Hailing from The Bronx, Walter Cruz is a creative collaborator exploring the intersections of art, design and architecture to better understand how Black and brown bodies activate and take up space through the lens of a second generation Dominican New Yorker. Cruz has completed residencies and fellowships with The Laundromat Project and the Haystack School of Craft and NurtureArt Gallery amongst others. As well as shown work in galleries and museums including The Museum of the City of New York, the Center for Political Graphics Los Angeles, Syracuse University and Longwood Gallery in The Bronx. He has taken part in the New York Edition of the New Art Dealers Alliance art fair and a recent solo exhibition at Swivel Gallery in Brooklyn, NY. Walter serves as the visual designer for the Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI). He is the creative director and co-founder for Zeal; a Black artist-owned cooperative company that creates spaces for Black multidisciplinary artists to thrive. Walter has received his MFA from The Maryland Institute College of Art and earned his B.A in Architectural Studies from Hobart & William Smith Colleges. In a world constantly telling Black and brown folks what to be besides themselves, Cruz's goal is to create work that inspires and informs those very people.