Artist Talk with Dionis Ortiz & Kleaver Cruz

Celebrate Black Future(s) Month at MFTA as writer Kleaver Cruz joins current MFTA Artist-in-Residence Dionis Ortiz in a dynamic conversation. They will discuss artmaking, gender, race and what it means to be Dominican New Yorkers in this celebration of artists and identity. The discussion will be followed by a Q&A. Attendees are invited to tour Ortiz’s current art exhibition, Evolution, on view at the MFTA Gallery.

About Dionis Ortiz:
Dionis Ortiz is an interdisciplinary artist working in painting, photography, printmaking, sculpture, video, and installation. He employs these mediums to create a coming of age story as a Dominican New Yorker exploring masculinity, vulnerability, the supernatural, family, and religion, as well as how culture plays a role in his community and in his life. As the fall 2018 Artist-in-Residence, Ortiz is able to immerse himself in an atmosphere filled with a variety of re-usable materials that contribute to his installations, mosaics, paintings, and prints. Vintage floor tiles become components for detailed inlays and massive plastic sheets become the backdrop for larger than life paintings and prints that are flanked by furniture and other objects that evoke memories of his past. www.dionisortiz.com

About Kleaver Cruz:
Kleaver Cruz is an uptown native of NYC, a writer, dreamer and lover of travel. His work has been featured in La Galería and African Voices Magazine as well as on Vibe.com and the Huffington Post among others. Cruz is also one half of the poetic duo, The Delta, which has performed at The Nuyorican Poet’s Café, Bowery Poetry Club as well served as judges for the Wordat4F Poetry Slam. Kleaver is the creator of The Black Joy Project, a digital and real-world movement to center Black joy as a form of resistance. He is a member of We Are All Dominican–A U.S.-based grassroots collective that amplifies the voices of and supports the work of Dominicans of Haitian Descent and Haitian migrants in the Dominican Republic. Cruz loves being Black, Queer, Dominican and the myriad of elements that comprise who he is with the understanding that they are all parts of a whole. www.kleavercruz.com

Photo credits for cover image from left to right by Bliss Green-Morehead and Dominique Sindayiganza