Historias in Motion: Cigar Workers' University Monument Launch

In collaboration with Kinfolk Tech, The Clemente will present Cigar Workers’ University, an augmented-reality public artwork by artist Molly Crabapple, developed with archival research and contributions by scholar Monxo López. The launch will include an accompanying zine and self-guided walking tour. 

The work memorializes Puerto Rican and Cuban cigar rollers and the enduring history of La Marqueta, a community marketplace active since the early 20th century. Crabapple and López’s research and work draw from the writer and workers' rights advocate Bernardo Vega’s acclaimed memoirs. Crabapple’s AR monument honors Vega and the cigarworkers he described - reading poetry, news, and political tracts aloud to one another as they rolled cigars- capturing a moment when labor, learning, and collective life converged.

This fall marks the launch of Historias in Motion, a new Historias signature series of virtual monuments and neighborhood site clusters that bring Latinx histories into the public sphere through digital and place-based storytelling. The inaugural edition focuses on East Harlem/El Barrio, viewed through the lens of writer and labor organizer Bernardo Vega and his chronicles of 1930s New York.

Cigar Workers’ University will remain accessible at La Marqueta via the Kinfolk App. This project is the first in a planned series of five monuments and walking tours to be launched across New York City through Summer 2026.

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Host or Publisher The Clemente Soto Vélez Cultural &Education Center