Ash Studios is a creative response to the racial segregation, political disenfranchisement, and economic displacement that is the reality for many citizens in Dallas, TX. Our mission is to encourage interracial and intergenerational dialogue and collaborations between creatives and citizens, to empower creatives to have a voice in public life, and to promote and create opportunities for economic self-determination for creatives. Initiated in 2012 by artists Darryl Ratcliff and Fred Villanueva, Ash Studios has already impacted over six thousand citizens and creatives in Dallas through events, think tanks, classes, exhibitions, activist campaigns, and site-specific work. Ash Studios is fully owned by creatives, and serves as a bastion against gentrification in the South Dallas area. We value and model racial equity and accessibility, believe that art is a public good, and are in the process of re-imagining art school, while organizing to achieve municipal funding for individual artists.
