CADRE (Community Artists’ Development & Resource Exchange)

CADRE (Community Artists’ Development & Resource Exchange) is El Puente’s Latine & BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) led intergenerational network of artists, artisans, and cultural workers. Our work is committed to the self-determination and liberation of all oppressed people. We build community, share resources, nurture holistic development, and offer a platform to incubate and showcase our individual and collective work.  

Created with JL Umipig Jessenia Mera Frances Lucerna, Melinda Gonzalez, Joe Matunis, Gloria Zelaya, Salome Egas, Jorge Barrios, Elisbeth Diaz Citron, Alba Hernandez, Joel Cruz, Shareef Dean, Hana Martinez, Alicia Martinson.

CADRE acts as our Community Cultural Organizing Collective.

MEMBERSHIP

  • CADRE Members will be connected and a part of a network of professional artists with aligned in values and intention related to Peace and Justice.

  • Meetings will be a space where CADRE Members co-create Artistic offerings for community while also  

  • Alongside any Event/Performance use of space we ask our CADRE members to:

    • Consider youth programming or involvement connected to Event/Performance

    • Free performances for our El Puente community

RESIDENT ARTISTS

CADRE Resident Artists are presenting seasonal Artists. There is a process of selecting these residents within a year and will be decided by active members. Presenting artists have access to rehearsal/studio space in addition to their calendarized Performance/Exhibition Show. 

CONTINUOUS COMMUNITY ARTS and CULTURAL ORGANIZING PROGRAMMING

  • As written by poet Chad Sweeney “The open mic is a ritual practice of oral literature spoken to the air, heard immediately to approval or distaste, to amens, orales, snaps and moans of recognition. By its nature, the open mic is a ritual of decolonization, a resistance movement, not only by undermining the assumptions of cultural normativity, but by its very format, of the collective, egalitarian nature of participation and shared ownership, of the absence of hierarchy, awards, bios and resumes. The open mic is the living embodiment of intersectionality, a microphone and dialogue for often-marginalized voices which are ignored at best by this America, if not actively silenced.”

    It is because of this we bring to our community in NYC-

    “The People’s Mic: An Open Mic Grounded in Transformative Community Building”- where we center Belonging, Sacred Practice and Collective Self-Determination and bring it to our stage at our El Puente Headquarters- 211 South 4th St., Brooklyn, NY 11211

    Every 3rd Tuesday of every month starting at 6-8PM!

  • The El Puente CADRE (Community Artists Development and Resource Exchange) is hosting their first Creators Market in the Winter Season. We invite all Community Artists, Artisans, Creatives and anyone who has an offering or service to exchange with community, that they can gift for themselves, their loved ones, their comrades, their communities or their homes. We invite those who offer creations and goods that are rooted in equity, inclusion, ancestral honoring, liberation and care to partner with us on this event.

    Our Market is located on the Southside (Los Sures) in our headquarters Williamsburg (211 South 4th St) where we continue to exist and thrive serving our community amongst the ongoing Gentrification in our neighborhood. An intention for our market is to activate our homebase at 211 South 4th St. in Los Sures as a supportive space for our community to uplift their talents, their efforts and their services for sustainable exchange.

    We prioritize Creators of the Global Majority. 

    The exchange with El Puente of all sales will be 10% of sales as a donation to CADRE and our Arts Collective, and the ongoing work of our BIPOC led community artists centered in El Puente.

  • Invited Artist as Healers circle that is culturally responsive to the needs of our community.

  • Arts Creative Lab gatherings monthly, space used to offer Artists a space to share and workshop and offer Artistic generating space.