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.

Bernardo Mazón Daher

Bernardo Mazón Daher

Bernardo Mazón Daher

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Bernardo Mazón Daher

San Diego County

"Bernardo Mazón Daher is a border brat from the San Diego South Bay. He has taught and worked in the arts nationwide for premier, prestigious companies and on grassroots, community-based projects. Mazón Daher has also organized public health causes and voting campaigns in Hispanic communities throughout California. Before the pandemic, he served as a medical disaster responder for multiple governments and agencies and, afterward, worked in a pro bono law office for immigrants and refugees from the Middle East and Latin America. Returning to his calling to engage people in civic action, among other creative projects, Mazón Daher recently wrote and performed “Taxilandia: San Diego” to motivate people to support local causes. He is an all-around story-focused advocate and seeks to create spaces where different peoples intersect to listen, learn, labor, love, and play together.

Jose "Eduardo Kintero" Quintero

Jose "Eduardo Kintero" Quintero

Jose "Eduardo Kintero" Quintero

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Jose "Eduardo Kintero" Quintero

Imperial County

Jose Eduardo Quintero is an artist who has worked in many mediums, including large-format metal and ceramic sculpture, curatorship and museography of exhibitions, development, and dissemination of visual arts programs, and art workshops helping different groups of people from adults to children with special needs. He's worked for the Autonomous University of Baja California, the Baja California Government, Casa de Cultura Mexicali, and the City of Calexico Recreation Department, among other places, focusing on murals,  exhibits, cultural programs, art activities in public spaces.

Sandra Carmona

Sandra Carmona

Sandra Carmona

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Sandra Carmona

San Diego County

Sandra Carmona is of Wixárika descent, Chicana, daughter of farmworkers, and a muralist for over 20 years. She is a well-known leader in her community and a longtime activist for farmworkers and Indigenous rights. She founded Calpulli Omeyocan, a grassroots Indigenous dance collaborative, and her project, Maijawee Divine Serpent, is a transborder art piece that served as a political statement in solidarity with the Kumeyaay Nation and Indigenous people’s struggle over sovereignty on the U.S.-Mexico border. Sandra’s art intends to amplify the voices of her people and showcase their culture, contributions, struggles, and vibrancy. To her, art is medicine.

Ana Ruth Castillo

Ana Ruth Castillo

Ana Ruth Castillo

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Ana Ruth Castillo

San Diego County

Ana Ruth Yela Castillo is an art therapist, a mother, and a muralist of Guate-Mayan descent who engages the community in healing through creative expression. She began her career by developing after-school programming using poetry, theater, and muralism to empower the lives of youth. Listening to her student's stories of intergenerational trauma and resilience directed her toward the mental health field. She graduated from Loyola Marymount University in 2017 with a dual master's in Family Therapy and Clinical Art Therapy. Ana Ruth moved with her family in 2019 to the beautifully rural and artsy town of Ramona in San Diego County. As a mother, a new journey began that informs both her clinical and intuitive skills as a therapeutic arts practitioner. Creative expression continues to be the bridge she trusts and uses to facilitate a naturally unfolding process connecting people to themselves, their medicine, and wisdom.

Thao French

Thao French

Thao French

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Thao French

San Diego County

Thao Huynh French is an artist, muralist, and street photographer. Born in Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam, she lives and works in San Diego. She is best known for co-founding Mindful Murals™, a creative social enterprise with the mission of bringing communities together through the power of art. Since launching it in 2018, she and her husband (and business partner) have painted over 400 interactive murals for schools and public spaces, reaching places as far as Hawaii and Vietnam. French’s artwork explores different varieties of flowers and her Asian American heritage. Her art is an eclectic mixture of abstract and figurative concepts using acrylic and spray paint as primary mediums with no limitation of color. Her work continues to evolve, using years of practice to experiment with more modern ways to create art styles that are uniquely hers.

Sarah Garcia

Sarah Garcia

Sarah Garcia

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Sarah Garcia

San Diego County

Sarah Garcia is a visual artist from San Diego, working predominantly with clay and found organic materials. Her practice is rooted in exploring personal and shared connections developed, maintained, and altered through her life experiences. Objects are a focal point of her work, reflecting individual and collective experiences, histories, hopes, dreams, and intentions. Sarah creates opportunities for play and experimentation with clay for students of all ages and abilities, intending to facilitate meaningful access to expressive material deeply rooted in shared human experience. Through her collaborations with other artists, educators, and community activists, she works to develop community-centered projects, exhibitions, and workshops focused on art as public expression, engagement, and service. Garcia works in the San Diego City College art department and is an MFA candidate at San Diego State University.

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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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