Birds and Barrio Ecologies with Marisol Cortez

Marisol Cortez is coming to the McNutt Co-Lab in the Negley Building on Thursday, October 22, for a talk titled Birds and Barrio Ecologies. It's the third event in the 2026-27 Arts + Ecology Series, a program that brings together artists and thinkers to look at how the natural world intersects with the places we live.

Cortez is a San Antonio writer, and this talk sits right in that overlap between the city's neighborhoods and the wildlife that shares them. The title gives you the gist: birds and the ecologies of the barrio. If you've spent any time paying attention to the birds that hang around the neighborhoods here, you know there's a whole world to it that usually goes unnoticed. That's exactly the kind of thing this series is built around—taking a closer look at the nature that exists right where we are, rather than somewhere far away.

Since this is the third installment of the series, it's part of a larger conversation running through the year. The Arts + Ecology Series is organized by UTSA, and this particular talk is hosted at the McNutt Co-Lab, which is inside the Negley Building on the UTSA campus here in San Antonio. If you're already following the series, this is the next one to have on your radar.

It runs from 6:30 PM to 8:00 PM on Thursday, October 22, and it's free to attend. If you're around that evening and interested in how the birds of the city fit into the neighborhoods we call home, it's a good one to catch.