Yara Travieso

Yara Travieso is a Cuban-Venezuelan-American anti-disciplinary artist, educator, and community collaborator working in performance, film, & ritual. In her work, she practices an embodied collective “story-listening” over the systemically imposed “story-telling.” She is a 2023-25 Resident Artist with NYC’s Chelsea Factory, a 2019 United States Artist Fellow, a 2016 Creative Capital recipient, a 2020 NYSCA Film & Media grant recipient, a winner of National Association of Latino Arts & Cultures Grant via The Ford Foundation, and an Open Interval Fellow via Simons Foundation. Since 2019, Travieso has been on faculty at her alma mater, The Juilliard School (Dance BFA 2005), and is the 2023 winner of Juilliard's John Erskine Faculty prize. Her productions have been featured in NYC’s Park Avenue Armory, Lincoln Center, Performance Space NY, The Public Theater, The Knockdown Center, The High Line Park, Opéra National de Lorraine France, New World Symphony Center, EMPAC in Troy, NY & many more. Her films and visual art have been presented with El Museo, Film at Lincoln Center, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, PBS, SXSW, NY Latino Film Festival, Museum of The Moving Image, Vizcaya Museum, among others. Travieso’s community projects include ¡EPA!, in solidarity with asylum seekers, and collaborations with Chilean Feminist collective, LASTESIS & Pussy Riot bringing together 25k women in a performance protest in front of the White House. Travieso co-founded the Borscht Film Festival in 2005 and co-ran it until 2010 when it was named “the weirdest film festival on the planet” by IndieWire. She has led lectures & workshops with: The Ford Foundation, The Park Avenue Armory, Google, MoMa, BAM, NYU, National YoungArts Foundation, The New School, GALLIM, UnionDocs, & Ghetto Film School, among others. Travieso is the recipient of residencies such as: EMPAC, PS122 RAMP, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, BRICLab, STREB, Tribeca Performing Arts Center, The Bessie Schonberg AIR & currently Gibney's Open Interval Residency.

Areas of Specialization:
Multi-disciplinary art practices, Film, live film, performance, dance, theater, ritual, protest, community organizing, video editing, embodied movement practices. 

Representative Productions:
(Selected recent works) "La Medea" 2017, "El Ciclón" 2018, "Sagittarius A." 2018, "Third Trinity" 2019, "RITUALES" 2021, "Ceremonia I. In Defense Of Tenderness" 2023, "Antología: Una Teta Novela" 2024

Honors and Awards: 
The Chelsea Factory Resident Artist Grant for community contributions, 2025
Open Interval Fellowship via The Simons Foundation, 2024 
The Juilliard School John Erskine Faculty Prize, for 2023
The Clemente Soto Velez Center BORIMIX Award for Contributions to Latine Arts & Culture 2022. 
New York State Council of the Arts Individual Artist Media and Film Grant 2021. 
United States Artist Fellowship 2019. 
Artist Honoree for The BRIC Arts Media House Gala, 2019
SXSW (South by Southwest) Panel Picker Winner, 2017 for La Medea
Knight Arts Challenge project winner under 305one Festival for Third Trinity, 2017
Creative Capital Award, 2016
Vizcaya Museum Lost Spaces Fellowship, Miami FL, 2016
National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures Grant via The Ford Foundation, 2014
Kodak Films, Individual Latino Artist Fellowship 2012. 
San Francisco Foundation Artist Grant for Kwaidan 2013. 
Miami-Dade Cultural Affairs Project Grant for Borscht Film Festival 2011. 
The James L. Knight Foundation Grant, for Borscht Film Festival  2010. 
The Miami New Times MasterMind Award for The Borscht Film Festival (co-founder) 2009. 
The Jerome L. Greene Fellowship 2008. 
The YoungArts Foundation Award for Dance, 2005
The YoungArts Foundation Honorable Mention for Choreography, 2005