Fort Worth Chicano Documentary Photographer Jesús Manuel Mena Garza to Talk About His Work from 1970 to the Present at SJSU

Click photos to enlarge

Texas documentary photographer Jesús Manuel Mena Garza will present an hour-long photo show and lecture, A Chicano Photographer’s Journey: 1970 to the Present, on Sept. 25 at 3 pm at San José State University. The event is free and open to the public at the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library, Room 225/229.

Midwestern State University Professor Dr. Ann Marie Leimer said, “This new presentation illuminates why Garza pursued his role of critical observer. He explains the various influences in his artistic life and details the process that helped him evolve into a prominent documentary photographer.” Garza’s new work is quite diverse – from intimate portraits of Chicana and Chicano academics to issues of abandonment and loss in Texoma.

Professor Leimer adds, “During the past decades, Garza has extensively published and exhibited several documentary photographic series. His Chicano Photographer series explores important aspects of the American experience, historic events and cultural practices often marginalized by the dominant culture.”

The presentation occurs in conjunction with Garza’s current exhibition at the library. A panel discussion on the 40th Anniversary of El Centro Cultural de la Gente (Garza was a member) will take place in the same room from 6 to 7:30 pm. There will be a reception following in the Cultural Heritage Center (Fifth Floor).

Location and Time:
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library, SJSU
Wednesday, Sept. 25, 2013, Room 225/229, Second Floor
150 East San Fernando Street, San José, CA 95112
3 to 4:20 pm with a reception at 7:30 pm
Free and open to the Public

Jesús Garza’s Portrait and Press Kit:
http://www.jmmgarza.com/html/00press_kit.html

Sponsored by the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Library; San José State University School of Journalism and Mass Communication; the César E. Chávez Community Action Center – SJSU Associated Students; Department of Mexican American Studies; and SJSU’s Chicano/Latino Faculty & Staff Association.

September 25, 2013 SJSU Photography Show and Lecture

Jesús Garza's Chicano Photographer show (1970-1975) continues for 30 more days

[Photo of César Estrada Chávez by Jesús Garza. Click image to view and/or download larger version. Suitable for printing.]

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Chicano Photographer, an exhibition by Riverside, California documentary photographer Jesús Manuel Mena Garza opened at the San Bernardino County Museum (SBCM) Schuilling Gallery, March 26, 2011. The exhibition continues to November 6.

The photographs were captured from 1970 to 1975. During this period, Garza took intimate photographs of Chicano icons César E. Chávez, Rodolfo “Corky” Gonzáles and others. The photographs provide a retrospective glimpse from the unique perspective of the photojournalist and activist. The SBCM exhibition lists thirty-one select images from the photographer’s Imágenes Xicano Archive, a portion of which has already been exhibited on both coasts.

University of Redlands Professor Dr. Ann Marie Leimer adds, “During the past decades, Garza has extensively published and exhibited several documentary photographic series. The Chicano Photographer series explores important aspects of the American experience, historic events and cultural practices often marginalized by the dominant culture.” Photographs from the series have already been published in journals and books. Dr. Leimer recently completed a book on the photographic series. The exhibition is perfect for students 5 to 95. Please feel free to contact the museum or artist for more information.

San Bernardino County Museum
Schuilling Gallery
2024 Orange Tree Lane
Redlands CA 92374
Voice (909) 307-2669 ext. 227 Fax (909) 307-0689
www.sbcountymuseum.org

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Pasadena NACCS Conference Photos

Sample photographs taken during the 2011 NACCS conference in Pasadena, California. It was great to see so many Chicana and Chicano Studies academics and artists in one venue. Please click the photos to enlarge. All photos are by Jesus Garza.

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Photographer Harry Gamboa's Passion and Activism

By Brian De Los Santos, CSUN

Professor Harry Gamboa Jr.’s said he is often inspired by everyday people in ordinary scenarios for his artwork. Photo Credit: Herber Lovato / Assistant Photo Editor

Professor Harry Gamboa Jr.’s first masterpiece involved a couple cans of spray paint and a wall at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art which served as his canvas.

In 1972, Gamboa and two other members of his art entourage,Asco (Spanish for nauseated), had asked a museum curator at LACMA why Chicano art was nonexistent in the museum and he told them Latinos did not partake in art but rather in gangs.

The art group responded by tagging their names on the right corner of the museum around 4 a.m., making the building itself a work of art produced by Chicanos.

The black and red graffiti had brief physical existence of about seven hours.

“It was a way to play the term he had used,” he said.

The piece, now know as Spray Paint LACMA, is one of many that have contributed to Gamboa’s reputation as an artist and voice for the underdog.

He’s been described as a “pioneer for art in action” by performance artists like Maris Bustamante, while his colleagues describe him as a humble man with an immense influence.

His avant-garde skills have allowed him to touch multiple realms in the world of art. His work, with its political activist notion, has not ceased to deliver messages to the masses.

However, on the CSUN campus, Harry Gamboa Jr., a world-renowned Chicano artist, is known for a different role as teacher.

Although he currently teaches a remedial writing class, Gamboa has taught art, theater, cinema, photography and Chicana/o studies at various UC campuses, as well as the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia and Otis.

He has also lectured at Harvard University, UC Berkley, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Centro Cultural de España, Mexico City and several others.

But long before stepping into his role as a teacher and lecturer, Gamboa pursued his passion for art, activism and people.

The East LA native began his career as an artist in the early 1970s, when he was an editor for several magazines.

The experience from those publications developed his unique eye for design, something that he is known for.

The artist has explored a plethora of artistic platforms, from photography to murals, film and canvas.

Gamboa also tried his hand at writing, producing several poems, books and essays, which have been used as academic course readers, as well. Most of his pieces are politically inclined, translating an idea onto a medium of art.

Human rights and activism have played a major role in Gamboa’s life since the 1960s, when he stood as one of the students who fought for education reform when the Chicano movement was being developed and the “East LA Walkout” occurred.

As part of the movement, Gamboa delivered speeches, spoke with the media regarding the subject, involved other youth and mentored protestors. He was fully involved, hoping to alter an education system that did not favor minorities at the time.

Gamboa said in comparison to the 60s and the education protests today, back then “it was a life or death situation” because it was either being drafted or accepted into school.

“It was imminently to stop the war,” he said.

He also battled the military drafts with protests against the Vietnam War.

“I was very interested and always pointing out the inconsistencies of what was being told to us versus what was real,” Gamboa said.

He added that during the early 1970s, today’s communication technology was absent, therefore many people created “things that were not real.”

Gamboa’s solution was to tell stories through photographs, which became his craft and expression of choice.

“My focus early on (in art) was always about establishing rumors and myths,” he said. “In the end that is kind of what I still do.”

Gamboa went on to say that through his art he enjoys generating interest, creating excitement, presenting new ideas or images that have not been expressed before.

He said he draws inspiration from everyday people in everyday circumstances and transforms the ordinary scenario into an extraordinary work of art. For example, Gamboa said when he steps onto a bus, he documents his journey with writings or photographic scenes from the common people who crowd the seats.

“It’s the idea that I can photograph an individual who had previously been under the affects of negative stereotyping, then bring that image and transform the concept of whom this person represents,” Gamboa said. “Not only does it become art, but it also becomes something included in the (mainstream) dialogue, cancelling out the negative stereotypes.”

His passion for activism and human rights has not wavered over the years. Most recently, the artist has rallied for immigrant rights and education and has drawn artistic inspiration from the causes.

Gamboa’s most recent projects, Aztlangst, a photonovela (graphic novel), is aimed to interpret the story of oppressed groups such as those who are being affected by Arizona’s controversial immigration law.

“(The graphic novel is based on) people who are in hiding, who are operating on a different level of awareness because they are being hunted down,” Gamboa said.

He said that he is also in the process of completing Pix, a collection of his favorite photography work from the 1970s to recent years.

“I found it my calling in life to to minor events and to transform and give them a historic nature even though they might not be worthy of history,” Gamboa said. “(I want) to have fun trying to create change.”

Junior Natalia Baires, 21, psychology, a former student of Gamboa’s, described his impact on her life as both a “privilege and bizarre.”

“(I feel) privileged because he was a good professor and bizarre because he did so much to fight for Chicanos,” Baires said. “It is weird to know that this humble and ordinary looking man did all that plus more.”

Over the span of his 30 year career, his work has attained world-wide attention and has been exhibited in acclaimed museums like the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, Museo de Arte de Zapopan, Guadalajara, Mexico, Centre Pompidou, Paris, Smithsonian Institution and the list goes on.

Dr. Denisse Sandoval, CSUN Chicana/o studies instructor, has known Gamboa for about 16 years and has been included in his art troupe since 2004. She also participated in photo shoots for Aztlagnst and other projects.

Sandoval said Gamboa’s gift is his unique view of the world.

“When you see that little tinkle in his eye, that’s little trouble maker in his life,” she said. “And that is what makes him a fabulous artist.”

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2011 San Bernardino County Museum Photography Exhibition Focuses on the 1970s Chicano Experience

[Click photo to enlarge. Photo copyright 2011 Jesus Manuel Mena Garza. All rights reserved.]

UPDATE: Chicano Photographer, an exhibition by Riverside, California documentary photographer Jesús Manuel Mena Garza opens at the San Bernardino County Museum (SBCM) Schuilling Gallery, March 26, 2011. The exhibition continues to November 6.

A reception open to the public takes place on Friday, March 25, 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. Space is limited (400+). Please call (909) 307-2669 x227 or email kplimley@sbcm.sbcounty.gov to make your reservation. The event is free to museum members or $10 at the door.

Get more information by clicking here...

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Photography show looks through Latina eyes

Sexy, but not erotic. Magical, mythic and mysterious. The photos in "Her Gaze" capture how identity shapes our vision.

By Kyle MacMillan
Denver Post Fine Arts Critic

When most people snap pictures with their cellphones or digital cameras, their intent is simple: Record whatever immediate reality is in front of them at the moment.

But for the five widely recognized Mexican and Mexican-American artists featured in a new exhibition at Museo de las Americas, photography provides a means to see beyond the tangible to something spiritual, metaphorical and mysterious.

The show's evocative title, "Her Gaze/Su Mirada," points to this preternatural ability, as well as broader implications of the word.

"We always talk about the gaze — the gaze of the photographer, the gaze of the public, the gaze of a man on a woman and vice versa," said Kathy Vargas, a participating photographer from San Antonio.

Kathy Vargas uses an in-camera, multiple-exposure technique to create multilayered images such as her cross-shaped array of six photographs, "Broken Column: Mother," 80 by 48 inches. (Courtesy of Joe Diaz )

"What is the female gaze? I guess that's what the show is about. What are women looking at? How are they looking at it? Is it different from the way a man would look at it?"

By focusing only on Latina photographers, curator Maruca Salazar, Museo's executive director, has expressly narrowed her focus to an artistic point of view that is not just female but also Latina.

The question is: Do these two pivotal identity markers come together to produce a distinctive vision? The more than 50 black-and-white and color images on display provide compelling evidence that the answer is yes.

It is a rich, perceptive world view that finds deep roots in the Latino embrace of the cycle of life and death and encompasses metaphorical and transcendent dimensions beyond the merely physical.

At the same time, it is a vantage point of the outsider. Although a Latina sits on the Supreme Court, Latinos in the United States still struggle to be fully enfranchised with equal pay and all that mainstream society has to offer.

"We are, I don't really want to use the word 'marginalized,' but I guess I could use that word," said Albuquerque photographer Delilah Montoya. "Even the word 'Latina' was

Exploring the relationship between humankind and nature, Mexican photographer Yesika Felix intersperses surprisingly similar topographic close-ups of human skin and bark, such as this silver gelatin print from her "Sequoia" series. (Courtesy of the artist )

devised by the dominant culture to explain who we are. That's a word to make us more simple, more uniform."

There is no doubt that each of these photographers — the youngest born in 1976, the oldest in 1942 — has a distinctive visual style and subject matter.

In 1979-88, for example, Graciela Iturbide, the most famous of the five, took her camera to the isthmus city of Juchitán in Oaxaca, Mexico, creating enigmatic images of its ancient, matriarchal society.

In a series of photos along the American-Mexican border, Montoya, who takes an overtly sociopolitical stance in her photographs, explores the clash between the area's rugged beauty and the frequent deaths of immigrants there.

Vargas confronted the death of her mother and her ensuing grief in a shrine-like installation that combines hanging and wall-mounted photographs with a sculpture that extends their multilayered symbolism.

Common themes

Divergent, yes, but certain commonalities run through these and the images by the two other featured photographers — Yesika Felix and Flor Garduño, both from Mexico.

Among those commonalities is a drive to define themselves, something that Montoya has sought to do in the Chicano communities where she has lived in Denver and Albuquerque, and in connection with other artists, musicians and writers.

"We were more or less forming our identity," she said, "forming a way of speaking about who we are and what our issues are. And, of course, the issues change throughout time."

Though what differentiates how men and women perceive things is nearly impossible to pin down and has been debated for centuries, it seems clear a dichotomy does exist.

"I tried to truly analyze why women are different when they take a picture," Salazar said. "What happens when they take a picture? How do they see things? Definitely, there is something there that tells me that we totally look at things differently."

Not surprisingly, the show contains many views of women, none more provocative then Montoya's series of feminist-infused images of female boxers.

"You think of them as very bad girls, (niñas)malcriadas," she said. "I wanted to find out who they are and why are they pounding each other. And what does violence look like with women? Does violence look the same as it does on a man?"

Defiant gazes

Greeting viewers at the entrance of the exhibition is the portrait, "Jackie Chavez" (2006). Posed in her uniform with boxing gloves boldly emblazoned with the abbreviation "TKO," the sitter stares directly at the viewer — adding a defiant dimension to the show's title, "Her Gaze."

"The strong woman in the photograph is saying to the viewer, 'Here I am, and I'm looking out too. I'm not just here to be looked at. I'm going to be looking at you, too,' " Vargas said.

Similarly, Iturbide presents her now-iconic take on the unbowed, independent woman in "Our Lady of the Iguanas" (1979), a portrait depicting a marketplace vendor in Juchitán wearing a group of iguanas on her head like a headdress.

In an alternative vein are a group of female nudes by Garduño that are certainly sexual but not in an erotic way, as they might have been through the lens of a man. Instead, she seems to be emphasizing the women's natural beauty and fecundity, tying them to the ancient notion of Mother Earth.

This connection links her directly with a Latino sensibility that emphasizes the relationship between humankind and nature, embraces the inevitable life cycle and does not shy from death and what might lie beyond.

"A lot of our work is very much about metaphor, that it's not just what you see on the surface," said Vargas. "It is about the spiritual and what unites the spirit with the physical."

Magic realism

This kind of supernatural realm is sometimes described as magic realism, an aesthetic that first emerged in Europe in the early 20th century but found particular resonance in Latin America, especially in the literature of Jorge Luis Borges, Gabriel García Márquez and many others.

This approach, which expands the notion of reality to take in elements of magic, myth and religion, extends as well to Latin-American visual art, such as the paintings of Frida Kahlo and the photography of Manuel Álvarez Bravo.

It has been a strong influence on Iturbide, a student of Bravo, suffusing her 13 images on view, such as "Cementerio (Cemetery)" (1988), a haunting scene in which dozens of what are apparently sparrows take to the sky at once.

There has been much debate in recent decades around exhibitions of this kind that critics would argue segregate, even ghettoize, certain societal groups like women.

But Vargas believes the day of such debates is over. Like the rest of the Latina photographers in the exhibition, her works are now regularly shown in mainstream venues of all kinds.

"It doesn't bother me because we've done all things now and because we all are everywhere," she said of "Her Gaze." "This is just another excuse for a show, as far as I'm concerned. It's kind of nice that it's women because we can sit and gossip and go shopping together."

Kyle MacMillan: 303-954-1675 orkmacmillan@denverpost.com

"Her Gaze/Su Mirada."

Photography. Museo de las Americas, 861 Santa Fe Drive. This exhibition showcases the works of five widely recognized Latina photographers of varying generations: Yesika Felix, Flor Garduño, Graciela Iturbide, Delila Montoya and Kathy Vargas. Through May 29. 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesdays through Fridays and noon to 5 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays. $4, $3 students and seniors and free for children younger than 13 and members. 303-571-4401 ormuseo.org

Read more:Photography show looks through Latina eyes - The Denver Posthttp://www.denverpost.com/entertainment/ci_17286464#ixzz1DJCG1bDL

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Chicano Photographer Exhibition

Please note that the reception has been moved to March 25, 2011. The exhibition opens to the general public the next day. It will be a packed house. See you there.

Call Jesus at (909) 557-7151 or send him email if you have any questions.

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Suitable For Printing - Chicano Photographer Sample Photos

[Click photo to enlarge. Copyright 2010 Jesús Manuel Mena Garza. All rights reserved.]

You are invited to download (non-commercial use) sample photos from the Chicano Photographer exhibition. The letter size JPG file are suitable for laser or ink-jet printing. Save the file and ask your photo lab or color laser printer to make a copy or two. Yes, color laser prints always look better than black and white ones.

I typically cut the sheet of photos lengthwise, then distribute the photo strips at my exhibitions and events. Have fun trimming and framing the photos for your personal use. The photos are not for commercial distribution or use.

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2011 San Bernardino County Museum Photography Exhibition Focuses on the 70s Chicano Experience

[Photo by Ann Marie Leimer, Ph.D. Click to enlarge]

Chicano Photographer, an exhibition by Riverside, California documentary photographer Jesús Manuel Mena Garza opens at the San Bernardino County Museum (SBCM) Schuilling Gallery, March 26, 2011. The exhibition continues to November 6. A reception open to the public takes place on March 25, from 5:30 to 8:30 PM.

The photographs were captured from 1970 to 1975. During this period, Garza took intimate photographs of Chicano icons César E. Chávez, Rodolfo “Corky” Gonzáles and others. The photographs provide a retrospective glimpse from the unique perspective of the photojournalist and activist. The SBCM exhibition lists thirty-one select images from the photographer’s Imágenes Xicano Archive, a portion of which has already been exhibited on both coasts.

University of Redlands Professor Dr. Ann Marie Leimer adds, “During the past decades, Garza has extensively published and exhibited several documentary photographic series. The Chicano Photographer series explores important aspects of the American experience, historic events and cultural practices often marginalized by the dominant culture.” Photographs from the series have already been published in journals and books. Dr. Leimer recently completed a book on the photographic series. The Chicano Photographer series can be viewed at Garza’s website, jmmgarza.com.

Please contact the SBCM for details about lectures and events coinciding with the Chicano Photographer exhibition. The March 25, 2011 reception is a family-friendly event featuring free entertainment, food and refreshments. Parking is also free.

Chicano Photographer Exhibition and Lecture Series

Location:

San Bernardino County Museum

Schuilling Gallery

2024 Orange Tree Lane

Redlands CA 92374

Voice (909) 307-2669 ext. 227 Fax (909) 307-0689

www.sbcountymuseum.org

Contacts:

Ann Marie Leimer, Ph.D., University of Redlands, 909-557-7159, ann_leimer@redlands.edu

Michele Nielsen, Curator of History, San Bernardino County Museum, (909) 307-2669 ext. 240, mnielsen@sbcm.sbcounty.gov

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