Life lessons from your kitchen
Art Exhibition Dates: March 6 – June 5, 2025 | Casa Azafran Art Gallery
The Recetas para la Vida Project and Exhibition (Recipes for Life) utilizes photography, storytelling, and the art of cooking to explore the identities, histories, families, and stories of love of Nashville’s Latino community. Through this exhibition 20 Latino community members generously volunteered to share treasured recipes and life lessons they have learned from their kitchens. To create the exhibition, professional photographer Carlos Leiva, visited each participant in their home, business or community kitchen, to capture through photos, community members cooking a special dish and hear first-hand the wisdom these recetas have to offer us.
The captions accompanying each portrait are the participants’ responses to the prompts: Share a family recipe; what is a life lesson you learned in the kitchen; what does this recipe mean to you and why do you want to share it?
Through the participants’ recipes we learn lessons about patience, generosity, dedication, taking risks, and avoiding perfectionism. But perhaps the more important life lesson we learn through Recetas para la Vida is around the power of love and sharing. As the participants share their food and stories with us, we realize how unique and beautiful every person’s journey is, while at the same time being reminded of our shared humanity, all that ties us together however different our journeys are.
As you view the exhibition we invite you to imagine yourself standing at your kitchen counter, or sitting and eating delicious food around a table with your neighbors, friends and family, sharing your family recipes and the life lessons you have learned in your own kitchen over the years.
* The captions used in the exhibition have been taken directly from text submitted from project participants. They have been edited for length and clarity. Text appears in the original language used by the participants.
This project is made possible with funds from the Tennessee Arts Commission and Bonnaroo Works Fund.
About Conexión Américas: Founded in 2002, Conexión Américas has 23 years of experience building a welcoming community and creating opportunities where Latino families can belong, contribute, and succeed. Every year, we assist more than 14,000 individuals and their families in their desire to start businesses, improve their English, help their children succeed in school and go to college, and become an integral part of Nashville’s social, cultural and economic vitality. Conexión Américas is the lead partner of Casa Azafrán, a nonprofit collaborative at the gateway to Nashville’s International District that is home to Conexión Américas and nine partners.
About the Casa Azafrán Art Gallery: The Casa Azafrán Art Gallery is a community centered art gallery located in Casa Azafrán in Southeast Nashville which opens space for Latinx and immigrant origin artists to share their voices, perspectives and art.
Learn more about each participant’s recipe and life lesson from the kitchen:
