The artist residency ‘El Río’ (‘The river’, 1 October 2024 – 31 January 2025, Santiago, Chile) gathered artists from the urban Mapuche diaspora with the aim of questioning the colonial materiality of the city and exploring new ways of inhabiting and thinking about urban space, both individually and collectively.

The residency was developed moving from critical mapping activities following the Mapocho river across the city. At each site, the organising team introduced the selected place as another participant in the conversation on the site, its history, its meanings and its current relevance.
After this brief introduction, the artists were invited to “work the place” in their own way and with the research and creation tools of their choice. At some of the selected sites, external guests participated to stimulate conversation and creation.

The last days were dedicated to reflection on the previous phases and to activities led by the artists in residence. Each artist chose a site on the banks of the Mapocho river that, from their perspective, was related to whiteness, racism and/or anti-racism; they convened the group and led a creative, reflective and/or dialogical activity. The choice of both the location and the proposed activity was free and personal.