The Experience
Home to the city’s most extensive collection of Puerto Rican and other Latin American painting, sculpture and various visual arts, the Taller Puertorriqueño (Puerto Rican Workshop) is the foremost Latino-oriented museum and workspace in Philadelphia. Its regular scheduling includes performance events and films.
The Taller strives to educate the Latino community and Philadelphians in general about Latino visual arts, literature, music and other aspects of Latin American culture. If you’re looking for images or masks of Puerto Rican vejigantes, want to know more about Mexico’s Day of the Dead, or wish to know the difference between the Dominican merengue and mangulina, the Taller can help you.
The workshop also teaches Latino youth how to paint and sculpt, holds classes for musicians, and at Christmas time, serves as gathering place for parrandas, traditional Puerto Rican caroling.
History
Taller was established in 1974 by a group of Puerto Rican artists and cultural activists from the North Philadelphia/Kensington areas. Since then, it has expanded from a small storefront to two large buildings on North Fifth Street, housing a theater, two galleries, classrooms and the Julia de Burgos Books and Crafts Store, the most extensive Spanish-language bookstore in Philadelphia.