Artist Statement
As a first-generation American, visual artist, organizer, and educator, my practice connects to several communities. I was born in America because my parents were in self-exile during the Brazilian military dictatorship. When I was only two months old, my parents returned to Brazil after the 1979 Amnesty Law was passed, and I grew up in Rio. After living in the US for about 15 years, I have increasingly questioned ideas of global instability, American interventionism, memory, belonging, and displacement.
It is perhaps unavoidable that my work is deeply influenced by the vibrant Brazilian culture and landscapes, while also bearing the generational trauma of the country's complex history. Brazilian philosopher Paulo Freire's Critical Pedagogy has taught me that dialogue is the only genuine form of education, and this principle consistently influences my creative practice.
In every aspect of my professional endeavors, I strive to listen and learn, inviting communities into conversation and encouraging participation, agency, and critical thinking. Through listening, learning, and adopting a collaborative mindset, we can avoid adhering to authoritarian, colonialist, and imperialist discourses, narratives, behaviors, and practices.
I am driven by the belief that fatalism can be overcome and that alternatives are plentiful. I envision a future where no one will dare say, "it has always been this way," to justify the unthinkable.
Julia
About
"Csekö divides her time between her practice as a Visual Artist, Arts Consultant, Educator, Arts Administrator, and Arts Advocate. She has received prestigious awards and residencies, including the SMFA @ Tufts Traveling Fellow Grant, Salem Public Artist in Residence, Tufts University & Andy Warhol Foundation Collective Futures Grant, and several Local Cultural Council (LCC) Grants in Somerville, Swampscott, Marblehead, Newton, and Randolph. She is also a member of the Tufts University Art Galleries (TUAG) Acquisitions Committee, a MASS MoCA Alumni AiR in 2025, and a BCA AiR 2022 - 2025.
With extensive experience in the Arts and Culture sector, Csekö served as Community Curator for the Somerville Museum in 2022, where she organized the Sanctuary City Exhibition, and as a MassCreative CTV Fellow, helping to create a policy document to bring arts and culture to the forefront of Massachusetts gubernatorial candidates' agendas. She has worked in communications, marketing, and administration at Artisan’s Asylum and previously served as Arts Program Coordinator at the Villa Victoria Center for the Arts (Inquilinos Boricuas en Acción - IBA Boston), where she implemented an exhibition program at La Galleria, featuring contemporary Latinx artists.
Csekö’s curatorial and visual arts practice began during her BFA at the Federal University of Rio, where she founded the artist collective Group Py (2005-2008) and worked as First Assistant to Brazilian Sculptor Ernesto Neto. She has also been an active Arts Advocate, securing a significant increase in Brazil’s national arts funding and establishing a cultural committee for ongoing dialogue with local representatives and the Brazilian Ministry of Culture.
Her work, which emphasizes diversity, inclusion, community building, social justice, political engagement, and artistic innovation, has been featured in group exhibitions at national and international venues, including unconventional spaces like a ferryboat. Her art is represented in collections at Tufts University Art Galleries, Emerson College, the University of British Columbia, the Museum of Modern Art in Rio de Janeiro, Centro Cultural São Paulo, and in private collections worldwide."
