Ricardo Gamboa

Ricardo Gamboa is an award-winning artist, activist, and academic working in their native Chicago and New York City, creating radically politicized work. They are working toward completing their doctorate degree at New York University’s renowned American Studies program and received their M.A. in Arts Politics from the Tisch School of the Arts (2013). In Chicago, Ricardo is a member of the Free Street Theater, the Goodman Theater Playwrights Unit, and founding adult creative partner of the controversial, politically-charged ensemble The Young Fugitives. In New York City, they are a fellow of the EmergeNYC program at Hemispheric Institute of Performance and Politics and a member of the New York Neo-Futurists. Ricardo has won several awards including an Art Matters Fellowship, a Joyce Award and an International Connections Award from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. They have worked with over 5,000 young people in the hemisphere. Recent projects include the underground live and live-streamed The Hoodoisie; the NY Times recommended BRUJOS, the genre-bending, ground-breaking web series about four gay Latino doctoral students who are also witches; and Meet Juan(ito) Doe, a community engaged theater piece that included Gamboa renting and remodeling a storefront into a community center and one of two operational theaters on the entire Southside of Chicago. Gamboa has directed, wrote, and realized numerous films and plays, performance art and media interventions, etc. and has worked with over 5,000 young people in the Americas. Much of this work is included in their doctoral research that examines contemporary radical arts activism in Chicago.