Dearest Michita is based on an archive that shouldn’t exist. It is composed of 56 letters written between June 25, 1939, and March 16, 1940, by the artist’s grandfather to her grandmother, following his disappearance two weeks after their first daughter was born. Never discussed by the grandparents “Tita” (abuelita), and “Tito” (abuelito), the letters were kept as a family secret, and were supposed to be destroyed upon Tita’s death in 2001. Clark discovered this archive upon the death of her uncle in 2020. Clark was named after Tita and her first born daughter, the three of them nicknamed Micha or Michita (diminutive versions of Artemisa).  The letters read as if addressed to Clark in present time, drawing a deep personal connection for the artist.

The archive of letters tells the story of a man—a Mexican national who later became a United States citizen—who, during the final years of the Great Depression fell into severe debt, causing him to flee to Mexico City, and abandon his wife and two week-old child for two years. His choice remains a family secret that has led to more questions than answers. These letters also tell a story of the socioeconomic precarity of Mexican nationals in the U.S. at the time of Mexican Repatriation (1929–1939) and The Bracero Program (1942). Tita and Tito would go on to raise four children over the course of their 47-year marriage, ending upon his death. Tito died before Clark was born, and by then he held a mythic status in the family. He was the doting husband and parent, the perfect grandparent, the life of any party. However, Clark was not able to relate to him until she found letters from what seems to be one of the darkest periods of her grandparents’ relationship.