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CSRC Newsletter - June 2017

VOLUME 15, NUMBER 9

DIRECTOR’S MESSAGE

This message is coming to you from the galleries on the third floor of the Broad Contemporary Art Museum at LACMA: we’re completing a three-week installation for Home—So Different, So Appealing, and let me tell you, our subtitle is right on target. The exhibition is a groundbreaking view of home since the late 1950s. Come and see for yourself—it opens on June 11 (see News). Or better yet, come to the artists’ panel at LACMA on June 10 (see Events) and view the show for free afterward! There’s no place like home!

Chon A. Noriega
Director and Professor
 

News

Home opens at LACMA
After four years of extensive research and planning, the CSRC-organized exhibition Home—So Different, So Appealing, featuring artworks by U.S. Latino and Latin American contemporary artists on the subject of home, will open to the public on June 11 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Curated by Chon A. Noriega, Mari Carmen Ramírez, and Pilar Tompkins Rivas, Home is part of the Getty’s Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA arts initiative. The exhibition has been funded by grants from the Getty Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and the Pasadena Art Alliance, as well as through support from the L.A. County Arts Commission, Entravision, AltaMed, and individual donors. Home is on view at LACMA through October 15 and then will travel to the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. A public panel discussion featuring exhibition artists in conversation with Noriega and Tompkins Rivas will take place June 10 (see Events).
 
Ortiz to receive UCLA Medal
The CSRC is thrilled to announce that veteran artist Raphael Montañez Ortiz will receive the UCLA Medal, the university’s highest honor, in a ceremony on campus June 8. Ortiz (b. 1934) gained recognition in the 1960s as one of the leading figures of the Destructivist movement. Perhaps best known for his piano destruction concerts, “Archaeological Finds,” and recycled film and video works, Ortiz employs his art to address issues of religion, indigenousness, ritual, transcendence, mortality, and duality. His artworks are in the collections of major museums, such as the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, the Museum of Modern Art and the Whitney Museum in New York, the Pompidou Centre in Paris, and the Menil Collection in Houston. He is currently distinguished professor of visual arts at Rutgers University. In 1969 Ortiz founded El Museo del Barrio, the first Latino art museum in the United States. He will be awarded the UCLA Medal for his achievements in art, education, and social justice. Read the press release here.
 
Tobar to join faculty at UC Irvine
Héctor Tobar, journalist, educator, and author of the award-winning book Deep Down Dark about the thirty-three men who survived the mine collapse in Chile in 2010, has been appointed associate professor of Chicano/Latino studies and English (literary journalism) at UC Irvine. He begins his appointment this fall. Since 2014 Tobar has been an assistant professor at the University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication. The CSRC has the Héctor Tobar Papers.
 
Gomez creates artworks at Whitney Museum
L.A. artist Ramiro Gomez, who is widely known for cardboard paintings of Latina/o domestic and day laborers, is creating paintings of the janitorial and security staff at the Whitney Museum of American Art from May 30 through June 1. Gomez’s paintings are based on his observations of laborers preparing for the opening of the 2017 Whitney Biennial in March. For more information, click here. Artworks by Gomez are included in the CSRC-organized exhibition Home—So Different, So Appealing, on view at LACMA June 11–October 15, 2017.
 
Epstein presents at career conference for graduate students
Rebecca Epstein, CSRC communications and academic programs officer, was invited to speak at this year’s UCLA Career Development Conference for Graduate Students and Postdocs, organized by the UCLA Career Center. The conference took place on campus May 4 and was designed to assist graduate students and postdocs seeking alternatives to traditional academic careers. Epstein has a PhD from the UCLA Department of Film, Television, and Digital Media.
 
CSRC visiting scholars report
 
  • Elizabeth González Cárdenas holds a doctorate from UCLA in social sciences and comparative education with a specialization in race and ethnic studies. This year she conducted archival research in Chicana/o studies with an emphasis on the importance of community-based learning and the ethics of social justice via pedagogical practices. This summer she will conduct interviews with founding members of the field to conclude her research project. González Cárdenas presented some of her research on the impact of Chicana/o studies curricula, “femtoring,” mentoring, and “tormentoring” at the National Association of Chicana Chicano Studies (NACCS) in March and the Pacific Coast Sociological Association in April.
  • Vanessa Díaz, this year’s CSRC IAC visiting scholar and a Ford fellow, used her time at the CSRC to work on multiple major projects. She co-authored the Bunche Center for African American Studies’s annual Hollywood Diversity Report and helped organize a UCLA Library Artist in Residence Program for Cuban rap artists Obsesión, which included a screening of Díaz’s 2006 documentary Cuban HipHop: Desde el Principio (From the Beginning) followed by a Q&A with the artists. In April at the CSRC, a presentation on paparazzi labor was followed by a panel discussion with two of the Latino paparazzi with whom she collaborates on her research. In addition, she helped create a hate-crime mapping project that will be hosted at the American Indian Studies Center (AISC). In her remaining time at the CSRC, she will finish revisions to her manuscript, “Manufacturing Celebrity: How Women Reporters and Latino Paparazzi Build the Hollywood Industrial Complex,” which is under contract with Duke University Press.
  • Lindsay Pérez Huber, assistant professor of social and cultural analysis of education at Cal State Long Beach, had three articles accepted for publication: “Healing Images and Narratives: Undocumented Chicana/Latina Pedagogies of Resistance” (co-authored with Daniel Solorzano, Journal of Latinos and Education, in press),  “Teaching Racial Microaggressions: Implications of Critical Race Hypos for Social Work” (Journal of Ethnic and Cultural Diversity in Social Work, 2016), and “‘Make America Great Again!’ Donald Trump, Racist Nativism, and the Virulent Adherence to White Supremacy amid U.S. Demographic Change” (Charleston Law Review, 2017). In addition, she has been recommended for tenure and promotion to associate professor in the College of Education at CSULB. 
  • Celia Lacayo, IAC visiting scholar, published the article “Perpetual Inferiority: Whites’ Racial Ideology Toward Latinos” in the American Sociological Association Journal (2017). The article seeks to explain how and why whites think negatively about Latinos. Her article includes empirical evidence and a theoretical framework for describing whites' rationalization of the contemporary racialization Latinos endure.
  • Katy Pinto, associate professor in the department of sociology at Cal State Dominguez Hills, has been working on three manuscripts during her year as a visiting scholar. Most recently she submitted "Beyond Cultural Explanations: Understanding the Gendered Division of Household Labor in Mexican American Families" to the Journal of Family Issues. She also submitted a manuscript to Sociology of Race and Ethnicity titled "Strippers and Tippers: Understanding Location, Space, and Male Exotic Dancers." She is currently finishing data analysis for a project titled "Exploring the Effect of the Advisor on Time to Degree (TTD) at a Diverse Urban University," and in April she presented related research at the Pacific Sociological Association conference in Portland. In addition, Pinto is working on two new projects in the area of faculty development. Finally, Pinto recently embarked on the Fragile Families Challenge, a research collaboration with the Bendheim-Thoman Center for Research on Child Wellbeing at Princeton University. The goal of the project, which will incorporate predictive modeling, causal inference, and in-depth interviews, is to improve the lives of disadvantaged children in the United States.

CSRC in the News

“Vincent Valdez on ‘Excerpts for John’ in ‘Home—So Different, So Appealing’”
Artist Vincent Valdez discussed his work Excerpts for John (2012) on Unframed, LACMA’s blog. A series of paintings that presents the sequence of a military funeral procession, Excerpts for John is a tribute to a friend who served in Iraq. Several of the paintings will be featured in the CSRC-organized exhibition Home—So Different, So Appealing.
Unframed, May 29, 2017 (PDF)
 
“An Excellent Read for the Extended Weekend”
La Voz reviewed Uncompromised: The Lupe Anguiano Story, in which author Deborah Wright describes the lifetime achievements of Anguiano, a civil rights and environmental activist. Wright used the Lupe Anguiano Papers at the CSRC as part of her research.
La Voz, May 24, 2017 (PDF)
 
“Destructivist Artist Raphael Montañez Ortiz to Receive UCLA Medal”
UCLA Newsroom reported on the upcoming presentation of the UCLA Medal to Raphael Montañez Ortiz, artist and social justice advocate. The UCLA Institute of American Cultures and the CSRC will host the event on June 8. The ceremony will celebrate Chicano art and culture in Los Angeles.
UCLA Newsroom, May 18, 2017 (PDF)
 
“How Los Angeles Became the Capital of Incarceration”
In a UCLA Newsroom Q&A, Kelly Lytle Hernández, associate professor of history and former CSRC associate director, discussed her new book, City of Inmates: Conquest, Rebellion, and the Rise of Human Caging in Los Angeles 1771–1965 (University of North Carolina Press, 2017).
UCLA Newsroom, May 10, 2017 (PDF)
 
“Frieze New York 2017 Expands Scope”
An article in NY Arts magazine on Frieze New York, an annual art fair in New York, mentioned a symposium sponsored by Frieze on the Getty’s Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA initiative. CSRC director Chon A. Noriega was listed as a panelist at the May 5 event.
NY Arts, May 9, 2017 (PDF)
 
“Champions of Chicano Art Need to Face Reality: A Response to Cheech Marin’s New Art Center”
In an opinion piece for Artnet News, Karen Mary Davalos, professor of Chicano and Latino studies at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, draws upon the opening of the new Center for Chicano Art at UC Riverside to discuss the need for sustainable practices regarding the collection, exhibition, and endorsement of Chicano art in Southern California. The CSRC is mentioned for its research concerning Chicano art exhibition practices and its participation in the Getty-funded arts initiative Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA.
Artnet News, May 8, 2017 (PDF)
 
“UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center Partners with Two Museums on New Exhibition”
The CSRC was mentioned in a UCLA Newsroom piece about the upcoming CSRC-organized exhibition Home—So Different, So Appealing, co-curated by CSRC director Chon A. Noriega.
UCLA Newsroom, May 5, 2017 (PDF)
 
“School of Arts Professor to Speak at CCAE”
Professor and artist David Avalos’s talk at the California Center for the Arts, Escondido, was previewed on the Cal State San Marcos news website. The CSRC holds some of Avalos’s works, including the public art piece “Welcome to America’s Finest Tourist Plantation” created with artists Louis Hock and Elizabeth Sisco in 1988 and on permanent display in the CSRC hallway.
CSUSM NewsCenter, May 5, 2017 (PDF)
 
“Home—So Different, So Appealing”
The May issue of Art Forum included a preview of the CSRC-organized exhibition Home—So Different, So Appealing, opening June 11 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
Art Forum, May 4, 2017 (PDF)
 
“The Surprising Evolution of Cinco de Mayo”
Former CSRC director David E. Hayes-Bautista was quoted in an article discussing the historic origin of Cinco de Mayo. The piece drew on  research he conducted for his book El Cinco de Mayo: An American Tradition (University of California Press, 2012). Hayes-Bautista is a distinguished professor of medicine and director of the Center for the Study of Latino Health and Culture at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.
TIME, May 3, 2017 (PDF)
 
“Our Obsession with Celebrity Is Being Fueled by Latinx Immigrants” Vanessa Díaz, IAC visiting researcher and Ford fellow, was interviewed for a feature on the increasing numbers of Latino paparazzi in what was previously an industry of white males. Díaz presented her research at the CSRC in April.
Fusion, May 2, 2017 (PDF)
 
All “In the News” articles are available in PDF format on the CSRC website.
 

Events

Talk: “At Home in America: Artist Dialogues”
Saturday, June 10, 1:00 p.m.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Bing Theater, 5905 Wilshire Blvd., Los Angeles, 90036
In conjunction with the exhibition Home—So Different, So Appealing, a CSRC-organized exhibition for Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA, LACMA will host an afternoon of dialogues concerning the ongoing place of home in contemporary art, public culture, and social relations. Home artists Laura Aguilar, Carmen Argote, Christina Fernandez, Ramiro Gomez, María Elena González, Salomón Huerta, Daniel Joseph Martinez, Camilo Ontiveros, and Raphael Montañez Ortiz will be in conversation with exhibition co-curators Chon A. Noriega and Pilar Tompkins Rivas. This event is free; tickets are required. For more information and to RSVP, click here. 
 
All CSRC events are free and do not require an RSVP unless otherwise noted. Programs are subject to change. For the most current information, visit the Events page on the CSRC website.
 

CSRC Library

New library exhibition
Raphael Montañez Ortiz: Shred Your Worries and Other Destructions highlights three works that the multimedia artist created for the LA Art Show in January 2017: Shred Your Worries, Couch Destruction: Angel Release (Pennies from Heaven), and Piano Destruction Ritual: Cowboy and Indian, Part Two. The exhibition also displays key documents from throughout the artist’s career, from his “Destructivism Second Manifesto,” written for the Destruction in Art Symposium in London in 1966 to “digital experiments” conducted in the early 2000s. This exhibition highlights the Raphael Montañez Ortiz Papers at the CSRC Library, an extensive collection spanning eight decades that includes audiovisual materials, correspondence, ephemera, exhibition documentation, manuscripts, performance scripts, personal papers, photographs, printed materials, and academic publications. Curated by CSRC librarian and archivist Xaviera Flores, the exhibition is on display through September 1 in the CSRC Library and hallway vitrines. It is viewable during regular library hours, Monday-Friday 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
 
New Getty intern
The CSRC is pleased to announce that Naiela Santana has been selected as this year’s summer intern through the Getty Multicultural Internship Program. Santana is an undergraduate at San Francisco State University, where she is studying art with a concentration in art history. She will assist with digitizing and describing photograph collections at the CSRC. Welcome, Naiela!
 
CSRC loans to exhibitions
Materials from CSRC archival collections will be on display in two new exhibitions opening in June. Raphael Montañez Ortiz, curated by Catherine Taft and on display June 9 through July 15 at LAXART in Hollywood, will feature items from the Raphael Montañez Ortiz Papers. Items from the Elena Popp Papers and papers from the Laura Aguilar Collection will be included in the exhibition Lesbians to Watch Out For: 90s Queer L.A. Activism, curated by Judy Sisneros and on display June 2 through June 30 at Long Hall, Plummer Park, West Hollywood. Finally, images from the Laura Aguilar Collection will be in the exhibition ¡Mírame! Expressions of Queer Latinx Art, June 3 through December 9 at LA Plaza de Cultura des Artes in downtown Los Angeles.
 
Congratulations to graduating student workers
The CSRC congratulates its student workers who are graduating from their degree programs this spring. Rosie Rios (BA, sociology), Marilynda Bustamante (BA, Chicana/o studies and gender studies), and Nathan Ohkawahira (BS, mechanical engineering) have been invaluable to the processing of collections, event production, and desk services at the CSRC Library. We will greatly miss these dedicated individuals. We thank them for their hard work and wish them the very best.
 
To schedule a tour of the CSRC Library, contact CSRC librarian Xaviera Flores at xflores@chicano.ucla.edu.
 

CSRC Press

Coming this summer
Mid-August brings the release of Laura Aguilar: Show and Tell. Produced to accompany the eponymous exhibition opening in mid-September at the Vincent Price Art Museum at East Los Angeles College, the book explores the work of Chicana photographer Laura Aguilar. The catalog is edited by Rebecca Epstein, communications and academic programs officer at the CSRC. The exhibition, curated by Sybil Venegas, is a collaboration between Vincent Price Art Museum and the CSRC. Laura Aguilar: Show and Tell is part of the Getty’s Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA initiative. The catalog will be distributed by University of Washington Press.


Opportunities

Call for papers: Fourth Bi-Annual Sal Castro Memorial Conference on the Emerging Historiography of the Chicano Movement
February 23-24, 2018
University of California, Santa Barbara
Faculty and graduate students working on historical projects concerning the Chicano movement are invited to submit a 500-word proposal and a short CV to Mario T. Garcia, professor of Chicano and Chicana studies, at garcia@history.ucsb.edu.
Submissions deadline: September 1, 2017.