Ribbon-Cutting Ceremony of New Office

September 13, 2007
435 Sterzing St., Austin, Texas 78704

Latinas Unidas Por El Arte (LUPE Arte) have the honor of inviting you to the Ribbon-Cutting Ceremony for the opening of their new offices shared with Fashion Designer, Juliana Mabry of JuJu Clothing, Inc. at 435 Sterzing, Austin, Texas 78704 on September 13th 2007. Ribbon-cutting and invocation ceremony from 5:30 to 6:00 and champagne, refreshments and preview of Fall programs from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m.

In attendance will be Council Member Mike Martinez and District Clerk Amalia Rodriguez Mendoza, Author David Rice along with other City and Community Leaders.

Photos of our new office

View more photos of LUPE Arte in our Photo Gallery >

About LUPE Arte:

Mission: LUPE Arte strives to further the critical thinking skills, literacy, academic achievement, and media awareness for children through multidisciplinary, culturally relevant after school arts education.
LUPE Arte supports artists with a focus on women artists and furthers community involvement. 

LUPE Arte has been promoting art in the Austin community for the last seven years. The inaugural program Niños y Arte began in the Fall of 2000. Mary Lou Castillo began instruction of visual art at Allan Elementary in East Austin. The school became the flagship school for LUPE Arte’s pilot arts program, Niños y Arte. The opening year culminated in the first Virgen de Guadalupe Fiesta - in effect bridging art, culture and history – in a display of the children’s completed artwork. By its second year, LUPE Arte had tripled the number of students it supported and expanded the curriculum to a year-round structure. Diana Garcia, folk artist, and Marita De la Torre, theater-drama instructor were recruited and collaboration began with other artists. By 2002, LUPE Arte’s board made a commitment to continue expanding and recruiting artists for theater/drama, music, three-dimensional work or computer arts production, and all aspects of learning to incorporate literacy throughout community schools.

LUPE Arte’s steady growth has coincided with the intent of staff and the board of directors to provide quality attention in their arts instruction. The Niños y Arte program has become increasingly multicultural both in its student make up and in the arts programming offered to those children. It is LUPE Arte’s belief that the ability to express what art or a particular creation means to the student artists is integral to the planning and creation of that piece.

With the addition of secondary schools, LUPE Arte is working to further diversify its programming to include summer classes which will provide culturally-relevant arts instruction to an area of Austin whose parents can most benefit from knowing their child has an opportunity to further their interest in the arts and get a head start in life within the arts. Currently LUPE Arte hires local artists to instruct the Niños y Arte program at nine schools throughout the community. Art classes ranging from visual art to music, theater/drama to newspaper writing.

Now well know in the community for their work within the community, LUPE Arte has sponsored art groups such as NALIP, Teatro Vivo and ALTA (Austin Latino Theater Alliance) with their artwork. LUPE Arte hopes to develop, and expand other components of their original intent: support for women of color and their artistic endeavors, include other projects such as residencies for women artists and a literary festival.

For more information, contact:
Marita De La Torre
Executive Director: Latinas Unidas Por El Arte
(512) 241-9799
marita@lupearte.org

View more photos of LUPE Arte in our Photo Gallery >