[Blog]

A recent case decided by the Administrative Appeals Office (AAO) of the Unites States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), has expanded who can come to the United States on a temporary visa for cultural performances, P visas. In order to be eligible for such a visa, a performer, artist or group’s performance must be culturally unique. Before this decision, US CIS had often only allowed such visas for performances that were a pure form of the cultural exhibition, i.e. without other influences. The new opinion expands the types of performers and artists who qualify to exhibit their talents in the United States. Now a culturally unique performance includes hybrids or fusions of artistic styles or traditions from more than one culture or region. So in this case, there was a fusion of traditional Eastern European Jewish klezmer music with South American styles by an Argentinean group, which the AAO announced met the basic requirements. 

This does not change the other requirements for bringing performers to the United States. If you are interested in bringing a group or artist to the United States, you still have to provide evidence about the authenticity of the artist or groups skills in “performing, presenting, coaching or teaching the unique or traditional art form.” This is done by providing affidavits or letters from experts in the field along with evidence of the expert’s credentials and the basis for the expert’s knowledge of the artist’s skills. Evidence that the performance is culturally unique is also required. This can be met by providing documents such as newspaper reviews, journals or other published materials showing that the performance is culturally unique.

This is exciting news as it opens opportunities for more performers to exhibit their talents in the United States; a benefit for performers and the people in the United States alike.