Today we’d like to introduce you to Carmen Guerrero.
Hi Carmen, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
As Founder and Executive Director of the Cultural Coalition, Carmen Guerrero produces annual community festivals including Mikiztli, the Día de Los Muertos Festival (Phoenix); the Mask Alive Festival (Mesa), Portal Festival at S’edav Va’aki Museum (Phoenix), and El Puente Festival (Tempe). Under her leadership, the Cultural Coalition has grown to partner with numerous local arts organizations and artists. As an artistic producer, she is committed and dedicated to issues of cultural literacy and social justice. As an educator and teaching artist for various area schools, she shares her indigenous roots through music and art to foster multicultural understanding. As an artivist/arts advocate, she co-founded Xicanindio (now Xico, Inc.), the Arizona Latino Arts Center, and the Cultural Coalition.
A Brazilian by birth, Guerrero has been a musician and a beader since age five. She is a descendant of the Kambiwá and Tupinambá tribes, from the northern state of Pernambuco. Upon moving to Arizona, she formed the band Zúm Zúm Zúm and currently sings and plays guitar and accordion as the Guerrero Family Musicians.
“My ancestral practices keep me focused and healthy to lead from my heart and our organization believes that culture heals! We share the arts and its full power in all its forms to inspire, motivate, and educate.”
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Since 1996, Cultural Coalition has provided free culturally relevant festivals and educational programs to communities throughout Arizona. Our programs and events uplift diverse heritages, prioritizing cultural representation in the arts that serves diverse populations. We produce four annual cultural arts festivals in Phoenix, Mesa, and Tempe, providing access to free arts opportunities within underserved communities to remove economic and geographic barriers. Each event features professional and youth artists, storytellers, dancers, musicians, traditional healers/curanderas, and more, as professional practitioners of ancestral traditions to instill cultural pride in our communities.
Cultural Coalition also operates a free daily after school arts program, located inside a low-income housing complex. The program provides free meals, homework help, and arts, science, cooking and gardening activities, annually serving over 100 youth in grades K-12. Our educational and community outreach programs provide informative presentations, storytelling performances, and hands-on arts activities that share the heritage and artistic traditions of Chicano, Latiné, and Indigenous cultures.
Our Mask Alive Art Collection Archive, launched in 2023, is a free online artwork database with in-person pop-up exhibits to provide greater accessibility to the cultural arts. It preserves traditional practices through the presentation of performing arts objects, artists interviews, photographs, and archival materials from over 40 years of Arizona’s mask traditions. Our most recent pop-up gallery was located at the Arizona Center in downtown Phoenix featuring over 200 works of art from January to November of 2025. The gallery was free and offered hands-on children’s activities, artist workshops, and community programs each month. We are very excited for the next iteration of this collection, which will be an exhibit at the Mesa Arts Center Gallery, opening in August 2026.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
A Brazilian by birth, Guerrero has been a musician and a beader since age five. She is a descendant of the Kambiwá and Tupinambá tribes, from the northern state of Pernambuco. Upon moving to Arizona, she formed the band Zúm Zúm Zúm and currently sings and plays guitar and accordion as the Guerrero Family Musicians.
My personal website is: carmencreations.com
My organizational website is: culturalcoalition.com
Alright, so to wrap up, is there anything else you’d like to share with us?
Since its inception, Cultural Coalition has established annual cultural festivals in partnership with different municipalities all over the Valley. The Mask Alive! Festival of Masks began in 2018 and has been growing as an arts placemaking community favorite at Pioneer Park in Mesa. Showcasing the art of masked storytelling and performance, Mask Alive is a multicultural festival of art from around the world that celebrates the diversity of our city.
Beginning in the early 2000’s, Cultural Coalition began expanding its mission of supporting Latino and Indigenous artists to also provide arts education to underprivileged families and communities. We began hosting festivals in Patriot Park in downtown Phoenix with music and dance performances. We provided hands-on arts engagement activities for children and partnered with AZ Health to talk to kids about how to stay healthy. This annual procession in downtown Phoenix to the festival continued until 2006.
In 2012, Cultural Coalition hosted its inaugural MIKITZLI: Dia de los Muertos Phx Festival (DDLM). Originally funded by a grant, the festival was a partnership with CALA Alliance, (Celebración Artística de las Américas). MIKITZLI has evolved and grown to become our signature event, focused on decolonizing the celebration with a return to its indigenous roots, and just celebrated its 15th year anniversary at Arizona Center in Phoenix in 2026.
At the Tempe Center for the Arts (TCA), Cultural Coalition has been producing El Puente Festival since 2013. Focused on families and young artists, this festival has music and dance performances by youth from around the Valley, continuing the legacy of Latino traditional cultural arts. In 2024, we became a TCA Resident Organization partnering with the Center to support more Latiné and Indigenous programming, such as the Indígena and OXDX Native Holiday Market events.
Our newest festival which launched in 2019, Portal to the Past, in partnership with S’edav Va’aki Museum (formerly Pueblo Grande Museum), celebrates the water legacy of the Ancestral Sonoran Desert People. We continue to create new opportunities for community celebrations at different locations of the Valley.
In addition to festivals, in 2015 Cultural Coalition opened a dedicated art space for children at the low income housing complex Rancho del Art in Mesa, Arizona. Here, teaching artists work with school aged youth to provide arts engagement activities that range from music, drawing, painting, and mask making. Children also receive help with their homework, cooking and gardening lessons, and a free meal to help encourage healthy eating and educational success.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://culturalcoalition.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/culturalcoaz/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/culturalcoalitionaz
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/culturalcoalition/
- Twitter: https://x.com/CulturalCoAz
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/culturalcoalition
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@culturalcoalition
