Artists + Practitioners + Organizations

Meet the artists, practitioners, and organizations! Far South/Border North awarded funding to support artists and cultural practitioners working in disciplines from performing arts, visual arts, music, film and media, and literature to multidisciplinary and socially engaged forms.

Far South/Border North Round I Grant Recipients

Our Round I grant recipients include about 60 artists and cultural practitioners from San Diego and Imperial counties. Round I grant recipients began developing their campaigns in June 2023, and are now implemented those campaigns through May 2024.

Alicia Siu

San Diego County

Alicia María Siu’s art centers on revitalizing a Mesoamerican mural tradition and recovering historical memory through art. As a first-generation refugee from the political violence of Central America, Siu came to the U.S. in 1998 at the tender age of 15, eventually earning a master's degree in Native American Studies from the University of California Davis. Her love for her own Mayan/Nahua-Pipil culture and awareness of Colonialism's political reality inspired Siu to advocate for Indigenous and environmental rights. Her art highlights Indigenous and marginalized peoples' ongoing struggle for respect, dignity, and sovereignty while celebrating a spirit of resiliency, healing, and hope.

Ryan Perez

Imperial County

Ryan Joseph Perez is an independent filmmaker, videographer, and writer. He lives and works in the desert community of Niland in Imperial County. Perez won an award for his entry at the Salton Sea Film Festival (2021) and worked as an art director on a soundstage for Awesomeness TV. As a writer, director, and editor, he continues to develop his craft while meeting and collaborating with people in and out of the industry.

Oscar J. Romo

San Diego County

Oscar Romo graduated as an architect with master's degrees in urban planning, social housing, and computer science and doctoral studies in environmental sciences. His concentration is art, reflecting scientific discoveries and exemplifying his academic research. An advocate of sustainability, he has created hundreds of art pieces made entirely from repurposed materials. He has worked in several countries on sizeable public art structures down to miniatures, always inspired by natural systems and resource conservation. Committed to education since he was in college, he has led thousands of students to appreciate science.

Sergio "Takito" Ojeda

Imperial County

Sergio Ojeda is a spray paint artist dedicated to changing the narratives of the binational communities of Imperial Valley and Mexicali. He was born and raised in the borderlands with a bohemian lifestyle and a cosmic perspective gained from an education focused on research, science, and psychology.

Juan Manuel Escalante

San Diego County

Juan Manuel Escalante is a designer and an artist working with computer code, modular synthesizers, and analog drawings. His work has been shown internationally and featured in major festivals and exhibitions, including Ars Electronica, Athens Digital Arts, OFFF, Mutek, Currents New Media, Binario, and Ceremonia, amongst others. He was a member of the National System of Art Creators (National Endowment for the Arts, MX) and received the Corwin Award (1st prize) for Electronic-Acoustic Composition in 2016. He has taught creative programming at the University of California Santa Barbara and various higher education institutions in Mexico, including the graduate program in Architecture (UNAM), where he founded and directed its Media Lab for eight years. He holds a Ph.D. in Media Arts & Technology (UCSB) and is currently an Assistant Professor at the Department of Visual Arts at California State University, Fullerton.

Johnny Bear Contreras

San Diego County

"From the ocean to the desert and everything in between" is how Johnny Bear Contreras answers the question of what influences his work. He works in the medium of sculpture, specializing in bronze, aluminum, and stainless steel and combining all three with resin. A critical component in his work is the representation of indigenous peoples within the arts industry, sharing that "our work is our belief system on display for the whole world to see."

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Far South/Border North Round II Grant Recipients

Our Round II grant recipients include 18 San Diego and Imperial County organizations. In fall 2023, they hired artists and cultural practitioners and began working alongside them to develop their campaigns, and implemented them through August 2024.

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