Documents of Latin American and Latino Art

This document is a copy of an application for a National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) grant submitted by Chicano artist, Gronk, in 1981. It briefly outlines several major moments in the life of the artist, beginning with an anecdote about the [...]

This is a flyer invitation to a “Fabulous Halloween Party at LACE” at the Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions (LACE) Gallery at 240 S. Broadway Street organized by artists Gronk and Patssi Valdez of the Asco Collective on October 31, 1978. The [...]

Written by art historian Tomás Ybarra-Frausto, this document represents a chronology of important social and cultural developments in Chicano art. Beginning in 1959 with an exhibition organized around the MAPA (Mexican American Political Association [...]

In his essay, scholar and curator Chon Noriega explores the process of writing alternative histories through three case studies in Chicano visual arts. He presents each example as the result of an engagement with both identity politics and the [...]

This essay by Margarita Nieto details the history of Chicano art in Los Angeles and broader California. Nieto focuses on the artworks and activism of sixteen prominent artists, including Carlos Almaraz, Gronk, Patssi Valdez, Luis Jimenez, and others [...]

Linda Frye Burnham introduces the article by explaining that the artist collective known as Asco received respect from neither their conservative Latino community nor from the art world. The author then recounts their early history, including street [...]

“A True Barrio” by Edy (Eddie Ytuarte) is part essay, part interview. Edy introduces the essay with a brief review of the work by Harry Gamboa, Gronk, and Willie Herrón exhibited at Mechicano Art Gallery in East Los Angeles in 1972. The author [...]

This document contains excerpts from a grant proposal submitted by Eduardo Carrillo to the National Endowment for the Humanities seeking traveling support for an exhibition of California Chicano art entitled Califas, Chicano Art and Culture in [...]

Jacinto Quirarte’s essay provides an overview of the development of Chicano art from its beginnings as a cultural wing of the Chicano socio-political movement. Quirarte focuses specifically on artists groups, cultural centers, and alternative [...]

In this essay, Ramón García explores the foundations and essential qualities of Chicano camp (rasquache) and its artistic and literary manifestations. García begins with a discussion of the walking murals of the Los Angeles conceptual art group, [...]

In this document, Los Angeles artist John Valadez describes the challenging and complex experience of being a contemporary Chicano artist. He stresses the inherently dual and/or fragmented identity with which all Chicanos must come to terms by virtue [...]

In this essay, Harry Gamboa, Jr. profiles the Chicano artist collective, ASCO, to which he belonged. He highlights Walking Mural (1972) as the performance that first introduced the group to the Chicano community. He describes how ASCO followed this [...]

In this short article, Karla Gutiérrez interviews prominent Chicano artist, Gronk, one of the members of the seminal Los Angeles performance art group, ASCO. Gutiérrez asks Gronk to discuss his views on the current state of the Chicano Movement and [...]

In this essay, author and artist Harry Gamboa, Jr. presents a series of episodes recalling the public performances in Los Angeles of the collective, ASCO. The text also highlights memories of violence and suffering in the writer’s neighborhood [...]

The first and longest section of this document is presented as an interview between Harry Gamboa Jr. and Gronk, two of the members of the artist group, ASCO. In it, the artists describe the conceptual media genre called “No Movies,” which they [...]

In this interview, Harry Gamboa, Jr. talks to muralists, Gronk and Willie Herrón. Gamboa’s introduction describes the collaborations of Gronk and Herrón that began in 1972: the two East Los Angeles muralists met that year and started [...]

 Harry Gamboa, Jr. begins the interview with comments on the early performances, street theater, and multimedia conceptual works of Gronk from the 1960s and ‘70s. In the interview, Gamboa and Gronk both discuss the “No Movies,” an invented [...]