Tin Can Trust

Description of Project

TIN CAN TRUST: Community-Based Art Exchange was an interactive, multi-phase experiment in artistic and cultural exchange in partnership with several nonprofit community based and arts based organizations in Philadelphia, Allentown, and San Juan, Puerto Rico. During public workshops, people created various forms of artwork to be packaged into individual tin cans, shipped and exchanged with someone in a different city.  Conceptually, we played with the history of the tin can as an object that was intended to allow for longevity and preservation of material resources, with a particular emphasis on its role in war, international trade, colonization and in low-income communities.

The project sought  to make deep connections between Puerto Rico and cities such as  Allentown, Philadelphia, and New York.  These three cities have been major destinations for Puerto Ricans displaced by Hurricane Maria. The project was carried out through an ethnographic process of documenting oral histories, recipes, personal artifacts and other expressions that participants are comfortable sharing in solidarity with their counterparts in Puerto Rico.