist documents and compares the Italian women who immigrated to the United States after World War II to their female counterparts (primarily sisters and cousins) who stayed in Italy. Ms. Chornesky highlights the images and voices of these immigrant women and brings to light a fuller picture of how immigration has affected their lives.

Throughout 2003 and 2004, Chornesky interviewed Italian American women about their immigration experience as well as their perspectives on such subjects as money, power, sex and work. She also traveled throughout Sicily and Southern Italy to meet and document their sisters and cousins in the same fashion.

Italian American women and their contributions to the Italian American immigrant experience have been largely unexplored and greatly under represented. Something Borrowed, Something New uses art to challenge traditional ideas and biases and to put forth a refreshing perspective on an often-stereotyped population.

Chornesky's work has appeared in numerous publications including Time magazine, The New York Times, Elle, The Los Angeles Times, and Rolling Stone. Her photography has also been published in LA Latino: The Cultures of Everyday Life (Sage Press). Her previous exhibit, 70UP Women: New Images of Aging, debuted at the Museum of the City of New York in 2003. It has won numerous awards and is currently touring throughout the United States.

In 1999, Ms. Chornesky was the recipient of a grant from the Cultural Affairs Office of Los Angeles for the project Hybrid City, an examination of multiculturalism in Los Angeles. In the mid-nineties, through a grant from Stanford University and Art Matters, she moved to a Bosnian Muslim refugee camp in Croatia, producing a body of work documenting the elders who lived there.

The National Italian American Foundation, New York City Council Member Helen Sears from District 25, Queens, the Lidia Matticchio Bastianich Foundation and the National Organization of Italian American Women have provided generous funding for this exhibition.