In migration, Doug Aitken explores the complex relationship between America’s wilderness and its sprawling built environment. Images of vast landscapes, roadside motels, and industrial cityscapes from every region of the country move across the screen, calling to mind the migration of settlers across the great expanse of land. Unexpectedly, the protagonists of Aitken’s meditative exploration are neither frontiersmen nor actors, but native North American animals. Confined in the sterile environment of motel rooms, the animals cautiously explore the unfamiliar habitat; their investigations yield scenes that are both humorous and heart-rending. The work captures the country’s strengths and contradictions—the sublime beauty of a landscape that is often marred by man-made interventions, and the national ambition to expand, which brings both opportunity and loss. Ultimately, migration provides a picture of America as it grows, changes, and finds its place in the twenty-first century.