Project Details

Jessica Fuentes and Christian Cruz’s initial goal for their skill exchange was to learn more about each other’s artistic processes and past work. Through virtual meetings and mail exchange, they were able to learn from each other and lay the groundwork for an ongoing exchange. 

To document their exchange, Christian and Jessica created a zine. They chose an accordion zine because of the ability to make it double-sided, incorporating work from each of them on either side of the booklet. One side features photographs by Christian Cruz based on prompts that Jessica Fuentes provided her and the other side has a documentation of a performance piece by Fuentes that responded to prompts that Cruz provided her.

Bios

Jessica Fuentes is an artist, author, and educator based in Fort Worth, Texas. She holds a BA in Art & Performance from the University of Texas at Dallas (2004) and an MA in Art Education with a Museum Certification from the University of North Texas (2013). She has exhibited her work regionally for over a decade and is a former member of the F6 Gallery Collective and 500x Gallery. During the 2019-2020 academic year, Fuentes was an Artist-in-Residence at Tarrant County College South Campus, and in 2021 her work was included in the temporary public art exhibition, New Stories: New Futures curated by Dr. Lauren Cross.

In her role as News Editor of Glasstire, an online magazine covering the arts in Texas, Fuentes writes news articles, interviews, reviews, and other long-form articles about the regional art scene. As an art educator with 15 years of experience, she has taught learners of all ages in classrooms, higher education, and museums. From 2017 to 2022, Fuentes served on the Education Planning Committee for the Smithsonian Latino Center in Washington, D.C. Currently, she serves on the board of the Dallas-based organization Make Art with Purpose. Learn more at http://www.jessicafuentes.com/

Christian Cruz (b.1989) is an award winning multi-media artist who works in the mediums of performance, video, and installation. She has performed nationally and internationally in galleries, museums, universities, festivals, and public spaces. Cruz received her Bachelor of Arts from Columbia College Chicago for Visual Arts Management and a Masters of Art in Visual and Performing Arts from University of Texas at Dallas.

Cruz created and maintains the Dallas Performance Art Index, an online archive of Dallas performance art. She also founded and runs the Mama Art Fund that awards artist single parents every year since 2020. Cruz hosted and produced the educational radio program “Forañeo” at Centro de Cultura Digital in Mexico City in 2013. She held a poetry residency at The National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago through Yollocalli Arts Reach in 2012. 

She was included in the Nasher Sculpture Center’s Nasher Public series where in she performed for six hours, twice a week, for eight weeks inside her multi-part installation in 2021-2022. In 2022, she held a performance art residency with The Momentary as part of their INVERSE performance festival. She is included in the landmark survey exhibition Soy de Tejas, first featured in San Antonio (2023) and now currently at Arts Fort Worth (2024).

As an independent writer her work has been published by Dallas Observer, KERA Texas Arts, D Magazine, and Nasher Magazine. She’s been awarded grants from NALAC, Foundation of Contemporary Arts, Nasher Sculpture Center, National Endowment for the Arts (sub grantee), The Office of Dallas and Culture, Aurora Dallas PNC grant, and more.

She a cohort member of EmergeNYC performance artists, and currently an artist in studio residence at Cedars Union arts incubator. She is a neurodivergent mother and an abuse survivor living in Dallas, Texas.