Open Call: Counter Histories Puerto Rico

Counter Histories is an initiative supporting projects that creatively reframe the past to engage with urgent questions of the present and future. Magnum Foundation is calling for proposals from photographers and artists who engage with photography in the context of Puerto Rico and its diaspora, who would like to expand and complete a project that responds to this theme and who are excited to contribute to a creative community of fellows.
At a time when public memory in Puerto Rico is under threat due to systemic disinvestment and cultural erasure, this initiative seeks to strengthen the role photography can play in building a collective visual archive that is useful for the present and future of the archipelago. The contested nature of history in the context of Puerto Rico is a fertile ground for artists to engage with ways of reimagining documentary and memory work. At this crucial crossroads, there is an opportunity to support work that upends the historical representation by outsiders and centers the perspectives of those on and with ties to the archipelago.
Building on our longstanding Counter Histories initiative, Magnum Foundation is partnering with the Instituto de Observación Colectiva and past Counter Histories Fellow Christopher Gregory-Rivera to launch a new edition of the program focused on Puerto Rico and its diaspora. Counter Histories: Puerto Rico is made possible with the generous support of the Mellon Foundation and hosted at the Museo de Arte Contemporaneo de Puerto Rico.