Yanira Castro

Yanira Castro’s work is rooted in communal construction as a rehearsal for radical democracy. She is an interdisciplinary artist born in Borikén (Puerto Rico), living in Lenapehoking (Brooklyn), and working at the intersection of communal practices, performance, installation, and interactive technology. Castro forms iterative, multimodal projects, developing performance scores and scenarios where the work unfolds in real time in response to the presence and participation of the public. Co-creating with a team of collaborators under the name a canary torsi, she investigates performance as a practice of collective embodiment, grappling with agency and communal action as a body politic. The process of gathering, witnessing, and decision-making is where performance and civics merge and, for her, is the critical, challenging, and transformational work of performance. She has developed over fifteen projects that have been recognized with national awards, commissions and residency support. She is the recipient of awards from the Creative Capital Foundation, Herb Alpert Award in the Arts for Dance, NYSCA/NYFA Interdisciplinary Artist and Choreography Fellowships and has received two Bessie Awards for Outstanding Production. She has recently been in residence at The Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, MacDowell, Yaddo, and The Maggie Allesee National Center for Choreography. Her most recent work, a public art project during the 2024 election, Exorcism = Liberation, utilized campaign materials (stickers, pins, lawn signs, banners and large scale posters) to proliferate–across New York City, Chicago, and the Connecticut River Valley of Western Massachusetts–slogans and QR codes that led to immersive sonic experiences calling for mutual liberation.

Castro is the lead artist directing Raft, designing the project with the whole creative team, writing the performance scores that accompany it, and choreographing the chorus of performers that make a visitation in the space.