Saturday, June 15, 2024 

2:00 pm Mask-Making Demonstration at Buffalo Arts Studio

3:00 pm Bomba Performance at Buffalo Arts Studio

Multinational Illumination Arts will conduct a demonstration and discussion of traditional vejigante mask-making tools, techniques, and materials. The artists will also discuss how they choose the characters portrayed in the masks. The 1,849 Millas project will also include bomba performances by the performance ensemble from El Batey Puerto Rican Center. A batey is a space where people sing, play, and dance bomba, the oldest genre of the Afro-Puerto Rican musical traditions. El Batey’s mission is to celebrate, inspire, and connect people to Puerto Rican culture and each other so that together they can reimagine and reshape their future. La bomba is Puerto Rico's traditional dance and musical style developed over 400 years ago among the island’s enslaved Africans to communicate with each other and as a “means for resistance, resilience, and self-expression.” All of the center’s programming is empowered by a strong connection to Puerto Rico’s rich traditions and history.