Las Palomas de Picasso, 5-3-13
12″ x 12″ Acrylic on Canvas
Cheech Marin holding Dr. Arias’ book (book cover designed by hija del sol)
CHICANITAS: Small Paintings from the Cheech Marin Collection
December 10, 2011-May, 2012
This is a photo of Cheech holding this manuscript written by Dr. Arias, my college professor/adviser. Dr. Arias wrote this book on Chicano Art and asked me to design the front and back covers , he’s always been a wonderful supporter of my art. He met with Cheech this past weekend, I was invited for unfortunately couldn’t be there, anyways, here’s Cheech with Dr. Arias’ book, cover designed by me…pretty cool huh?
Galeria Tonantzin Celebrating it’s 20th exhibit of Las Latinas
(Very happy that these three of my painting are part of the exhibit at Galeria Tonantzin, please read information below)
Galeria Tonantzin celebrates 20 years of exhibiting women’s contemporary art.
115 – 3rd St. San Juan Bautista, CA 831-623-2783 Hours: 12 – 5pm Fri, Sat, Sun
The 20th exhibit of “Las Latinas” will take place during the month of
May featuring women artists of Latina heritage including gallery
co-founder Carmen Leon, long time exhibitor Pat Zuniga, and well known
muralist Patricia Rodriquez . Other artists include Alejandra Oseguera and Helene C’de Baca.
The reception for the artists will be held on Saturday, May 12 from 5 – 7 pm
At 6 pm during the reception Patricia Rodriguez will lecture on
“The Chicana/Latina Art Movement – Then and Now” offering her insight from
her early work with the “Mujeres Muralistas” to her recent curatorial
experience at Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts, in San
Francisco and the Oakland Museum of California.”
Bio
Patricia Rodríguez, is a muralist and printmaker, She also create box
constructions with mixed media. Ms. Rodriguez co-founded the “Mujeres
Muralistas”, a breakthrough group of Latina artist who painted over 18
murals in San Francisco. She is the first Chicana artist to create a
course on Chicano Art History, and a reader for the course at UC
Berkeley, 1977. A native of Texas, she has resided in San Francisco
Bay Area since 1958. A graduate of the San Francisco Art Institute,
BFA, and from Sacramento State University, MA. she has taught
printmaking, mural painting, in many of the colleges both locally in the Bay Area
and at CSU, Monterey Bay and at the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico,
and at UNM Los Alamos College, New Mexico, from 1990-1996.
She recently completed a ten-year career as gallery curator for
Mission Cultural Center for Latino Arts, in San Francisco. Her latest
curatorial work was for Dia de los Muertos exhibition, at the Oakland
Museum of California, 2011.
Her exhibitions, The Museum of Modern Art, NYC, Mexican Fine Arts
Museum, Chicago, Ill. White Gallery, UCLA, Daniel Saxon Gallery, Los
Angeles, De Young Museum, San Francisco, CA., and The Triton Museum,
Santa Clara, Ca.
New Paintings 04/2012
I hadn’t paint in a while since I’ve gotten so much into digital photography and editing and I think that I have learned so much in this past year, self taught from books, online videos and tutorials, and I’m always asking questions in class. Anyways, someone commissioned me to do a painting through my Etsy shop online and an art exhibit call for artists came up and I got motivated to paint again…and I really enjoyed it!!! The blue Hair painting is a 16×20 acrylic on canvas and I submitted it as part of an entry for a future art exhibit at Galeria Tonantzin in San Juan Bautista, they will be celebrating their 20th anniversary so I would love to be part of that and that’s why I completed that painting. The Revolutionary Kalaka couple is a replica of a smaller painting I had done back in 2010. It was somewhat challenging as it had to look exactly the same and I’m very happy with the results, I think that it looks much better than the original, very clean. That piece is on it’s way to the buyer, I really hope she is happy with it.
Turtle Island to Abya Yala -Native American & Latina Women Artists & Poets Anthology
“We are a group of over 60 Native American and Latina women artists and poets who are to be featured in the forthcoming anthology, Turtle Island to Abya Yala. Our goal is to raise funds to print this book in full color and in a way that is environmentally safe.
For this project, indigenous women artists were asked to submit visual art and poetry that addresses the theme of love. Many issues were addressed through the selected pieces: healing from intergenerational wounds of genocide, racism, Christianity and Catholicism, domestic violence, incest, alcoholism and drug addiction, violence and death of women along the U.S. border, to the celebration of Two-Spirit relationships, sensuality, cultural resiliency and affirmation, Mother Earth and our responsibility to take care of her, remembering the stories of our elders and practicing traditional ways.
Poets and artists featured in the forthcoming book include: Margaret “Quica” Alarcon, Adelina Anthony, Cathy Arellano, Natasha Beeds, Natalie Bell, LeAndra Bitsie, Maylei Blackwell, Nanette Bradley Deetz, Robin Carneen, Melanie Cervantes, Alethea Chamberlain, Melanie Chan, Pamela “EYA” Chavez, Maya Chinchilla, Cihuatl-Ce, Susana “Sonji” Figueroa, Alapay Baa-Hozho Flores, Margarita Alex Flores, Jennifer Elise Foerster, Raven Fonseca, Happy Frejo, Gabriela Garcia Medina, Karina González Amaya, Reva Mariah Gover, Sonia Gutiérrez, Celeste Guzman Mendoza, Nayeli Guzmán, Melanie Printup Hope, Lillian Jackson, Marjorie Jensen, Rosa M. Hernández, ire’ne lara silva, Jaynie Lara (Weye Hlapsi), Kristina 
Lovato-Hermann, Celeste De Luna, Luna Maia, Nancy Magdaleno, Celia Monge Mana, Griselda Liz Muñoz, Sharah Nieto, Amparo Ochoa, Sara Marie Ortiz, Alejandra Oseguera, Pennie Opal Plant, Brianna Lea Pruett, Naomi Quiñonez, Maria Gisella Ramirez, Cassandra P. Rendon, Gabriela Spears Rico, annie ross, Kanyon Sayers-Roods, Kim Shuck, SistaHailstorm, Cinnamon Spear, Nazbah Tom, Theresa Turmel, Mica Valdez, Linda Vallejo, Vickie Vértiz, Martha Villa, Lela Northcross Wakely, Amy JB Wagner, and Sherry Wilson. Cover artwork by Nayeli Guzman.”
I feel so honored and happy to have been part of this amazing project. I remember getting an email about 3 years ago and I got all excited and quickly replied with an email of three of my images, “Celeste Quetzalli” “Floreciendo” and something else that I can’t remember. I followed through the progress of this project coming a reality. It felt so great to hold the book and find my artwork in it as well as my short bio. Thank you so much ladies for your great efforts and for including my humble work as part of this awesome book. Here’s a photo of me holding the anthology and another one of me showing my published painting of “Celeste Quetzalli” who in fact is a portrait of my daughter Celeste Quetzalli when she was 2 years old. Mil Gracias!!!
New Paintings -Fall 2011
I took a painting class with well known artist/muralist Juana Alicia this semester. I tried different approaches and worked outside of my comfort zone which gave me some interesting results. I started of with the black and white flower which I later decided to add some color glazes in magenta and green aqua to. I then later created the landscape painting inspired in the Berkeley Botanical Garden, I did some watercolor thumpnails and also took photographs and this is what I came up with. I then had to do a portrait of someone and ended up doing two painting, one of my two kids riding a fictitious turtle and another one of my son Leonardo. I also did a lot more watercolor than I usually do, which I really enjoyed. I did a small watercolor of Frida in a modified way, with her loose hair and nursing a baby. I also had to create a surrealist painting and I chose my hubby as my subject, but that’s still in progress so that’s why I’m not showing it here. Finally, I created the stencil project of a self portrait and a power animal, for which I chose Xochiquetzal, (flower feather) goddess of love and so many other things.
What I enjoyed the most about this experience was working larger than I usually do. Most of my canvases where bigger than 24″ in any dimension. I really loved working on plywood also and I’m actually thinking of painting on wood for the next few months, I love the smooth texture. I’m also very glad I’ve taken the digital photography class twice now, because thanks to that I was able to do some work on Photoshop before I started my paintings and after, so it’s really helping me keep track of my work and have some good quality digital images of it.
I feel that whenever I go back to teaching art, I’m going to have so much more to offer to my students. I’m currently doing a project in my daughter’s classroom and I’m loving interacting with the kids. I guess I do have a passion for teaching art because I enjoy it so much.
“TODOS SOMOS MORTALES” Day of the Dead Art Exhibit 2011-Hijos del Sol
I am very happy to be part of this art exhibit. Thanks to Jose Ortiz and Hijos del Sol I fell in love with painting and developed a passion for the arts. Since I’m kind of far from Salinas it’s been hard to stay in touch with Jose, but this year he remembered about me and called me to invite me to be part of the show. I didn’t really have something new for his show since my Ramona painting is in the DOD show at Puerto Alegre in SF and my other small pieces were at my own DOD show at Contra Costa College, but he wasn’t picky and accepted other older work I had. This is the first time that my art work is shown at 3 different places at during the same period of time, it feels good and I feel very fortunate.