Ten local artistic projects selected for residency through UTSA’s DRJ Project

MARCH 5, 2024 -The UTSA Democratizing Racial Justice (DRJ) Project has selected 10 local artistic projects for its 2024 Artist in Residency Program from a competitive pool of nearly 40 artists from the greater San Antonio area. The artists are receiving a stipend to fund their work for the duration of their project using a variety of media including music, multimedia, poetry, storytelling and visual art.

"It's important for us to work closely with different community organizations and artists to create artistic projects," said Alejandra Elenes, DRJ principal investigator (PI) and chair of the Department of Race, Ethnicity, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.

Kirsten Gardner, DRJ co-PI and UTSA associate professor of history, described the selection process as difficult because of all the unique projects submitted for consideration.

"We had very strong applications," she said. "When you look at the list of those who won you'll be struck by just how amazing these projects are."

DRJ's 2024 artists in residence include:

Marisela Barrera, "Lechuza Guide to the Lone Star State"
"Lechuza Guide to the Lone Star State" is an original performance focused on historical and living personajes de Tejas, with a focus on the Rio Grande Valley, San Antonio and Dallas. "Lechuza" blends personal storytelling, Barrera's particular style of jokes/rants, and a TED Talk-like approach to Texas as told through a Tejana lens. (@lamarisela)

Briana Blueitt, "Liberation Lineages: Linking Afro-Diasporic Fights for Land & Food Sovereignty"
"Liberation Lineages" (working title), an oral history and storytelling project, will focus on histories often omitted or distorted to challenge assumptions about Latinidad, Blackness and Indigeneity while connecting shared histories and struggles. Blueitt draws from her time traveling, studying and organizing between Texas and Mexico.

Veronica Castillo, "Volver a la Tierra"
"Volver a la Tierra" is a living installation with three components: a community consulta, an open-air community kitchen, and classes in clay sculpture and sustainability. The back patio of Galeria E.V.A. (Castillo's gallery) will serve as an open-air mobile kitchen space where Castillo will lead cooking, nutrition, clay and sustainability classes. (@galeriaev)

Anel I. Flores, Pintada de Rojo: A Hybrid Graphic Memoir About Love, and Love, and Love
Through a survey of Flores' multimedia visual art, illustrations, poetry, essay and other unnamed queer wonderings, Pintada is about understanding their life's trauma through the love of writing and making art, connecting to source to come face-to-face with our inner child to understand our ancestors, our mother, our community and more. (@aneliflores)

Andre Renteria Menchaca
Renteria Menchaca will develop a chronicle telling individual stories of the members of Grupo VIDA (Victimas por sus Derechos en Acción/Victims for their Rights in Action), a citizen collective in the northern Mexican city of Torreón formed in response to narco terrorism by the Zetas cartel. Since the group formed in 2015, hundreds of thousands of bone fragments in unmarked graves have been discovered.

Amalia Ortiz, "Punkera Diatriabas"
Ortiz's band, Las Hijas de la Madre, includes Jacque Salame, Lilith Tijerina, Lety RZ, Kip Austin Hinton and Lorenzo Beas. A Chicanx feminist punk outcry for social change, "Punkera Diatriabas" will include new poem songs, choreography and costumes, and a staged performance of Chicanx spoken word and punk music. (@amalia.o)

Cruz Ortiz, "CORRIDOS SUPER MAS FUERTE"
"CORRIDOS SUPER MAS FUERTE" will continue the regional journalistic poetic ballad tradition in the Rio Bravo, West Texas and Central Texas areas. Using a solar-powered mobile printing press trailer, Ortiz will distribute live hand-printed corrido posters in six curated Tejanx towns and write and print corridos that reflect current social injustices, climate changes and Tejanx historical figures. (@cruzortizart)

Tanesha S. Payne, "In the Well"
"In the Well (working title)" is a multi-disciplinary work that uses performing and media arts to guide the audience through three vignettes. Each vignette explores racial dichotomies of labels experienced through examples of civic (dis)obedience throughout time. (@tanesha_payne1)

Andrea "Vocab" Sanderson, "The Echo Project: Legacy Continues"
Utilizing oral history practices, participants of "The Echo Project" will interview local leaders, activists and teachers to learn about the history and intersections of their communities. Workshops led by experienced and diverse local artists will foster student development as they reflect on what they learned and forge a creative space. (@vocabulous)

David Zamora Casas, "Lady Violencia and the Worship of Guns"
In collaboration with Barbara Renaud Gonzalez, Casas will co-organize a conference on violence. Local community leaders, educators and activists will be invited to two separate "platicas" - one in San Antonio and one in Uvalde - to deepen understandings about shared histories of Texas violence (@davidzamoracasasartist)

Public link

Please use the above public link if you want to share this noodl on another website.