Samantha Cortez

Alumni Artist in Residence 

Samantha is a Puerto Rican, Nicaraguan-American based in NYC. She is an artist whose art explores the different emotions and thoughts she experiences daily as a woman in the diaspora growing up in New York City. Before joining Artistic Noise, she graduated from the Youth Speakers Institute, which trained her to be a dynamic public speaker advocating for justice reform.

At 17, Sam became a participant in our Arts & Entrepreneurship program. During her time in A&E, she participated in 4 cycles of the Mural Project, a collaboration with the School of Visual Arts (SVA). This project has allowed her to guest lecture at workshops and webinars hosted by SVA. In 2022, Samantha became a fellow in the Future Economy Lab, a collaboration between Grantmakers for Girls of Color and Second Muse, where they collectively imagined what an abundant future looks like. 

Being an A&E participant, she was able to grow her artistic talent and utilizes it at I Am Why within her role as the Social Media & Arts Manager, a virtual learning organization that brings young women and gender-expansive activists together with researchers and other partners to celebrate triumphs and share lived experiences that lead the way to policies, practices, and programs that work. Recently, she has become a steering committee member of IMPACT, a national alliance network centered and led by young mothers building collective power with a focus on actively advocating for change within their communities. 

Sam believes in using imperfections, mistakes, and errors as strengths for self-growth, inspiration, and community building. This year, as the AIR, she hopes to be a role model to the current A&E participants just as other alumni had been to her. She knows that the youth coming out of Artistic Noise have the potential to achieve anything they put their minds to.