A large-scale print media installation by José Ortiz-Pagán, a Puerto Rican artist who uses art for social change and community empowerment, opens in the McNeil Building (3718 Locust Walk) at the University of Pennsylvania on Friday, March 21, 2025.
The exhibit is titled “De Tierra a Estrellas/ From Soil to Stars.”
This large installation, suspended over the McNeil’s building open atrium and composed of various mediums, including woodcuts, textiles, and technologies, traverses time bridging ancient talismanic sources and methodologies with a modern rendering of a talismanic calendar.
“The calendar serves as a testament to the struggles, victories, and strategies in the pursuit of well-being, particularly within the context of migration and cultural transformation,” according to the exhibit’s description written by the artista, Ortiz-Pagán.
Ortiz-Pagán was inspired by dialogue and printmaking activities with a group of high school students from Centro de Cultura, Arte, Trabajo y Educación (CCATE), a Norristown-based non-profit dedicated to participatory, community-centered education in art, photography, ceramics, academics, and other fields.
During the students’ participation in 2024 High School Summer Latinx Leadership Institute sponsored by CCATE and the Center for Latin American and Latinx Studies (CLALS) at Penn, the artist engaged students in various activities, from card role-playing to meditative walks, designed to explore root causes of harmful social challenges and imagine ways to organize to against them.
Ortiz-Pagán writes that the installation “reflects on the ways in which human movement reshapes lives, using astronomy and astrology as frameworks for marking actions realities beyond physical borders.” He continues, “At its core, the piece examines moments of historic arrivals and considers how present challenges can be navigated while laying the groundwork for new strategies of existence and belonging.”
According to Johnny Irizarry, a Philadelphia-based artist and community leader and lecturer at Penn’s Center for Latin American and Latinx Studies (CLALS), “Jose’s artistic voice challenges us to hear the voices of the rarely heard.” Irizarry adds, “This installation speaks to working collaboratively in a time much needed.”
Cathy Bartch, the Associate Director of CLALS says, “Aesthetically, the art piece is magnificent, compelling all passersby to stop and reflect on its striking presence and powerful images -including symbols, such as la barca, related to migration.”
Bartch has also been one of the coordinators of the High School Latinx Leadership Institute at Penn, where she witnessed interactions between the youth and the artist. She says, “José’s experiential, student-centered pedagogy is liberating and transformative for students at a critical time in their adolescence. In just one day, after a few hours of dialogue, walks in nature, and reflection, the students produced spectacular prints of their own design, piecing them together into a beautiful whole.”
José Ortiz-Pagan has been in residency at the Center for Latin American and Latinx Studies at the University of Pennsylvania since June 2024. The residency is funded by the Sachs Program for Arts Innovation through a grant received by Johnny Irizarry to invite Ortiz-Pagán to Penn.
