THE TEA.

What we’re all about and what we do.

Tauraro Fest started six years ago as an intentionally outspoken series of multi-media presentations from the Black and First Nations 2sLGBTQIA+ experience that has co-produced plays, gallery exhibitions featuring Black Indigenous and Greater Indigenous work, drag, and time based art all documented through film. Today we are a resource hub for QTBIPOC, that builds community through open source creative media , contributions to trans and queer history, Tribal reclamation and cultural heritage.

We prioritize Art, Media and Data as Spectacle: To interrupt the posit that we don’t exist and re-center the definitions of gender expansiveness on Indigenous history and leadership.

Our Creative Tech Learning: We offer pop up classes and panels to learn creative tech and media skills like filmmaking, software and hardware, research, and mentorship . We run a theme camp annually in partnership with SOAK PDX (Oregon’s Regional Burning Man) where QTBIPOC can immerse in their special interests freely and get inspired.

Fieldtrips: With support from our friends and collaborators, we offer free tickets to opensource conferences like Teardown , day trips/hang outs with our Indigenous sibs around Oregon and pop up art events.

Our Residency and Micro Grants: The film residency for two new artists each year focuses on short films and artist must hail from the Black Indigenous and/or Greater Indigenous Two Spirit, trans and gender expansive experience. Artists can be producers, writers, crew or talent. We also offer a micro grant to artists with completed work that is in post.

Our Annual Film Festival: Has been the seed of our archive project and is an annual love letter to ourselves. It boasts award winning, internationally recognized shorts and select features from around the world with an emphasis on striking filmmakers in the Pacific Northwest. Our residency alumni’s works are featured as part of the festival.

Monthly QTBIPOC KIKI: Once a month (Second Saturday Evenings)we invite the community to come out and vibe at a friendly vibrant location on the westside where the heart of activity is based.

Data and our Archival Practice: Our capstone project in progress is to create our own open source library system of Indigenous and Greater Native knowledge and artifacts and to connect that to other already existing open source systems to remove the siloing of our libraries, reclaim digital and analog artifacts and share wisdom.

International Black Indigenous Circus Conference: Three years and counting, and hosted by Philly Fringe and Cannonball, the IBICW takes place annually in Philadelphia, PA featuring circus, movement and media artists from all over the world. The conference is free, with classes, performances, panels and meet n greets.

We have assisted in changing the grass roots arts leadership structure, the cultural, the economical and the political landscape for Two Spirit, trans and queer Black and Native people. And helped make over 40 installations, performances and independent films, produce five editions of our film and music festival and sponsored groundbreaking convenings in circus, physical theater and experimental media.