See the Latest Projects from Building Dignified Worlds
Christopher Gregory-Rivera
Building Dignified Worlds is a collaborative initiative developed by Magnum Foundation, FICA (Fundo Imobiliário Comunitário para Aluguel), and the Parsons Design for Social Innovation and Sustainability (DESIS) Lab at The New School, with support from the Henry Luce Foundation’s Democracy, Ethics, and Public Trust program.
This fellowship brings together five photographers and grassroots organizations to document alternative approaches to housing and property in Latin America, bringing to light the many ways communities are already building dignified alternatives.
The resulting exhibition, at Centro de Fotografía de Montevideo, is both a record of collective strength and an open invitation: to learn from these initiatives, to carry their lessons into wider conversations, and to imagine futures where solidarity, dignity, and justice guide how we inhabit the places we call home.
Saturday, February 28, 2026 | 7 – 9 PM (UYT)
Opening Reception:
Fotogalería Parque Rodó,
Montevideo, Uruguay
Location:
See featured projects below!
Christopher Gregory-Rivera
Puerto Rico| The Architecture of Permanence
In collaboration with Fideicomiso de la Tierra del Caño Martín Peña.
In The Architecture of Permanence, Christopher Gregory-Rivera photographs everyday ways of resisting through architecture, design, and organizing in San Juan, Puerto Rico. The city is home to El Caño Martin Peña Community Land Trust, which was established by local residents in 2004 to recognize and protect the informal settlements built along this long-polluted canal, in the face of ongoing gentrification. The trust placed absolute control of the land in the local community itself, and as a condition of the land transfer, the community directly oversees environmental restoration projects of the canal.
Gregory-Rivera’s images of El Caño depict this unique system, which enables the local community to thrive despite rising costs of living. Through photography, Gregory-Rivera honors the people at its core.
Diego Casseres
Colombia | Our Patio
In collaboration with El Palenque de Benko.
Colombia’s El Palenque de San Basilio (also known as El Palenque de Benkos, after its founder Benkos Biohó, leader of the Cimarron slave rebellion) was founded by formerly enslaved African people in the seventeenth century, becoming the first free Black town in the Americas. In 2024, after a struggle to achieve financial and administrative independence, it became a municipality with capacity to manage its own resources, infrastructure and development projects. Recognition as a territorial entity allows communities to safeguard their language, culture and traditions within a modern legal and political framework.
In Our Patio, Casseres works from the intimacy of people’s homes to preserve and share local traditions during this moment of change.
Mariana Greif
Uruguay| 50 years of Communal Utopias of Brick and CemenT
In collaboration with Complejo Habitacional Bulevar Artigas.
Made in collaboration with residents, Mariana Greif’s layered work offers a personal view of El Complejo Bulevar Artigas in Montevideo, Uruguay while touching on larger themes of friendship, aging, and ritual. Founded as a cooperative housing complex in 1974, Complejo Bulevar is designed with flexible units to support changing needs of families over time, as well as communal space at its center. The complex is currently home to 332 families.
Greif photographed everyday life in Complejo Bulevar, and then hosted workshops for the community in which adults and children embroidered and drew on her photographs, sharing their perspectives.
Priscilla Mora Flores/Colectivo Nómada
Costa rica | Longo Mai, Land for Refugees
In collaboration with Longo Mai.
In Longo Mai, Land for Refugees, Priscilla Mora portrays the current residents of Longo Mai in Costa Rica—an intentional community founded in 1979 by European migrants to provide land for and live communally with war refugees from Central America.
The founders of Longo Mai devised their own housing model, creating 15-year renewable contracts for the symbolic rental of plots and houses. Collectively, the residents are the caretakers of approximately 450 hectares of tropical rainforest. Mora’s photographs describe the warmth of everyday life in this vibrant ecosystem.
Renan Teles
Brazil | Neighbors first
In collaboration with FICA.
In 2015, FICA was founded on the premise that housing is a fundamental right which enables access to other rights. This non-profit acquires properties and leases them at fair, accessible prices in São Paulo, where homelessness and long commutes are common while central buildings lie empty. Around 100 people live safely in FICA’s houses and flats.
Renan Teles collaborated with FICA's agents, residents, and farmers to create dramatic, highly detailed photographic scenes for Neighbors First. His images thoughtfully portray both those empowered by this property model and those who organized themselves to fight against land speculation.
