The work explores my Carpatho-Rusyn cultural heritage through an interdisciplinary approach, referencing dying Carpathian shepherding tradition and Carpatho-Rusyns immigration to Pennsylvania's steel mills (1880-1920). The work integrates traditional designs, costume elements and video work. The project is a continuation of my investigation into disappearing traditions, drawing attention to a small ethnic group, the Carpatho-Rusyns while evoking my memories of many childhood summer stays with my great-grandfather in Tyushka, a small mountain village in Ukraine's Zakarpattia Oblast, Ukraine.

The Carpatho-Rusyns are a largely unknown, ethnically and linguistically distinct people living in remote villages scattered throughout the valleys of the Carpathian Mountains in east central Europe, indigenous to the Carpathian Mountains and surrounding areas. They have never had a state of their own, except declaring their independence from Czechoslovakia on March 15, 1939 and was formally annexed by Hungary one day later, existed for a mere 24 hours. Carpatho-Rusyns live as a national minority in Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, and Ukraine. Carpatho-Rusyns shortest-lived state in history.

Of the estimated 1.2 to 1.6 million Carpatho-Rusyn, only about 90,000 were officially recorded in recent censuses. This is largely because some census authorities don’t recognize them as a distinct ethnic group and because Carpatho-Rusyns intermingle with surrounding communities over time. Among the 250,000 Carpatho-Rusyns who immigrated to the United States, a total of 7583 have been identified. They immigrated between 1880 and 1920 and settled primarily in Pennsylvania and Pittsburgh, where they worked in the Still Mills and coal mines.