programs

Virtual Programming
The Digital Library Project
Artist Residency
The AFH Media Production Center
Digital Career Program
Business Incubator

Artist Residency

The Andrew Freedman Home (AFH) Artist In Residence Program (AIR) primarily supports visual artists of color, while cultivating their direct engagement with the community through public arts programming. Our ultimate goal is to enrich the artistic practices and livelihoods of serious, hard-working artists of color, artists who are underrepresented and under- supported in the art world, while engaging them with the South Bronx community in meaningful ways that create lasting bonds.
AIR awards 21 individual artists or artistic collaborations annually.

AIR serves the diverse community of residents in the South Bronx that would benefit from meaningful exposure to the arts. Our goal is to bring in a cadre of innovative working artists who can enrich our youth arts programs and provide our community with new cultural experiences. 

The primary goals of this AIR:

  • To enrich the lives, livelihood, and creative aspirations of artists who need studio space and other support in order to grow and expand their artistic practice.
  • To enable, through professional development and workshops, the evolution of resident artists’ careers and their network of support and resources.
  • To invite at least one international artist into the residency each year in order to bring a broader perspective to the other resident artists and to expose the international artist to New York’s rich art and culture environment.
  • To engage working artists with the South Bronx community through the arts, and to provide artists with meaningful experiences working within an underserved community of children, youth, adults, and seniors.

The Digital Library Project

The Digital Library project is introducing technology-based innovative solutions that challenge the centralization of information and revenues in the Tech, Science, and Creative Industries. It will presents online workshops, archive interdisciplinary artists practices and host panel discussions, podcast conversations, conferences on global topics from : COVID 19 era social dynamics and issues, systemic racism, financial inequity, and contemporary diasporism. The goal is the development of a database with interdisciplinary content, peer to peer connectivity, and an innovative approach to online education and learning. By fulfilling this mission, the Digital Library Project would contribute to job creation, provide for enhanced technological training in targeted areas and foster digital literacy in COVID-19 impacted communities and financially disadvantaged communities.

The Digital Career Program

The Digital Career Program is an innovative and interdisciplinary program that combines education in digital
communication, technology, and art with workforce training to provide youth and adults in the Bronx with the integrative literacies increasingly necessary for careers in technology firms, government, educational
institutions, and cultural institutions. The program prepares workers involved in the creation design and production of interactive multimedia products and services, including development of digitally generated or computer-enhanced media used in business, training, entertainment, communications, and marketing. The program is designed for youth and adults with a desire to pursue careers such as Photographer and Photo Editor, Graphic Artist, Web Page Developer, Webmaster, Illustrator, 2D Animator, 3D Animator, CAD expert, Multimedia Specialist/Artist, Projectionist, Advertiser, Effects Designer, Social Networking Specialist, VR and AR Specialist, Sound Engineer, Media editor. Exploring emerging and experimental approaches to media production, digital communication and art creation, AFH has a holistic vision for the program that encompasses all media, ritual or contemporary art, and immersive performance; focusing on the philosophy of art for public engagement, activism, and social change. The program will contribute to training a new generation of innovators to think more deeply about the challenges of inclusion, diversity and cultural awareness.

BombaYo Community Empowerment of Ancestral Culture-Arts & Education

The BombaYo Community Empowerment of Ancestral Culture-Arts & Education in collaboration with The Andrew Freedman Home is an affordable wellness program for community members and local community organizations.

"Community are people who are descendants of Ancestral groups that are the foundation for Life sustaining solutions. The Life sustaining solutions are like Treasure waiting to be discovered. It’s my belief that most of these solutions are being explored in privatized institutions that are not accessible to our communities". Dr.Drum

The Media Production Center

The goal of the Media Production Center in the Andrew Freedman Home is to establish stronger media sophistication within the community and to expand and deepen AFH capacity to create more uniquely positioned cross-disciplinary projects and educational programs in Media Production, Performance, AR, VR, Projection, Entertainment, Entrepreneurship, Creative Writing, Coding/Programming Technology.

Uptown Fine Art Printing Studio

The Studio offers high quality inkjet prints, scanning, reproduction of paintings, retouching, color corrections, consulting, coffee and creative workshops.

Some of the great people/organizations I work with: Fabiola Jean-Louis (photographer), Monica Watkins (Co-Founder of Beauty for Freedom), Donna Karan (Urban Zen/Urban Zen Foundation), Chester Higgins (staff photographer for the NYTimes), Chris Dei (wildlife photographer), Stanley Greene (photojournalist), Artist for World Peace, Lookalike Productions (filmmakers), Greg Brophy (fine art photographer), Meg Hitchcock (drawings), Sky Pape (contemporary abstract artist).