We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Rafa Tarín. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Rafa below.

Rafa, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today. It’s always helpful to hear about times when someone’s had to take a risk – how did they think through the decision, why did they take the risk, and what ended up happening. We’d love to hear about a risk you’ve taken.

I’ve always been a maker – a creator, a builder, an experimenter, a cook, a crafter, a trash picker, a mess maker – someone who takes various materials and turns them into something else. an alchemist maybe. a rasquachero definitely.
being an artist is/was always how i saw myself even if I didn’t know exactly what that meant in a day-to-day way.

I’ve done so many jobs for money over the years – administrative assistant, cook (so many cooking jobs all over the country in all types of cuisine), adult and youth counselor, community organizer, custodian, dishwasher, video store clerk, caterer, construction worker, landscaper, art teacher, youth program coordinator, circus arts instructor, grant writer – but nothing held my attention in the way that engaging in an individual and collective art practice has. I keep coming home to it despite all the divergence.

In 2004 or 5 while working as a family advocate for survivors of sexual violence I burned out on the non-profit model of advocacy and treatment. it replicated so many unhealthy power dynamics – the same ones that I thought I was trying to dismantle.

My non-traditional aspirations for personal success allowed me the space to explore what it would be like to focus on art and the creative process as a legitimate vocation.

My belief in the transformative power of art lead me to work with youth utilizing art and performance as a place of connection – modalities whereby young people can be themselves, take creative risks, develop their voice, their stories, see themselves and each other beyond social constructs, reflect on and imagine a world they feel invested in and represents their hopes and dreams for the future.

So…..that’s what I been doing for the past 18 or so years through a community based group of artists and performers known as The Peñasco Theatre Collective supporting the creative lives of young people in schools, summer programs and afterschools out around Tiwa and Tewa territory (northern New Mexico). i also co-facilitate an artist-in-residency space in an 82-year old adobe black box theater located in the magnificent Sangre de Cristo mountains.

In your view, what can society to do best support artists, creatives and an thriving creative ecosystem?

I don’t believe that you always need money to create something beautiful, meaningful and/or transformative. But as artists creating within a white supremacist capitalist patriarchal society that defines the value of things through a monetary lens public funding for the arts needs to increase to reflect the value that cultural production has on the lives of individuals and communities. 

Access to arts and culture is a quality-of-life issue. art isn’t a luxury, it’s a necessity for survival and growth. art and cultural production are necessary for the wellbeing of individuals and communities. not just because artists contribute billions of dollars to the overall GDP but because artists build community, foster connection, create spaces of multiplicity, challenge the status quo, propagate imagination and generate solutions to our society’s most challenging issues. 

Artists should be venerated, but not in the way that capitalism does it, commodifying work it deems marketable. Artists should be supported because of their contributions to our collective cultural lives. this support could look like increased funding to rural artists, to indigenous artists, to poc, trans and queer artists, black artists, immigrant artists, youth artists, parent artists, elder artists – anyone who falls outside of the privileged walls of arts institutions and the market. 

The U.S spends so few tax dollars to develop and support the creative lives of its people. Artists shouldn’t have to choose between making art and writing grants or marketing. they shouldn’t be at the mercy of non-profit funding priorities and limited funding access forcing artists to compete with each other for crumbs. this reality contributes to an unhealthy production oriented hamster wheel that drains artists of creative energy and compartmentalizes creative communities. 

Artists should have a paid position in every aspect of society. Every community organization and government agency should have at least one artist on staff- someone who can help facilitate collective creativity, joy and transformation.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

As a gender non-conforming queer xicanx of mixed indigenous mexican and european ancestry growing up in northeast LA in the 70s and 80s there are many stories, many moments in my life that illustrate my resilience – so many near misses, so many starts and stops, so much self-doubt coupled with so much joy, laughter, gratitude, righteous anger and love.

I want to reflect on a major take away so far that keeps me going – the system and all its tentacles were never designed for someone like me. it doesn’t offer any framework or rules or conformity I need to abide by. I don’t want a piece of its rotten pie. or a seat at its busted ass table. I am making and building and envisioning and defining and questioning and living and loving in my own way and making spaces for others, including my children, to do the same.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: @brushfire575

Image Credits
rafa tarín