An organization supporting Puerto Rican artists received $1.2 million from the Mellon Foundation to move into its third phase to invest in contemporary art practices, according to an Oct. 15 press release.

The Puerto Rican Arts Initiative, which added UT’s College of Fine Arts as a partner in 2021, will launch new workshops, curatorial projects and exhibitions in its third phase, according to the release. Ramón H. Rivera-Servera, COFA dean and principal investigator of the initiative, said the project began at Northwestern University in 2017 when Puerto Rico’s debt crisis went public. The investment from the Mellon Foundation allows artists to stay in their homeland of Puerto Rico and continue practicing art in their community, Rivera-Servera said.

“We need to start thinking, as we get closer to our first decade of activity, how are these practices appropriately appreciated in the academy archive, cultural institutions and talked about more broadly around the institutions that fund the arts,” Rivera-Servera said.

Artists participate in one month-long micro-residencies, and applicants can submit proposals for submission every six months, Rivera-Servera said. 

Artist Pelé Sánchez Tormes will complete a micro-residency in Ponce, Puerto Rico where they were born. Tormes said they started the project as a way to connect back to their home country. 

“The artistic community in Puerto Rico is fairly small,” Tormes said. “We are a very experimental island when it comes to the arts. There is a sense of familiarity with the subjects that invite me to participate in this, and it’s been great. I’m just happy that I have the experience to keep doing my work.”

The initiative pairs artists with mentors for their projects. Nibia Pastrana Santiago, who mentors Tormes, said in an email that the most important aspect of the initiative is the sustainability it brings to the community of artists in Puerto Rico. 

“I love processes, so to be a mentor, this time of Pelé Sánchez Tormes, gives me the opportunity to test new methodologies (to make a performance) and witness how another artist makes their own creative decisions,” Santiago said. “For me this is the exciting part, to have some kind of intimacy in an artist’s process and support that one-of-a kind ride.”