Cinthya Santos Briones is an interdisciplinary artist, educator, and cultural worker of Nahua Indigenous heritage based in New York. With a background in Ethnohistory and Anthropology, she spent a decade conducting research at Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), focusing on Indigenous migration, codices, textiles, and traditional medicine. Her multidisciplinary practice combines participatory art and collective storytelling, weaving together nonlinear narratives through photography, archival material, writing, ethnography, drawing, collage, embroidery, and popular education. Her work centers community voices and social engagement.
Cinthya holds an MFA in Creative Writing and Photography from Ithaca-Cornell University and a Certificate in Documentary Practice and Visual Journalism from the International Center of Photography (ICP). She is currently an adjunct professor at the CUNY Graduate School of Journalism and serves as Associate Director of Outreach and Partnerships at the Mexican Institute, where she also leads interdisciplinary research projects.
She has been a guest artist at institutions such as Columbia University, Rutgers University, and the Institute of American Indian Arts in New Mexico. Her work has received numerous fellowships and grants, including from the Magnum Foundation (2016, 2018, 2020), En Foco (2017, 2022), National Geographic Research and Exploration (2018), We Women (2019), City Artist Corps (2020), Mexico’s National Fund for Culture and the Arts (2009, 2011), Wave Hill House Winter Residency (2023), Mellon Artist Fellowship at the Hemispheric Institute of NYU (2023–24), BricLab Contemporary Art (2023), Talk of the Town AIR at El Museo del Barrio (2024), and NYSCA (2025), among others.
Her photography and written work have appeared in The New York Times, PDN, California Sunday Magazine, Vogue, Open Society Foundations, Buzzfeed, The Intercept, The New Yorker, The Nation, and more. As a writer, she has contributed to academic and journalistic publications including NACLA, The Nation, and La Jornada.
Cinthya has exhibited her work in both solo and group exhibitions at institutions such as Sky Blue Gallery (Portland, OR), The Latinx Project at NYU, the International Center of Photography, El Museo del Barrio, the Museum of the City of New York, Trout Museum (Wisconsin), and the Paul W. Zuccaire Gallery at Stony Brook University. She has presented artist talks at numerous universities including Columbia, NYU, Boston College, CUNY, SUNY New Paltz, and Dutchess Community College.
She is co-author of the book The Indigenous Worldview and Its Representations in Textiles of the Nahua Community of Santa Ana Tzacuala, Hidalgo and co-creator of the documentary The Huichapan Codex. In addition to her artistic practice, Cinthya has worked as a community organizer with pro-immigrant organizations in New York, addressing issues such as detention, education, and sanctuary. She has also volunteered to accompany migrants to immigration courts and asylum proceedings, and serves as a guardian for unaccompanied migrant children.
Cinthya is a member of Colectiva Infancia, a collective of anthropologists engaged in ethnographic and visual research around childhood, migration, violence, urban studies, and epistemologies of the Global South. Learn more at infanciasenmovimiento.org.
