Atwood Magazine invites music industry members to contribute essays throughout the year, focusing on themes such as art, identity, culture, and inclusivity.
In recognition of Black Music Month, Ali Rosa-Salas, Vice President of Visual and Performing Arts at Abrons Arts Center, reflects on the institution’s 50-year legacy and its ongoing dedication to the arts in New York. A curator driven by the principle that curatorial work should benefit the public, Ali draws inspiration from the cultural landscape of her childhood in New York City.
For more than ten years, Ali has contributed to New York City's arts and culture primarily through curatorial efforts in live performance. Currently, she holds the position of Vice President of Visual and Performing Arts at Abrons Arts Center, connected to Henry Street Settlement, the sole cultural organization in New York City linked to a social services agency. From 2020 to 2023, she served as an Associate Curator for the Jacob's Pillow Dance Festival. As an independent curator, she has organized exhibitions, performances, and public programs with various organizations, including AFROPUNK, Danspace Project, Discwoman, Knockdown Center, MoCADA, Weeksville Heritage Center, and more. Additionally, she has facilitated discussions as an Alumnae Fellow at the Barnard Center for Research on Women and the Associate Curator for the 2017 American Realness Festival.
Ali earned her BA in Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies from Barnard College and an MA in Curatorial Practice in Performance from Wesleyan University.
By Ali Rosa-Salas
Music serves as the heartbeat of New York City. With roots in hip hop from the Bronx in the 1970s to the current local form of drill music, Black artists in New York City consistently shape the trajectory of contemporary music across the globe. For half a century, Abrons Arts Center has functioned as a creative incubator, performance venue, and educational center in the Lower East Side of New York City, inviting musicians to explore ideas and collaborate in our galleries, classrooms, and studios. Over the years, our Playhouse has hosted performances by artists like Dizzy Gillespie and recently, keiyaA, who debuted their latest project, milk thot, on our stage in January.
In alignment with our mission, Abrons is particularly committed to assisting emerging artists. Our Performance AIRspace Residency aids performing artists in creating and producing original works. Additionally, our Arts Education program offers aspiring musicians of all ages lessons in singing, songwriting, and digital music production.
I share treasured memories with many New Yorkers of summers enriched by free arts programs such as Celebrate Brooklyn and Summer Stage. These formative experiences, with their focus on accessibility and community, have deeply influenced my approach to music programming at Abrons.
I discovered MIKE’s music through word of mouth and was drawn to the introspective quality of tracks like “God’s With Me.” MIKE embodies a sense of sincerity and confidence that transcends his teenage years. Our mutual love for New York City, hip hop, and nurturing our artistic community led to our initial collaboration on Young World, MIKE’s free annual festival that has hosted artists like Noname, Earl Sweatshirt, and others.
Our curatorial collaboration continued with Sound, Sun, Pleasure, a free concert and community event in 2023. On June 7, Abrons and MIKE held the festival’s second edition, celebrating the spectrum of Black art and music through workshops, visual artist studios, and performances. Attendees experienced a diverse range of Black creative expression, from house and vogue classes to bossa nova songs performed by Alici.
Throughout these initiatives, the primary goal remains to respect the vision and integrity of the artists. The Performance AIRspace Residency offers artists not only a commission fee and budget but also the time and space needed for ideation and development, which are often scarce resources in the creative process. The progress of these residency projects, from initial ideas to completed productions like keiyaA’s milk thot, underscores the importance of investing in creative processes. Our studios foster community, which is then expressed on our stages.
Hope is local. Despite ongoing threats to arts and culture support, artists in New York City continue to shape and stretch the limits of our imaginations. I am inspired by the practices of our 2025-2026 Performance AIRspace residents, Cleo Reed and Symara Sarai, as well as the New York-born talents of MIKE and SALIMATA, showing how limitless we can be.
Black Music Month is every month. Now and always, we must acknowledge and support Black artists as vital contributors to our creative ecosystem and architects of our culture. – Ali Rosa-Salas
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In celebration of Black Music Month, Ali Rosa-Salas, the VP of Visual and Performing Arts at Abrons Arts Center, contemplates the organization's 50-year legacy and its sustained dedication to the New York arts community.