Artists at Work (AAW) is a national initiative based in New York that provides artists in six cities across the United States with an eighteen-month salary, health care, and professional support as they work alongside community organizations to address local needs through their art practice. In Tucson, the Southwest Folklife Alliance serves as the local host partner, identifying and supporting heritage-based artists whose work is already embedded in the communities they serve. The program’s premise is straightforward and consequential: when artists are supported as whole people instead of being funded for isolated projects, they are free to do deeper, more sustained, and more meaningful work.
Why Partnership Makes a Difference
Southwest Folklife Alliance’s role as Tucson’s Artists at Work host partner reflects the organization’s long-standing commitment to supporting traditional and heritage-based artists year-round — not only during festivals or public programs, but in the daily, often invisible labor of cultural maintenance. SFA’s program team works to ensure that selected artists are already trusted within the communities where their projects will unfold, and that the support they receive is responsive to the full range of their needs. From the Mata Ortiz potter who says the program has “opened more doors” and helped him remain in Tucson, to the O’odham potter who — for the first time — could attend an international cultural exchange because the salary made it possible, the results speak to what happens when an organization genuinely invests in artists as people.
2025-26 Artist At Work Cohort
Four artists, four traditions, one shared commitment
Tucson’s current Artists at Work cohort brings together four heritage practitioners whose work spans Indigenous, Mexican, and multicultural artistic traditions. Porfirio “Pilo” Mora, a Mata Ortiz potter from the pueblo of Chihuahua, Mexico, is sharing hand-built, open-fire pottery with residents of Tucson’s La Doce corridor through a collaboration with Regeneración, the grassroots collective co-developing Louis’ Market as a center for cultural organizing. Harrison Preston, a Tohono O’odham potter and member of the O’odham Haha’adam Collective, is working to revitalize traditional paddle-and-anvil pottery techniques with a new generation of community members — a practice that fewer than twenty people on the Nation still carry. Katrina Kerstetter, a mixed-media artist and founder of the Koru Multicultural and Diverse Library, is leading the Refugee Garden Art Program at Iskashitaa Refugee Network, creating space for people from more than twelve countries to share stories and make art together. Shane Beeshligaii, an Apache and Navajo metalsmith, is bringing traditional silversmithing and copper casting to Mission Garden, Tucson’s living agricultural museum, connecting participants to the material and symbolic heritage of Indigenous cultures across the region.
Videos are available for each artist within their profile!
2022-23 Artist At Work Cohort
Art as a tool for community resilience
What connected these four artists was not medium or method, but a shared understanding that creative practice and community well-being are inseparable. Annetta Koruh’s basket weaving offered a path through grief and trauma. Keith Johnson’s drumming introduced young students to a global cultural inheritance. Guadalupe Mario Valencia’s paintings affirmed the living presence of Yaqui ceremonial life. Tanisha Tucker Lohse’s work with saguaro harvest reconnected O’odham community members to a seasonal tradition that has shaped their relationship to the desert landscape for generations. Each residency was distinct, and each addressed a gap in opportunity, a tradition at risk, a community in need of gathering space and cultural affirmation.
Videos are available for each artist within their profile!
