The Audacity to Create in Santa Cruz

The Audacity to Create is an exhibition that showcases the work of UCSC Alumni of color Alejandra Chavez, Jorge Gomez-Gonzalez , Katie Dorame, Seráb Serabia, Aleya Caballero, Edward Ramirez, Josselyne Morales, Marceline Valentine, and Aaron Mulenga. Some of these alumni formed the Student Art Coalition (SAC), in an effort to provide connections and support for one another, in an environment where they felt under represented. In The Audacity to Create the artists unwrap coils that constricted their experience as Black, Indigenous, Students of Color, revealing a sense of home among each other. The artworks are not a disclosure of pain but an affirmation of their vibrancy. Through SAC these alumni practiced radical community by navigating support and sustainability through collective experiences in the past and present. Spindles of hope are captured throughout, weaving new boundaries of transcendence in educational and art spaces with the dare to bend expectations built to minimize and quiet.