San Diego-Tijuana Arts Groups Among First Grantees in Launch of $25 Million Border Culture Fund

The Mellon Foundation on Wednesday announced a $25 million commitment to support artists, cultural leaders and tribal communities in the U.S.-Mexico border region.

Five groups in the San Diego-Tijuana-Imperial County region will be among the first to receive grants from the Frontera Culture Fund, which aims to amplify the voices of those who continue to shape the borderlands as “a place of beauty, imagination and collective action,” Mellon said in a news release.

The local grantees are:

• Chicano Park Museum and Cultural Center, Barrio Logan – to support the assessment, conservation, cataloguing and digitization of two significant archives that document the work of generations of Chicano artists and activists at the park and beyond.
• Fandango Fronterizo, Tijuana – the annual event at the border brings together musicians, dancers and community members around son jarocho, regional music from Veracruz. The funding will facilitate organizational and programmatic capacity for the event.
• Haitian Bridge Alliance, Grantville – the advocates for fair and humane immigration policies, focus on Black migrants and asylum seekers from Haiti, the Caribbean and Africa. The funding will support expansion of artistic partnerships and storytelling.
• Planta Libre, a gallery in Mexicali, and the MexiCali Biennial, which showcases exhibitions on both sides of the California/Mexico border. The artist-led projects offer opportunities for both multidisciplinary research and creation of contemporary art works. 

“The U.S.-Mexico borderlands are home to an abundance of cultures and creative traditions, yet remain a region minimally funded by arts philanthropies in the United States,” said Elizabeth Alexander, president of the foundation. “Our long-term support for the artists, culture-builders, and stewards of creative expression among these communities will help amplify and sustain the profoundly varied arts and histories taking place in the borderlands.”

Designed in collaboration with artists and cultural leaders from the region, the fund will provide flexible support for grantees, including artists, cultural organizations and grassroots community groups.

The fund also will support Indigenous, binational and Black networks that are facilitating regional and cross-border knowledge exchanges and working to defend cultural rights.

The inaugural group of grantees was selected based on “their vital contributions to the region’s cultural life and their integration of arts with essential community needs,” Mellon officials said. The needs include racial and climate justice, migrant and refugee rights, LGBTQ+ rights, Indigenous cultural sovereignty, public memory and community health.

Other recipients include Alianza Indígena Sin Fronteras in Tucson, which supports a network of Indigenous organizations and communities divided by the border, La Semilla Food Center in New Mexico, which operates a community farm, and Carrizo Comecrudo Nation of Texas, Inc. for a trust protecting 170 acres of Rio Grande ancestral land and an education center.

The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, based in New York, is the nation’s largest supporter of the arts and humanities.