Significant works by contemporary Latinx and Latin American artists acquired by The National Gallery of Art

WASHINGTON, DC.- The National Gallery of Art has acquired over 40 significant works by contemporary Latinx and Latin American artists of different generations, including Luis Cruz Azaceta, Ken Gonzales-Day, Guadalupe Maravilla, Michael Menchaca, Aberlardo Morell, Sophie Rivera, Joseph Rodríguez, and Rafael Soriano. Spanning photography, painting, sculpture, and mixed media, these works demonstrate the National Gallery’s commitment to artistic excellence and support our goal to build a collection that reflects and attracts the nation and its global connections. These new acquisitions include significant works by artists who participate in major art movements and whose practices explore creative experimentation, personal and communal identity, and histories of the United States and the Americas.

“Our collection has grown in exciting ways over the past few years as we strived to capture a fuller view of the history of art, both nationally and globally,” said E. Carmen Ramos, the National Gallery’s Chief Curatorial and Conservation Officer. “Collectively, these artists bring forth noteworthy practices and perspectives that are new to our collection. Their works fill in major gaps and empower us to tell complex and compelling stories in our galleries that can connect with our audiences. The ongoing, insightful work to broaden our collection will continue with the recent arrival of our new associate curator of Latinx art, Natalia Ángeles Vieyra, whose work will expand, study, and interpret our evolving collection of modern and contemporary Latinx art.”
...

Michael Menchaca (b. 1985)

Menchaca’s suite of 16 screenprints, La Raza Cósmica 20XX (2019), includes artist-designed frames covered in various social media and “Big Tech” icons. They conceived the project as a mythical reinterpretation of Mexican philosopher José Vasconcelos’s mestizo identity theory, La Raza Cósmica (1925). According to Vasconcelos, the Latin American intermixing of European DNA with Indigenous American, Asian, and African DNA created a technical fusion, or “mestizáje,” which he designated the “cosmic” or universal race. Menchaca’s La Raza Cósmica combines Vasconcelos’s theory and 18th-century Spanish casta paintings, popular in Spanish colonial Mexico, as a visual hierarchical guide of stereotyped racial and socioeconomic identities.

This series features New World racial combinations in the guise of a variety of animal archetypes and mythological figures who pose with contemporary “smart” devices and other technology-based imagery. In works composed in the 18th-century casta painting format, interracial couples are paired with their resulting offspring and a corresponding historical racial designation that was used in colonial Mexico and the broader Americas, such as “Quarteron” or “Mulato,” on a label below. The prints are executed in a completely different, highly stylized, brightly colored mode reminiscent of both Mayan glyphs and Japanese animation. Menchaca thus draws from world mythology and contemporary forms of communication to depict a variety of Latinx “families” as hybrid constructs of digital technology. His works draw comparisons between what Menchaca sees as Silicon Valley’s continued legacy of systemic bias and antiquated forms of categorization and oppression.

Menchaca is a Xicanx, Mexican American, Mexica, Mestizx, queer multidisciplinary visual artist based in San Antonio, Texas, who works at the intersection of printmaking and new media formats. Their digital-based imagery combines the frameworks of ancient Mesoamerican codices, European bestiaries, Catholic baroque paintings, and Japanese video games with the seductive interfaces of social media and big data technology. Using inventive imagery and coded symbolism, Menchaca explores the social variances that define Latinx peoples across lines of gender, race, age, class, caste, nationality, neurodiversity, sexuality, and ability.

New Prints!
"Amor Y Muerte No Hay Mas Fuerte"
25” X 19” Screenprint, signed
Acrylic & Metallic Silver Ink on Yellow French Paper
2024
Buy Here

¡Printing the Revolution! at Frist Art Museum, Nashville, TN 37203

8.5 x 2.75
"R-E-S-I-S-T" Clear Vinyl Sticker
Buy Here

R-E-S-I-S-T
Screenprint
12" X 9"
2024
Buy Here

I'm included in a brilliant essay on post-internet Latinx Art by Claudia Zapata published in Latin American and Latinx Visual Culture Journal, Vol. 6, Issue 2, 133–140 (April 2024).

Read full essay here: Post-Internet Latinx Art: Networked Interventions in the Digital Diaspora

This Dialogues is a curated discussion of Latinx digital humanities emphasizing digital visual culture and the digital visualization of culture by scholars and artists with diverse backgrounds and projects. Envisioned as a foundational text in the growing Latinx visual digital humanities field, this Dialogues is not striving to be comprehensive. Instead, through its discussion, participants define Latinx digital humanities and visual culture broadly, with authors and artists finding common ground through their decolonial practices and community-based methods, as well as sharing concerns about and resistance to inevitable co-option by capitalism as their respective Latinx digital humanities projects work against community erasure and toward visibility. Contributors also map antecedents and futures for Latinx digital humanities projects of visual culture.

New screen-print "DandyLions", 11" X 14", 2024, Edition of 37
Screen-Prints available for purchase at this link

I've been invited back to the Fine Arts Work Center for a Pollock-Krasner printmaking residency. I'm currently in the process of printing my newest screen-print edition, "DandyLions", which stems from a series of drawings made in the early days of the 2020 pandemic. This residency has surely catalyzed my drive for screen-printing my designs and to hone in on the art of color mixing inks.

Cleveland Museum of Art showing some love to this Tejanx. I'm so honored to be included amongst my art heroes in this exhibition of contemporary works on paper. Visit Exhibition page

DandyLions prints for sale

Selling a new line of merch at my ONLINE TIENDA

I'm selling original screenprints at a discounted price, posters of some of my classic screenprints, and also new merchandise.
CLICK TO SHOP PRINTS, POSTERS, AND MERCH

^^Image generated using a derivative A.I. network (Midjourney)
Text and image created in response to this headline

^^Collaborative animation with Glendalys Medina currently being developed. 🫘💪🏽🌱✊🏽

Press
Thanks to the Art in Public Places Program of the State Foundation on Culture and the Arts, Honolulu, Hawai'i and curator Elizabeth Baxter.

How has the technology of printmaking evolved? And what current digital innovations are shaping the print world today?

On May 31st, 2023, the Artists Archives of the Western Reserve host the virtual program "From Stone to Silicone: The Future of Printmaking." Featuring renowned printmaker Michael Menchaca and print expert Professor Maggie Denk-Leigh, the virtual program provided a fascinating overview of the evolution of fine art printing and looked to its future through Menchaca’s digitally and socially engaged work.

To learn more about the program and presenters, visit https://www.artistsarchives.org

register here<=====

Link here

“Behind the Cloud: Interrogating Digital Technologies” Artist Panel
Originally aired on 5/3/23

Dear Anonymous attendee:

I think I may have sent the wrong link in response to the "web3 is bullshit" question:

I think it was actually this one on substack:
https://mattward.io/is-web3-bullshit/

I guess its too late to share

-Mikey

RSVP here

Thanks be to activist curators like Claudia Zapata for valuing my millenial Tejanx perspective. My art is in this monumental retrospective exhibition on Chicanx graphics. Way to challenge aging art institutions to champion Latiné creative expressions ❤️❤️❤️. -MM

¡Printing the Revolution! The Rise and Impact of Chicano Graphics, 1965 to Now
Hood Museum of Art, Hanover, NH 03755
4 FEB — 17 JUNE 2023

Reclaiming the Americas:Latinx Art and the Politics of Territory

So grateful to be included in Reinoza's new book on Latinx Art as a social function to geo-social politics across the Americas. This is such a great start towards unpacking latiné heterogeneity and all our nuanced approaches to producing artworks that become a part of the cultural vocabulary of the Americas. I hope historians are paying attention and taking notes from Reinoza's insight.
-MM

from the publisher:
How Latinx artists around the US adopted the medium of printmaking to reclaim the lands of the Americas.

Printmakers have conspired, historically, to illustrate the maps created by European colonizers that were used to chart and claim their expanding territories. Over the last three decades, Latinx artists and print studios have reclaimed this printed art form for their own spatial discourse. This book examines the limited editions produced at four art studios around the US that span everything from sly critiques of Manifest Destiny to printed portraits of Dreamers in Texas.

Reclaiming the Americas is the visual history of Latinx printmaking in the US. Tatiana Reinoza employs a pan-ethnic comparative model for this interdisciplinary study of graphic art, drawing on art history, Latinx studies, and geography in her discussions. The book contests printmaking’s historical complicity in the logics of colonization and restores the art form and the lands it once illustrated to the Indigenous, migrant, mestiza/o, and Afro-descendant people of the Americas.

View more

Visit
Benton Museum of Art
Claremont, CA 91711
13 ABRIL — 23 JULY

^^Image generated using a derivative A.I. network.
Headline generated by the U.S. Justice Department.

If you have 11 minutes to spare: Read here

RSVP here

Animated Poster for #Wild Wild Web3:The Musical”, 2023
WARNING: This video may potentially trigger seizures for people with photosensitive epilepsy. Viewer discretion is advised.

Carlos Valladares responds to each work in prose or with a poem. Read Here

RSVP Here

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
DECEMBER 13, 2022

MAP Fund Announces $2.6 million in Artist Grants

NEW YORK, NY - Today, the MAP Fund, the longest running private funding partner to performing artists working in non-commercial, disruptive, and often marginalized practices, awarded $2.6 million to more than 300 artists across 88 live performance projects. Each grantee project received $30,000, which includes $25,000 towards the proposed work and $5,000 in unrestricted funds. We celebrate and honor the multiplicity of their brilliant ideas and deep practices, which collectively move us toward a better world. 

Grantees will use jazz, ghost stories, clowning, butoh, puppetry, bharatanatyam, musical theater, folklorico, and more to explore connections between topics such as Japanese cultural erasure and consumer culture or Big Tech vulture capitalism and border imperialism. They take audiences inside an apartment building of immigrant families in Chicago; a runway with fashion designed to disrupt surveillance technologies in Albuquerque; a public water-and-fire ceremony in small town Sunbury, PA; and a historic intervention at the former home of Esek Hopkins, commander of the slavery ship Sally, in Providence. Grantees use their deep knowledge to push collective thinking forward with questions about how society might address environmental justice issues in Latiné American countries; the medical racism faced by Black women; and societal myths about aging. They envision better worlds – using their projects to call again and again for peace, rest, love, healing, space, connection, and joy.

To read the full announcement, click here.

Making La Raza Cósmica 20XX
Clare Rogan in Conversation with Michael Menchaca and Julia Samuels
Bulletin of the Detroit Institute of Arts Volume 96, Number 1, Dec 2022
pp. 50–63
Read here

Current issue available via The University of Chicago Press Journal

TICKETS

Screening and Talk
Centering Latinx Video Art
Disrupting and Rewriting Colonial Narratives

Wednesday, November 30, 2022, 7pm
Anthology Film Archives, New York
anthologyfilmarchives.org

Gagosian, in collaboration with Anthology Film Archives, presents a selection of videos by Latinx artists who engage in destabilizing, disrupting, and rewriting colonial narratives. The creators of the featured works—María Magdalena Campos-Pons, Carolina Caycedo, Lizania Cruz, Michael Menchaca, and Juan Sánchez—launch their interrogations into the effects of colonialism from a place of solidarity with their diverse communities. Using personalized symbologies, historic documentation, architecture and landscape, dance, and sound, they reveal and memorialize suppressed histories while offering alternate understandings of the present. The screening will be followed by a panel discussion with Campos-Pons, Cruz, and Sánchez, moderated by Marcela Guerrero, associate curator at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.

Featured videos include
Michael Menchaca, A Cage Without Borders (2021)
Carolina Caycedo, Apariciones/Apparitions (2018)
María Magdalena Campos-Pons (with sound by Neil Leonard), Matanzas Sound Map (2016–17)
Lizania Cruz, Opening Statement (2021)
Juan Sánchez, Unknown Boricua Streaming: A Nuyorican State of Mind (2011)

CENTERING LATINX VIDEO ART: DISRUPTING AND REWRITING COLONIAL NARRATIVES

Date:
Wednesday, November 30
Time:
7:00 PM (70 minutes)
Location:
Anthology Film Archives, 32 Second Avenue New York, NY 10003
Screen:
Courthouse Theater

Gagosian presents a selection of videos by Latinx artists that engage in destabilizing, disrupting, and rewriting colonial narratives. The creators of the featured works – Carolina Caycedo, María Magdalena Campos-Pons, Lizania Cruz, Michael Menchaca, and Juan Sánchez – launch their interrogations into the effects of colonialism from a place of solidarity with their diverse communities. Using personalized symbologies, historic documentation, architecture and landscape, dance and sound, they reveal and memorialize suppressed histories while offering alternative understandings of the present.

The screening will be followed by a panel discussion moderated by Dr. Marcela Guerrero, Associate Curator at the Whitney Museum of Art.

Carolina Caycedo APARICIONES / APPARITIONS 2018, 9.5 min, digital

María Magdalena Campos-Pons MATANZAS SOUND MAP 2017, 16.5 min, digital

Lizania Cruz OPENING STATEMENT 2021, 11.5 min, digital

Michael Menchaca A CAGE WITHOUT BORDERS 2021, 21 min, digital

Juan Sánchez UNKNOWN BORICUA STREAMING: A NUYORICAN STATE OF MIND 2011, 8 min, digital

Total running time: ca. 70 min

TICKETS

Now On View
Printmaking in the Twenty-First Century

Fri, Oct 21, 2022 — Sun, Apr 9, 2023

The Detroit Institute of Arts presents Printmaking in the Twenty-First Century, an exhibition that celebrates the range and ingenuity of artwork by contemporary printmakers, featuring more than 60 prints, posters and artists’ books by local, national and international artists, such as Hernan Bas, Susan Goethel Campbell, Enrique Chagoya, Marc Dion, Nicole Eisenman, Walton Ford, Chitra Ganesh, Rashid Johnson, Julie Mehretu, Michael Menchaca, Ryan Standfest, Katia Santibañez, James Siena, Dyani White Hawk, Ai Weiwei and more. This exhibition features works using the latest digital tools, techniques used in the fifteenth century, and a combination of these methods, and highlights many works recently acquired by the DIA.

image: “Untitled (Anxious Crowd),” 2018, Rashid Johnson, American, soft ground etching. Detroit Institute of Arts

Casta State of Mind: Michael Menchaca and the Graphic Revolution of Caste

Michael Menchaca (You) 6:49 PM
What rituals do you rely on to maintain your spiritual and creative hygiene in the face of Texas’ legendary brand of border imperialism and racialized /gender non conforming expulsion?

I posed this question during the Q&A session of X as Intersection: Material Constellations, a virtual program with Latinx Artist Fellowship awardees Leslie Martinez, Tanya Aguiñiga, and Amalia Mesa-Bains and moderators Dr. Adriana Zavala, Executive Director, US Latinx Art Forum, and Marcela Guerrero, Jennifer Rubio Associate Curator, Whitney Museum of American Art.

Leslie’s answer echoes my exact sentiments about persevering and transgressing through asymmetrical class warfare deep in the heart of Texas. Making the best art they can requires a daily artistic declaration that states “we are here!”, (re)connecting to ancestral wisdom, and “staking your place in the world.” As we come out of this pandemic, I am more and more curious about the maintenance rituals that cultivate creativity for artists in the face of systemic trauma.

Marcela Guerrero read my question to the audience not once, but twice at the request of Leslie. After hearing my hastily typed question read aloud the second time around, I did not agree with my phrasing of “...racialized /gender non conforming expulsion”. It should have read “...racial /gender oppression”. However, I think my original phrasing rings true to the restrictive policies and nativist alarms in the U.S. immigration acts of 1917 and 1924. These acts gave way to invasive medical evaluations grounded in eugenic philosophies of ethnic purity and ableist ideas of “racial sanitization.” As a result, ethnic Mexicans and Asian immigrants were vilified and stamped “undesirable” or as “public charges” to Anglo homogeneity and ostracized as national security threats.

I am left with a material constellation of interest on the subject of gender identity in Texas.

After hearing Leslie's answer, I typed:

Michael Menchaca (You) 7:00 PM
Leslie - ❤️💪🏽🌈❤️

Michael Menchaca (You) 7:07 PM
Amalia, Tanya, and Leslie - 🤑🤑 🙏🏽🙏🏽 ✊🏽✊🏽 !
Marcela, Adriana - 🙏🏽🙏🏽 ✊🏽✊🏽!

—MM

La Raza Cósmica 20XX Featured in Library of Congress Magazine
Vol. 11 No. 5: September-October 2022 Download

Secrets Revealed
Preservation scientists uncover hidden stories in the Library’s collections, from an image of Christ in a centuries-old prayer book to a thumbprint on Lincoln’s handwritten Gettysburg Address draft. Also, conservators bring tiny, 19th-century playthings back to life and the Library acquires playwright Neil Simon’s papers.

NO TECH FOR ICE

Published in the Brooklyn Rail
THE PRINT MATRIX HAS YOU

The U.S. Latinx Art Forum (USLAF) is thrilled to announce the second installment of “X as Intersection: Latinx Artists in Conversation.” Each conversation in the series will take place virtually and bring together several of the artist fellows in conversation about themes that resonate across their creative practices. Part II | RESISTANCE, REAFFIRMATION AND RESILIENCE February 5, 2022 | 11am PST/1pm CST Mexic-Arte Museum (Austin, TX) & Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Los Angeles, CA) To learn more about each program or to RSVP, visit: uslaf.org/x-as-intersection

Press Release

THE PRINT MATRIX HAS YOU

Printmaking and capitalism, a marriage made in heaven yet a double-edged sword for many artists, emerging or seasoned.

On one hand, printmakers gain the psychological and physical benefits of manual labor and the accompanying endorphins, emphasizing collaboration and community building with peers IRL (hopefully) while (hopefully, but not limited to) disengaging from their digital screen(s). By committing their attention to a print matrix, printmakers are rewarded with a beautiful series of multiples on the surface of their choosing.

On the other hand, this kind of practice easily surrenders itself to colonial values of production that emphasize maximizing material goods in as little time as possible for the greatest financial return possible. This mindset can very easily place the printmaker in a position to have their creative labor stunted, their spirit consumed by a capitalist chilling effect that has them attempting to prioritize the precarious demands of the art market over their own creative expression. Even if one finds a kind of print production that is satisfying to the creative soul, one still has to commit oneself to exhibiting the fruits of their labor with the hope of gaining recognition from an art world of endless social comparison anxiety. If they have not fully developed an understanding of their role in society, this leaves them vulnerable to exploitation, or in an otherwise easily commodifiable position at the hands of powerful predatory capitalists, of which there are plenty of in elite art circles.

As printmakers, it’s imperative to acknowledge these sometimes-dueling aspects of our growing practice.

Like any other industry dealing in multiples, printmakers have to confront the following questions: Do you prioritize quantity over quality? Quality over quantity? Or perhaps you subscribe to an ethos of a higher calling, making art for art’s sake. In any case, every printmaker will have to answer the dreaded question: what’s the point of producing multiples using ancient print technology?

This analysis begs the question: If printmaking is so closely tied to capitalist modes of production, can’t we use printmaking to redefine capitalist modes of consumption?

Printmaking is in dire need of rebranding. It’s an activity that need not be relegated to ancient world techniques that materialize onto rectangular objects that hang inside frames and inside the loftiest of buildings. Printmakers, print collectors, and print curators, I urge you to think more liberally about the definition of a print and of printmaking in general.

Remember movie theatres? When we use to stare hours at a time at an impression of light onto the surface of a large screen? Guess what? That was printmaking. In action. Let’s redefine our collective understanding of what printmaking is and what it can be. We are living through an industrial revolution that has brought with it innovative possibilities for printmakers of all kinds and from all generations to express themselves through digital matrices. We’re an earshot away from Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) print collections at our aging art institutions if we can only agree that these technologies have print potential written all over them.

Let’s go back to a basic definition of print. Webster’s Dictionary defines print as a transitive verb: “to impress (a pattern or design) on something.” Take your pick. There are a countless ways to make impressions these days, particularly with a concentrated light or shadow show. And with consumer holographic technology on the rise, we would be remiss to discredit the validity of a holographic print as anything but a kind of print technology deserving of a spot in the art market.

Let’s talk print editioning. In order to quantify more abstract printed editions, one would have to include more contextual information, possibly in the way of metadata, as boundaries for printed information are redefined.

Printmakers, we live in a capitalist society, yes. And I urge you to take notice of what capitalism asks from artists, and from printmaking in particular. Are you feeling the pressure to constantly produce material objects that can be converted into commodities that enter into the art market? Do you ever question where this pressure comes from? What happens if you abandon the print studio? Does this signal the end of your career as an artist?

If you are like me, you’ve invested a lot of capital into your career path as an artist, and maybe paid tuition to gain access to institutional resources such as a printmaking studio. You’ve convinced yourself that a return in your investment in your education must materialize into a body of work, a suite of prints, or an NFT that can be exchanged for some kind of real world profit you can then share on any number of commercial platforms you may currently be tethered to and have committed your life to monitoring. I digress.

The institutionalization of printmaking needs to evolve as does our understanding of what a print matrix is. The way we value art needs to be reinvented. Let’s complicate this rich practice we call printmaking. Take the red pill. Challenge how we classify prints. You already know what you have to do.

-Michael

La Raza Cósmica 20XX Recently acquired by:
- United States Library of Congress, D.C.
- Detroit Institute of Art, MI
- Princeton University Art Museum, NJ

HOPE IS A DISCIPLINE
3 Channel Video Installation and new series of digital prints expressing the discipline of hope. Inspired by the critical writings of Mariame Kaba.

Texas A&M University-CC
6300 Ocean Drive
Corpus Christi, TX 78412

19 NOV 2021 — 4 FEB 2022

Read on Hyperallergic

La Raza Cósmica 20XX review on Ars Longa

In 2019 I made the difficult and deliberate decision to remove myself from any form of gallery representation/affiliation as a means of claiming agency over my artistic practice.

I am in no way under the "representation" of an art gallery nor do I seek any similar gallery affiliation. Assertions otherwise are misinformed.

Mark your calendar! The U.S. Latinx Art Forum (USLAF) is proud to launch “X as Intersection: Latinx Artists in Conversation,” a three-part virtual public program series featuring conversations with fellows from the inaugural cohort of the recently announced Latinx Artist Fellowship.

Each conversation in the series will take place virtually and bring together several of the artist fellows in conversation about themes that resonate across their creative practices. Programs include:

Part I | ART IN UNCERTAIN TIMES

October 20, 2021 | 7pm EST

El Museo del Barrio (New York, NY) and Museum of Fine Arts (Houston, TX)

Part II | RESISTANCE, REAFFIRMATION AND RESILIENCE

February 5, 2022 | 2 pm EST

Mexic-Arte Museum (Austin, TX) & Los Angeles County Museum of Art (Los Angeles, CA)

Part III | HEALING, JUSTICE AND WORLD-MAKING

March 9, 2022 | 7pm EST

National Museum of Mexican Art (Chicago, IL) & Whitney Museum of American Art (New York, NY)

To learn more about each program or to RSVP, visit: http://uslaf.org/x-as-intersection or click the link in our bio.

#LatinxArtistFellowship #LatinxArt, #Latinx, #contemporaryart, #XasIntersection, #arthistory #LatinxArtIsAmericanArt, #USLAF

@asahinyc @lacaycedo #CeliaAlvarezMunoz #AdrianaCorral @elrafaesparza @cmfrndz123 @cocofusco @miguelluciano_ny @guadalupe__maravilla @martielcarlos #michaelmenchaca @delilah.montoya @vickquezada @guaninsanchez @uslaforum @elmuseo @mfahouston @fordfoundation @mellonfdn @nyfacurrent

Re: Cradle Of Jim Crow 2.0
Three Channel Video Installation, Digital Animation and Wallpaper
140.5" X 200.5"
2021

MX 21 - Resistance, Reaffirmation & Resilience
Mexic-Arte Museum
419 Congress Ave
Austin, TX 78701

Sept. 17, 2021 — Feb. 27, 2022

Throughout 2021, Mexico is observing and commemorating major events in history: the falling of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlán, the invasion by Spain, and the Independence of Mexico. Mexic-Arte Museum will present an exhibition and programs in conjunction with Mexico’s 2021 events, and reaffirm our common cultural history.

The exhibition MX 21-Resistance, Reaffirmation & Resilience is divided into three sections: Resistance, Reaffirmation, and Resilience. Resistance refers to the Original Peoples resisting the Spanish invasion and occupation of Mexico, which was really not “conquered.” Reaffirmation speaks to affirming the unique history and cultural diversity of our shared heritage. Resilience represents the on-going evolution of Mexicans, Mexican Americans, and other Latinx peoples, despite and because of struggles to achieve liberty, social justice, and plurality. Invited artists respond to these themes to help the public better understand and appreciate how Mexico’s history has impacted and inspired our shared U.S.- Mexico cultural history in the Americas, as Mexicans, Mexican Americans, and Latinx peoples.

Participating artists include Luis Abreux, Santa Barraza, Cande Aguilar, Angel Cabrales, Tomas Filsinger, Eduardo Garcia, Tita Griesbach, Mari Hernandez, Michael Menchaca, Delilah Montoya, Juan Navarrete, Yelaine Rodriguez, Sergio Sanchez Santamaria, Andy Villarreal, “Kill Joy”, and artwork from the Mexic-Arte Museum Permanent Collection.

The goal is to participate in Mexico’s remembrance, and at the same time, reflect on history and current reality here in the U.S., reclaiming and reaffirming shared heritage and experiences through the work of contemporary artists. Public programming includes lectures sponsored by Humanities Tx.

Hope Is A Discipline, New Mural at the Paul Creative Art Center, University of New Hampshire, 2021

Titled “Hope Is A Discipline”, after a quote by activist, educator, and organizer Mariame Kaba, who is an advocate for racial, gender, and transformative justice, this design blends the framework of ancient Meso-American codices, European Bestiaries, and Japanese Video games with popular contemporary attention seeking user interface (UI) designs developed by Big Tech companies (i.e. emojis). Kaba’s quote is paired with this combination of imagery to instill in viewers a sense of faith in hoping for a more just future for BIPOC communities.

ANNOUNCING THE LATINX ARTIST FELLOWSHIP!

Thank you to the Mellon Foundation, US Latinx Art Forum, and the Ford Foundation for this incredible honor.

"USLAF is thrilled to announce our role as partners with The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Ford Foundation in the Latinx Artist Fellowship and to welcome the inaugural cohort of fifteen artist fellows.

Since 2015, USLAF has championed the vitality of Latinx artists, who have historically lacked visibility and received little of the philanthropic or institutional support necessary to secure their place in the story of American art. Designed to address this systemic and longstanding lack of support, the Latinx Artist Fellowship will award $50,000 each to a multigenerational cohort of 15 Latinx visual artists each year for an initial commitment of five years. Administered by the US Latinx Art Forum (USLAF) in collaboration with the New York Foundation for the Arts and supported by The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and the Ford Foundation, this unrestricted award is the first significant prize of its kind and celebrates the plurality and diversity of Latinx artists and aesthetics."

Join us Thursday, July 15, from 6–9pm for the opening reception of new exhibitions by our Summer 2021 International Artists-in-Residence. Be the first to see new work by Iván Argote (Paris, France/Bogotá, Colombiá), Nao Bustamante (Los Angeles, California) and Michael Menchaca (San Antonio, Texas). The Summer 2021 International Artist-in-Residence Program was curated by Pilar Tompkins Rivas.

Online Conversation with Julio Salgado, Michael Menchaca, E. Carmen Ramos, and Claudia Zapata.

“¡Printing the Revolution!” Virtual Conversation Series: Creating in a Digital Sphere

On May 13, 2021, the Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM) presented a virtual conversation featuring artists from ¡Printing the Revolution! The Rise and Impact of Chicano Graphics, 1965 to Now who use digital strategies as a form of political advocacy for issues such as immigration, the commodification of personal data, and LGBTQ+ rights. Learn more about how the digital realm is defining a new chapter of Chicanx graphics and how artists use technologically based artwork to critique Big Tech, as well as distribute digital graphics across social media networks as a unifying call for social justice.

A short clip of my installation in ¡Printing the Revolution! The Rise and Impact of Chicano Graphics to Now currently on view at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
image credit: @theprofd

Link
For over a century, museums in New York City have played an important role in collecting and preserving Latin American Art, from pre-Columbian and Indigenous artifacts to modern and contemporary works. At MoMA in Manhattan, visitors can view pieces by muralist Diego Rivera; the Brooklyn Museum, meanwhile, holds more than 35,000 objects representing the Indigenous arts of the Americas.

The next time you visit one of these institutions, take a moment to appreciate the breadth of what’s on display. Read on for details of the origins of the collections and select works to look out for.

The online exhibition Art_Latin_America: Against the Survey is on the Davis Museum's website.

Critics Page in the Brooklyn Rail June 2021

My screenprint Caravan Mode is for sale on Prints For Protest. 100% of all $$ raised will go to The Bail Project, Black Lives Matter, Border Angels, The Navajo, and Hopi Families Covid-19 Relief Fund, and Sister Song.
*Artwork by Nabil Gonzalez

Episode No. 497 of The Modern Art Notes Podcast features curator E. Carmen Ramos and artist Michael Menchaca

Thursday, May 13, 6:30 p.m. ET

A recording will be made available afterward on the Smithsonian's website for the exhibition page for ¡Printing the Revolution! here

I'm sharing a recording from a presentation I gave a few weeks ago "at" Bucknell University.

here's the recording

Passcode: .NBsnw3T

Estamos Bien show review via Hyperallergic

Sousveillance Tower
Dates: Wednesday nights from April 1 – 30 between 8:30 p.m. – 12:00 a.m. MDT
Location: Daniels & Fisher Tower, Denver, CO
more info
Documentation by Wes Magyar. Courtesy of Black Cube and Night Lights Denver.

New Projection Video running during 'clock-watching' in collab with @night_lights_denver, now on view at the historic Daniels & Fisher Tower, Denver, Co. This month-long exhibition Runs 8:30p - midnight MT nightly in April.
More info via BlackCube Nomadic Museum
Photo by Wes Magyar. Courtesy of Black Cube and Night Lights Denver.

Estamos Bien show review via The New York Times

clock-watching

Spanning the entire month of April, clock-watching is a projection-based exhibition that explores slowed perceptions of time through a 7-day rotation of artworks by 7 artists. The animated, digital works are projected nightly onto the clock tower’s facade on a set, looped schedule—each corresponding to a day of the week. Informed by the pandemic’s effect on our sense of time and Denver’s landmark clock tower, these 7 works create a new way of measuring days and weeks on a public clock that normally counts in seconds, minutes, and hours.

Projection Schedule:
MONDAYS — WANG Chen (New York City)
TUESDAYS — Sabrina Ratté (Paris)
WEDNESDAYS — Michael Menchaca (San Antonio)
THURSDAYS — Stephan Herrera (Denver)
FRIDAYS — Esther Hz (Denver)
SATURDAYS — Thea Lazăr (Cluj-Napoca)
SUNDAYS — Jan Chan (London)

Dates: April 1 – 30 from 8:30 p.m. – 12:00 a.m. MDT (every night)
Location: Daniels & Fisher Tower

This project is in partnership with Night Lights Denver, which is operated by the Denver Theatre District.

Estamos Bien show review via Artnet

A Cage Without Borders
Estamos Bien: La Trienal 20/21 at El Museo Del Barrio.
13 MARCH – 26 SEPT 2021

Spotify Playlist

Visiting Artist Lecture
Purchase College, NY
March 10 2021

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Visiting Artist Lecture
University of Texas, TX
March 1 2021

Visiting Artist Lecture
Ithica College, NY
Feb 23 2021

Visiting Artist Lecture
Northwest Vista College, TX
Feb 10 2021

ONLINE EXHIBIT >>HERMANO GRANDE
Palmetto Center for the Arts
Northwest Vista College
January 25 - February 27, 2021
Curated by Rachael M. Bower

New Installation in Printing the Revolution: The Rise of Chicano Graphics, 1965 to Now
at >> Smithsonian American Art Museum

>> In the 1960s, activist Chicano artists forged a remarkable history of printmaking that remains vital today. The exhibition “¡Printing the Revolution! The Rise and Impact of Chicano Graphics, 1965 to Now” presents, for the first time, historical civil rights-era prints by Chicano artists alongside works by graphic artists working from the 1980s to today. Many artists came of age during the civil rights, labor, anti-war, feminist and LGBTQ+ movements and channeled the period’s social activism into assertive aesthetic statements that announced a new political and cultural consciousness among people of Mexican descent in the United States. “¡Printing the Revolution!” explores the rise of Chicano graphics within these early social movements and the ways in which Chicanx artists since then have advanced innovative printmaking practices attuned to social justice.<<

“¡Printing the Revolution! The Rise and Impact of Chicano Graphics, 1965 to Now” now on view.

Experience highlights from the galleries of “¡Printing the Revolution! The Rise and Impact of Chicano Graphics, 1965 to Now” in this exciting brief look at the exhibition. In the 1960s, activist Chicano artists forged a remarkable history of printmaking that remains vital today. The exhibition presents, for the first time, historical civil rights-era prints by Chicano artists alongside works by graphic artists working from the 1980s to today. Many artists came of age during the civil rights, labor, anti-war, feminist and LGBTQ+ movements and channeled the period’s social activism into assertive aesthetic statements that announced a new political and cultural consciousness among people of Mexican descent in the United States. “¡Printing the Revolution!” explores the rise of Chicano graphics within these early social movements and the ways in which Chicanx artists since then have advanced innovative printmaking practices attuned to social justice.

>> Online Conversation with Michael Menchaca and Claudia Zapata and El Museo del Barrio's Trienal Curators: Rodrigo Moura, Susanna Temkin, Elia Alba

ESTAMOS BIEN - LA TRIENAL 20/21

THE WALL
The online launch of the video animation by Michael Menchaca debuts on Thursday, October 22, 2020

HEISTHEWALL.NET

As part of El Museo del Barrio's year-long initiative ESTAMOS BIEN: LA TRIENAL 20/21, the museum announces the online launch of the video animation, The Wall by San Antonio-based artist Michael Menchaca on Thursday, October 22nd at 6pm. Accompanied by a score drawn from journalist Jorge Ramos Avalos's 2019 op-ed, "Trump is the Wall," the video incorporates the language of video games, Mexican codices, Chicanx graphics, and other popular sources to address the political and humanitarian crises related to the U.S./Mexico border wall. Released just prior to the 2020 Presidential election, the project thus addresses one of the major issues surrounding the current U.S. administration.

Commenting on the project, Menchaca states, "With the virtual presentation of The Wall, my intention is to offer a space for contemplation on one of the central campaign promises of the 45th U.S. president as he seeks reelection."

Originally displayed as a three channel video, Menchaca's online presentation of the The Wall is presented as a continuously streaming loop on a custom-built, arcade-inspired website.

PUBLIC PROGRAM | Thursday, October 22, 2020, 6-7pm EST

Join La Trienal curators in conversation with artist Michael Menchaca and Claudia Zapata, Curatorial Assistant at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, for the launch of the online artist's project, The Wall. Together they will discuss issues related to the border wall crisis through the lens of video art, gaming, and Chicanx aesthetics. This event marks the fifth online artist's project commissioned as part of ESTAMOS BIEN - LA TRIENAL 20/21. Free, to RSVP, click here.

¡Printing the Revolution! The Rise and Impact of Chicano Graphics, 1965 to Now
November 20, 2020 — August 8, 2021
Smithsonian American Art Museum (8th and G Streets, NW)
Link

¡Printing the Revolution! features more than 120 works drawn from SAAM’s pioneering collection of Latinx art. The museum’s Chicanx graphics holdings rose significantly with an important gift in 1995 from the renowned scholar Tomás Ybarra-Frausto. Since then, other major donations and an ambitious acquisition program has built one of the largest museum collections of Chicanx graphics on the East Coast.

This exhibition is organized by E. Carmen Ramos, curator of Latinx art at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, with Claudia Zapata, curatorial assistant. The museum will publish a major catalogue with essays by Ramos and Zapata, as well as contributions by Terezita Romo and Tatiana Reinoza, leading scholars of Chicanx and Latinx graphics.

This exhibition will be the first to unite historic civil rights era prints alongside works by contemporary printmakers, including several that embrace expanded graphics that exist beyond the paper substrate. While the dominant mode of printmaking among Chicanx artists remains screen-printing, this exhibition will feature works in a wide range of techniques and presentation strategies, from installation art, to public interventions, augmented reality and shareable graphics that circulate in the digital realm. The exhibition will also be the first to consider how Chicanx mentors, print centers and networks nurtured other artists, including several who drew inspiration from the example of Chicanx printmaking.

Emerging Latinx Artists/ELA 25: Intersección: Choque & Alivio, Intersección: Shock & Relief
September 25, 2020 – November 22, 2020
Link

Mexic-Arte Museum (Austin, TX) proudly presents Emerging Latinx Artists/ELA 25 (previously called Young Latinx Artists/YLA): Intersección: Choque & Alivio, Intersección: Shock & Relief, which celebrates the last twenty-five years of exhibitions featuring emerging Latinx artists. This exhibition showcases artists converging at the crossroads of aesthetic interests and cultural history. The exhibition aims to discover shared life experiences, a mashup or crash (choque) at intersecting lanes of similarities and dierences as expressed in the artistically diverse artworks. In reaction to this historical era of identity politics and civic unrest, these artists respond in a visual dialogue, drawing from their sociopolitical consciousness.

Exhibiting Artists:

Christin Apodaca, El Paso, El Mero Muro muralist
Yareth Fernandez, Austin, YLA24
Hatziel Flores, Dallas, YLA21
Michael Anthony Garcia, Austin, YLA18 curator
Suzy Gonzalez, San Antonio, YLA19
Jellyfish Collective, El Paso, YLA17
Sade Lawson, Austin, El Mero Muro muralist
Alejandro Macias, Brownsville, YLA23
Michael Menchaca, San Antonio, YLA16
Ashley Mireles, San Antonio, YLA22
Hope Mora, Pecos, TX, YLA20
Niz, Austin, YLA17, El Mero Muro muralist
Jose Villalobos, San Antonio, YLA22

El Museo del Barrio presents ESTAMOS BIEN: LA TRIENAL 20/21, the museum’s first national large-scale survey of Latinx contemporary art featuring more than 40 artists from across the United States and Puerto Rico. Originally planned for Fall 2020, the show has been reconceived and expanded as a yearlong initiative, the exhibition debuts summer 2020 with online projects by artists Lizania Cruz, Xime Izquierdo Ugaz, Collective Magpie, Michael Menchaca, and Poncilí Creación. In Spring 2021, the onsite exhibition opens in Las Galerías (Galleries). Related public programs featuring curators, artists, invited scholars and other guests will take place throughout the year.

Featured in RISD XYZ

Breathe
Acrylic on Canvas
20" X 24"
2020

Homebody: New Prints 2020/Winter Artist Talks on January 16, 2020
Michael Menchaca (b.1985, USA) talked about his work La Raza Cosmica 20XX in the exhibition.

3D Virtual Tour of Homebody: New Prints 2020/Winter

View the current exhibition Homebody: New Prints 2020/Winter online! Check out a 3D virtual tour of our exhibition space. Zoom in for a closer look at each artwork and click the blue circles for captions. Enjoy the tour!

Take the tour

Sign the Petition here

As part of the curatorial collective Dos Mestizx, our vision for the recent exhibition XicanX: New Visions has been compromised.

The video work of artist, Xandra Ibarra, has been censored by the City of San Antonio from the exhibit we curated titled XicanX: New Visions at the Centro De Artes. Her work contains queer sexual expression and we see this censorship as an act of discrimination, as they have legally assessed it as "obscene."

Xandra Ibarra’s parodic video Spictacle II: La Tortillera has been legally assessed as containing “obscene content” by City Attorney Andy Segovia and has been censored by the city of San Antonio’s Department of Arts and Culture. On February 13, 2020, Ibarra’s work was removed preceding the opening of a group exhibition entitled XicanX: New Visions curated by Suzy González and Michael Menchaca at Centro de Artes. According to the National Coalition Against Censorship, The City of San Antonio’s censorship violates our civil right to freedom of speech & expression, a right granted by the U.S. Constitution.

We have created a petition to restore Ibarra's work to XicanX: New Visions. Link here

XicanX: New Visions

Experience, “XicanX: New Visions” at the Centro De Artes in San Antonio, TX. This national exhibit curated by Dos Mestizx (Suzy González and Michael Menchaca) challenges previous and existing surveys of Chicano and Latino identity-based exhibitions. Artworks from 34 artists expands upon how Latinx artwork can be established across ideological borders; freely expressing a new wave of images and voices in a post-internet era.

The XicanX Art Movement consists of artists from a variety of regions, genders and backgrounds, not necessarily with Mexican origins. This exhibition especially highlights the women, queer, immigrant, indigenous and activist artists who are at the forefront of this movement. With roots in painting, murals and printmaking, the XicanX movement expands to include new media, video and installation-based art making. Per Dos Mestizx, these artists are not afraid to use their voices, and often comment on and/or question socio-political issues, identity and contemporary civil-rights through a conceptual means.

Artists include Yvette Mayorga, Efren Ave, Eric J. Garcia, William Camargo, Lisette Chavez, Nabil Gonzalez, Celeste De Luna, Irene Antonia Diane Reece, Jesusa Marie Vargas, Audrya Flores, Lisa Guevara, Kalli Arte Collective, Yvonne Escalante, Daphne Arthur, Michael R. León, Alan Serna, Xavier Robles Armas, Joel "rage.one" Garcia, Josie Del Castillo, Arleene Correa Valencia, Ben Cuevas, Lilia Berenice Hernandez Galusha, Robert Martinez and Erick Iniguez.

Location:
203 S. St. Mary's Street,
Suite 120, San Antonio, TX 78205

Both exhibits run through June 28, 2020.

Link here

Join Open MFA Houston to welcome San Antonio based artist Michael Menchaca for an artist talk and Q&A!

Monday, February 10
6:30pm-8:00pm
Sabine Street Studios: Suite 120

Michael Menchaca’s images blend the framework of ancient Meso-American codices, European Bestiaries, and Japanese Video games with the seductive digital interfaces of Surveillance Capitalism. His personalized index of animal archetypes assist in translating, preserving, and mythologizing contemporary stories of social and economic inequality, racial prejudice, and digital surveillance. Narrative pattern designs influenced by cultural conquest patterns set the stage for Menchaca’s compositions; while recurring motifs encourage multiple interpretations. He exhibits his work in immersive installations that apply a combination of printmaking, painting, and digital animation; exploring LatinX identities in a digital 21st century American landscape.

Born in 1985 in San Antonio, TX, Menchaca received his BFA from Texas State University in 2011, and his MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design in 2015. He has been an Artist-in-Residence at the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture (ME), Vermont Studio Center (VT), The Wassaic Project (NY), The Segura Arts Studio (IN), and The Studios at MASS MoCA (MA). Exhibitions include The Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art (AR), The McNay Art Museum (TX), The Davis Museum (MA), North Carolina Museum of Art (NC), The Chrysler Museum of Art (VA), The Gilcrease Museum (OK), The Contemporary Austin (TX), and the IPCNY (NY). He was a Visual Arts Fellow at the Fine Arts Work Center from 2015 – 2016 in Provincetown, MA, and is a recipient of the 2018 National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures (NALAC) Fund for the Arts Grant. Through 2020, he is co-curating the New York/San Antonio exhibition Xicanx: New Visions with Suzy González. Menchaca lives and works in San Antonio, TX.

Sabine Street Studios

1907 Sabine Street

Houston, 77007 Texas

Link Here

Link Here

XICANX: NEW VISIONS

Dos Mestizx (Suzy González + Michael Menchaca) is pleased to present XicanX: New Visions at the Centro De Artes, San Antonio, TX.

XicanX: New Visions
This national exhibit will span Xicanx-identifying artists from Texas, California, New York, Chicago, Colorado, New Mexico and more. XicanX: New Visions acknowledges and appreciates the artistic symbols typically associated with Chicano art, but also hungers for the inclusion of a new wave of images and voices. Curated by San Antonio-based artists Dos Mestizx (Suzy González and Michael Menchaca).

Los Maestros: Early Explorers of Chicano Identity
This exhibition focuses on three of the founders of San Antonio’s Chicano arts movement of the 1960s and 1970s: Jesse Almazan, Jose Esquivel and Rudy Treviño and will highlight their unique contributions and histories as individual artists. Curated by San Antonio arts organization Centro Cultural Aztlan.

Opening Reception: February 13, 2020 | 6PM — 9PM

#XicanxNV

Featured in new
Exhibition Catalogue

Open World Video Games and Contemporary Art
Edited with text by Theresa Bembnister. Text by Andrew Williams, Samantha Blackmon.

Millions of people play video games every day, including visual artists, yet they are rarely examined as a major influence on contemporary art, though they offer rich opportunities for creative expression. Published for an exhibition at Akron Art Museum, Open World presents a survey of artworks influenced by video games and gaming culture. Artworks include paintings, sculptures, textiles, prints, drawings, animation, video games, video game modifications and game-based performances and interventions by game maker–artists. Artists such as Tim Portlock, Angela Washko, Cory Arcangel, Feng Mengbo, Rachel Rossin and Bill Viola reference a cross-section of games in their artwork, ranging from early text adventure and arcade games to multi-player online roleplaying games. Many of their works are inspired by some of the most beloved and recognizable video game franchises, including Super Mario Brothers, The Legend of Zelda, The Sims and Final Fantasy.

INTERNATIONAL PRINT CENTER NEW YORK (IPCNY) is pleased to present Homebody: New Prints 2020/Winter, an exhibition featuring 31 artists from Australia, Canada, Portugal, Ukraine, the United Kingdom, and the United States whose work explores relationships between personal and domestic structures. IPCNY’s New Prints Program is a biannual, juried open call for prints and print-based work that captures current voices and issues in contemporary printmaking.

Artists

Annie Bissett, Mandy Bonnell, Susanne Dagmar Olsen, Stella Ebner, Jomo Falconer, Fidencio Fifield-Perez, Olivia Fredricks, J. Leigh Garcia, Emily Gui, Robert Hague, Hanni Huang, Evgenia Kim, David Lopes, Linda Mahoney, Michelle Martin, Michael Menchaca, Carol Montgomery, Senem Oezdogan, Ben Potter, Kristin Powers Nowlin, Tammy Ratcliff, Mark Rice, Red Sagalow, Julia Samuels, Margo Sarkisova, Peri Schwartz, Susan Siegel, Alma Sinai, Judy Talley, Imin Yeh, and Haoyun Erin Zhao.

Installation view of Enter The Border, Six Archival Digital Pigment Prints on Hahnemühle Paper; 2018, at Akron Museum of Art, OH. Open World on View Through Feb. 2nd, 2020. Curated by Theresa Bembnister

Curated by Dos Mestizx (Suzy Gonzalez & Michael Menchaca)
Full Press Release

Featured in Juxtapoz Magazine

By Molly Glentzer for the Houston Chronicle
Read online here

Visit Exhibition Site

Now on view:
The Codex Silex Vallis (The Silicon Valley Codex)
Lawndale Art Center
4912 Main Street
Houston, Texas 77002
September 21, 2019 – December 22, 2019

VIEW PHOTOS

September 21 — December 22, 2019

“Michael Menchaca’s The Codex Silex Vallis (The Silicon Valley Codex) in John M. O’Quinn Gallery features site-specific wallpaper based on his latest works on paper series, “The Codex Silex Vallis (The Silicon Valley Codex),” which seeks to visualize how the growing tech industry, largely based out of Silicon Valley, is infiltrating traditional Latinx family customs in the United States.”

Opening: September 20, 2019 | 6–8 pm

Lecture: October 19, 2019 | 1–3 pm

Silicon Valley: The Seduction of Racial & Surveillance Capitalism: A lecture by Michael Menchaca

Lawndale Art Center
4912 Main Street
Houston, 77002 TX
(713) 528-5858
Get directions
Visit Exhibition Site

Connie Gonzalez visits with San Antonio artist Michael Menchaca | Brooks

San Antonio artist Michael Menchaca shares his thoughts and inspiration behind one of his newest large scale collages of Brooks which celebrates and honors the Brooks legacy. The City of Service exhibit and Michael Menchaca's artwork will be on display through September 13, 2019 at the Culture Commons Gallery (115 Plaza de Armas).

To learn more about Brooks visit https://livebrooks.com

Connect with Brooks
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LiveBrooks
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/livebrooks
Twitter: https://twitter.com/livebrookstx

2019 NORTH AMERICAN PRINT BIENNIAL
JEWETT ART GALLERY, WELLESLEY COLLEGE
AUGUST 26 – SEPTEMBER 29, 2019

JUROR’S TALK: Sunday, September 8, 2019, 1pm
Jewett Auditorium, Shelley R. Langdale, Curator, National Gallery of Art
PUBLIC RECEPTION: 2-5pm

ADDITIONAL EVENTS:
Monday, September 9, 1pm, Curatorial Insights
Meet Shelley Langdale in the gallery

Saturday, September 21, 1pm, Looking at Prints
Gallery talk with Deborah Cornell, professor, Boston University

ALL EVENTS ARE FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC

Jewett Art Gallery | Wellesley College | 106 Central Street | Wellesley MA

Gallery Hours: Monday–Friday: 11am – 5pm,
Saturday & Sunday: 12 – 5pm
For details go to: www.bostonprintmakers.org

The Boston Printmakers is proudly affiliated with
Lesley University College of Art + Design

Thanks to Liz Rhaney (MFA ‘20) for their thoughtful question after my lecture at Maine College of Art.

MECA MFA Summer Visiting Artist Lecture
I've been invited to the Maine College of Art to participate in the MFA Summer Visiting Artist Lecture Series.

The MFA Summer Visiting Artist Lecture Series brings a national and international roster of visiting artists, curators, and scholars to Portland, Maine. In addition to the schedule of public lectures listed below, visiting artists conduct studio visits and attend critiques with graduate students during their week-long visits.

Michael Menchaca: July 29, 5:30–7pm in MECA’s Osher Hall.

Lectures are free and open to the public.

As the world continues to witness the conscience of the United States uphold fascist policies that dehumanize and abuse detained migrant children and their families in U.S. established concentration camps, there is little to celebrate this fourth of July.

What To Do Instead via Shannon Weber at The Body is not an apology

"Instead of celebrating this July 4th, there are a number of things you can do to help migrant families. Using whichever privileges you may have — citizenship privilege, educational privilege, white privilege, class privilege, able-bodied privilege, and so on — you can advocate for an end to these morally bankrupt, illegal, and fascist policies.

Consider organizing with others in your community to hold protests, rallies, marches, vigils, speakouts, and teach-ins about what’s going on at the border, much like the #CloseTheCamps protest I attended. Check out the nationwide vigils set for July 12th by the group Lights4Liberty, whose website has a constantly expanding list of cities hosting events. Join the Jewish-led grassroots group Never Again Action, whose motto is, “When Jews Say Never Again, We Mean It.”

Donate to migrants’ rights organizations, especially local groups that get less money than the more widely known, national groups like the ACLU. Google lists of top actions to take to support migrants and refugees. If you have the means, volunteer to host a refugee at your home with a group like Room for Refugees.

Also make sure you’re aware of what your rights are should you encounter ICE, especially if they’re unlawfully trying to get access to someone’s documents or gain entry to a home. Knowing your rights can help you stand up for someone who is being intimidated, and depending on the situation, it can save people from arrest, confinement, abuse, and deportation.

Regardless of who you are and what resources you have access to, there is always a role for you to play in affirming the humanity of migrants and refugees and refusing to normalize their mistreatment. Even having conversations with your less aware family members, friends, neighbors, and coworkers will go a long way in creating and sustaining a culture that refuses to look the other way on issues of injustice.

Join me in unequivocally calling out that American concentration camps are wrong. Join me in organizing to figure out how to close them, how to avert further atrocities, so that together we can build a society proud of its diversity and worthy of celebrating. Your conscience will thank you."

Video of the April 2019 Third Thursday at the Perry Glass Studio is now online!

Michael Menchaca and the Glass Studio team pay homage to his late Chihuahua, Winnie, in Mitología Danza de Cristal, a performance that mythologizes the afterlife of his companion

New Video online

La Raza Cósmica 20XX
HD Digital Animation
2 min. 21 sec.
2019

This animation presents a mythical re-interpretation of Jose Vasconcelos’ mestizo identity theory, La Raza Cósmica, using animal stand-ins to depict the intermixing between Latinx bodies. In his theory, Vasconcelos states that the Latin American intermixing of European DNA with Amerindian, Asian, and African DNA, created an ethnical fusion, a mestizáje, which he characterizes as the cosmic race. Pairing this theory with the Spanish Casta paintings, popular in 18th century Spanish colonial Mexico and instrumental in constructing racial identity through a visual index, I envision a new set of Castas where Silicon Valley technology has been integrated to intercommunicate between Latinx families.

On view in "Unicorns, Aliens, and Futuristic Cities: Speculative Latinidades"
MACLA, San Jose, CA
Jun 5 — Aug 18, 2019

New Video online

The Wall
2015 — 2019
HD Digital Animation
13 minutes

Featuring words by Jorge Ramos published January 9, 2019.

Read Here:
Donald Trump is the Wall

On view in "Forward Press: 21st Century Printmaking"
American University Museum at the Katzen Center for the Arts, Washington, D.C.
April 6 — August 11, 2019

Read Here

To reiterate the words in Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's sobering tweet, Border detention facilities for migrant children are, by definition, concentration camps. The executive powers establishing these camps are, by definition, fascist.

A Alguien Le Falta Un Tornillo.

By Rachael Myrow
Read Here

“La Raza Cósmica”, 2019
New video installation included in the show Unicorns, Aliens, and Futuristic Cities
Jun 5 - Aug 18
MACLA

*photo by Anna Lisa Escobedo

“La Raza Cósmica”, 2019
New video installation included in the show Unicorns, Aliens, and Futuristic Cities
Jun 5 - Aug 18
MACLA

"Unicorns, Aliens, and Futuristic Cities"—explores the work of artists: Claudia Blanco, Veronica Rojas, Michael Menchaca, Javier Martinez, Stephany Sanchez, Jorge Gonzalez, and James Canales; all of whom use science fiction and fantasy to reveal the nuances of history, culture, and Latino identity.

Visit MACLA

I'm introducing two brand new large scale collage works, now on view through September 13, 2019 in the City of Service Exhibition at the Culture Commons Gallery (115 Plaza de Armas), San Antonio, TX. Each piece reinterprets the legacy of a former San Antonio Air Force Base; Brooks Air Force Base and Kelly Air Force Base, respectively.

Watch on KLRNTV here

*photo by Elida Bocanegra

I am humbled to be included in this amazing catalog for an exhibition currently on view at the Davis Museum:

Art_Latin_America: Against the Survey
By James Oles

"Using the holdings of the Davis Museum at Wellesley College as a case study, this illustrated volume reconsiders the contours of “Latin American Art” and launches a rich, broad, gem of a collection into the public sphere for the first time."

Davis Museum, Wellesley College
January 2019
7.75 x 11 | 256 pages, 200 color illustrations, 2 foldouts |

Available Here

I have a New Wallpaper Installation on view inside the Wedding Cake House on Broadway Street, Providence, RI.

"The Dirt Palace at the Wedding Cake House is an ambitious restoration project of the historic 514 Broadway property last occupied by the Tirocchi sisters and the couture design business that they ran from the location from 1915 to 1947. The renovation will develop artist in residence quarters which will complement the feminist residency program and facilities at the Dirt Palace’s current location in Olneyville Square."

Opening reception May 18 6-9pm EST

The Dirt Palace at the Wedding Cake House
514 Broadway
Providence, RI 02909

Info pamphlet PDF

By Mark Jenkins
May 2, 2019
Read Here

MECA MFA Summer Visiting Artist Lecture Series 2019
I've been invited to the Maine College of Art to participate in the MFA Summer Visiting Artist Lecture Series.

The MFA Summer Visiting Artist Lecture Series brings a national and international roster of visiting artists, curators, and scholars to Portland, Maine. In addition to the schedule of public lectures listed below, visiting artists conduct studio visits and attend critiques with graduate students during their week-long visits.

Jamillah James: June 20
Eneida Sanches, an Indigo Arts Alliance Artist-in-Residence: July 1
Bradford Nordeen: July 8
Charlie Hewitt: July 15
Jessi Reaves: July 22
Michael Menchaca: July 29
Sonya Schönberger: August 5

Lectures are free and open to the public from 5:30–7pm in MECA’s Osher Hall.

Curator Susan J. Goldman sat down with the artists of "Forward Press: 21st Century Printmaking" to learn how their works reinterpret centuries-old printmaking techniques in the digital age. Featuring artists April Flanders, Tom Hück, Carrie Lingscheit, Beauvais Lyons, Dennis McNett, Michael Menchaca, Richard Peterson, Nicole Pietrantoni, Steve Prince, and Sangmi Yoo.

I had an amazing experience working with Robin and his incredible staff and assistants on a glass performance to mythologize the afterlife journey of me and my partner's Chihuahua, Winnie, with the Perry Glass Studio at the Chrysler Museum of Art. I learned a great deal about the many versatile forms of glass, beyond fragile articles, but also how glass can be used to make badass performance costumes. Mitologia Danza de Cristal took place in front of a sold out audience at the Glass Studio in Norfolk, VA. Thank you to curator Kimberli Gant for the invitation to exhibit at the Chrysler Museum of Art.

More images soon.

Save the Date
Third Thursday Glass Studio Performance at the Chrysler Museum of Art.

Forward Press: 21st Century Printmaking now on view at the American University Museum at the Katzen Center for the Arts, Washington, D.C.
Show runs April 6 — August 11, 2019

Featuring Artists:
April Flanders, Tom Hück, Carrie Lingscheit, Beauvais Lyons, Dennis McNett, Michael Menchaca, Richard Peterson, Nicole Pietrantoni, Steve Prince, and Sangmi Yoo.

I just completed a 6 week artist residency at the The Studios at MASS MoCA, in North Adams, MA! These new works on paper are funded in part by a grant from the NALAC Fund For The Arts.
*photo by Yuria Okamura

Read More

Learn More

Poster printed and designed by Alán Serna

I'm leading a panel discussion titled LatinX Printmaking at the 2019 Southern Graphics Council International Printmaking conference in Dallas, TX.
**Become a LatinX Art Advocate in your community with this LatinX Resources List ! **

This panel will address the Latinx ethos in contemporary printmaking, with a particular focus on Texas. Topics will range from historical prints distributed as a propaganda tool to influence Texas legislation, the exchange of ideas through printmaking, to the ethics of addressing "trending" issues within contemporary prints. The legacy of printmaking within latinx communities in the U.S. is undeniable, but is even more so in Texas, a state sharing a physical border with Mexico. The panelists will also discuss why printmaking is their chosen medium for expressing their political views, any difficulties experienced producing or exhibiting their work, and their perspective on what it means to identify as a latinx artist today. The theme of Texchange is connected to the Latino heritage within the Tejano population that identifies with both U.S. and Mexican cultures.

Latinx Printmaking Panelists:
Lisette Chavez, Paloma Mayorga, Alán Serna

I'll have prints on display at the 2019 McNay Museum Print Fair.

Read Here

More info here

I'm included in an print exhibition raising funds for organizations that protect civil rights.

This exhibition features the 2018 Winter Collection from Prints for Protest, a grassroots community of artists, several who are also members of SSP, that use their work to support organizations that protect civil rights. So far, these prints have raised over $5,000 for organizations that are working to protect marginalized communities across the US. Prints are available for $25 and under to show your love and compassion for organizations that support others.
Purchase prints here!

"...Check out a new video installation based on ancient art at the Chrysler"

By Denise M. Watson
Staff writer, The Virginia Pilot
Sun. Feb. 10, 2019

Everything old is new again. Especially with the latest exhibition at the Chrysler Museum of Art.

San Antonio-based artist Michael Menchaca has created a vibrant installation based on the Chrysler’s Mesoamerican collection, which covers centuries of art from Pre-Columbian Mexico and Central America.

The statues, figurines and ceramic pieces represent a variety of groups, including the Olmec, Mayan and Xochipala, and are some of the museum’s oldest pieces.

Menchaca calls the exhibition “Dioses Nuevos,” or “new gods” to point out how he interpreted the archaic symbols into a contemporary, digital context.

The center of the exhibition is the 5½-minute video, "Histrionic Mestizaje II" that plays in the multimedia gallery space called “The Box.” The video is a kaleidoscope of dancing images pulled from the neighboring Mesoamerican collection. "Histrionic" refers to the colorful, energetic presentation, Menchaca says. "Mestizaje" is the blending of the indigenous cultures with Spanish explorers who invaded the countries beginning in the 15th century.

Visitors can treat the interplay of the two spaces like a cultural scavenger hunt — seek out the iconic stone faces and animals in the video that decorate the ancient vases and jugs, particularly the jaguar, a revered figure in Mesoamerica.

Menchaca came to the Chrysler last summer and took numerous photos so he could digitize them. He learned that one of the most popular items in the collection is a stone figure of a child, eerie with its wide eyes and flashing teeth. Docents and curators told Menchaca that people had nightmares after seeing it in the gallery. The creepy baby, as it is sometimes called, has a role in the video.

Birds are another popular symbol, and Menchaca has created a giant bird mouth to be the opening into The Box. The shrouded feel of The Box also conveys the feeling of a temple or meditative space. The installation includes two encased figures from the collection placed on each side of the video.

“Many of the pieces in the collection have animal spirits dancing in the afterlife,” Menchaca said recently while at the Chrysler finalizing the installation. In The Box, he said, “They will be alive, very much alive.”

Kimberli Gant, the Chrysler’s McKinnon Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, has been following Menchaca’s work and likes how he breathes new life into the old imagery.

Both Menchaca and Gant said it reminds viewers that what might be considered a relic of a bygone era still has meaning. Every society and era use objects, such as crosses in Christianity, to convey messages and lessons.


“Even though the context of these pieces was different, they were used for cultural and ritual purposes,” Gant said. “The work was contemporary at that time.”

Menchaca’s art also allows him to reinvigorate his cultural history.

Menchaca was born in Texas in 1985 to parents who immigrated from Mexico.

He said that at times he felt like a minority even though he grew up in predominantly Hispanic San Antonio. In elementary school, he and other Hispanic students could get in trouble if they spoke Spanish.

Once he got into college, first at Texas State University and then the Rhode Island School of Design, his work delved into social issues like human trafficking and immigration. As with Mesoamerican art, Menchaca started using animals to represent people and messages. He uses a cat to symbolize immigrants seeking a new life in America. Menchaca got the idea from growing up in a mobile home community where a lot of stray cats lived. Some people, like his mother, fed them, and the cats kept coming back. Others in the community refused to feed them to prevent them from having kittens and wanting to stay.

Cats will pop up in the Chrysler’s video.

In 2010, Menchaca paid close attention to the protest signs being used among crowds denouncing the passage of Arizona’s Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act. The law was passed to give police officers more teeth in combating illegal immigration. Opponents feared that it allowed anyone who looked Hispanic or spoke Spanish to be profiled. Most of the law has since been overturned.

Many of the protest signs, though, included bold prints made popular by Chicano artists.

One of Menchaca’s specialties has become printmaking.

With the Chrysler exhibition, Menchaca has covered the walls of The Box with the colors and geometric pattern taken from a fragment of cloth in the Mesoamerican collection.

Menchaca said the Norfolk installation is less about politics, however, and more about looking at old cultures in a new way.

-Denise M. Watson
The Virginia Pilot
Photo by Kristen Zeis

Prints included in Art_Latin_America at the Davis Museum

Art_Latin_America: Against the Survey highlights the Davis Museum’s extensive and diverse collection of “Latin American art," formed over the past twenty+ years. The exhibition’s thesis is expansive, an approach signaled by the underscores in the title. On one side Art, from abstract paintings to political posters and photojournalism; on the other America, understood broadly and accurately, as geography demands. Between them, the adjective Latin confronts both nouns: American works of art, yes, but only those connected—literally, through the underscore—to a particular part of the Americas colonized by Spain and Portugal, whose languages are derived from Latin.

The underscores function as productive gaps into which new meanings can be inserted, suggesting rather than restricting what goes in between. The first—“Art_Latin”—expands the range of art of inclusion to art from Latin America, art of Latin America, and art [made] in Latin America—none of which are synonymous—but also art about Latin America, or even related to Latin America. The second—“Latin_America”—further complicates the question of where such “Latin” art is produced; the gap stands for single characters: one is the hyphen, which ties together the words, but others—o, a, @, x—push them further apart, amplifying our pool to bring in works by Latinos and Latinas, as well as artists who seek gender neutrality though recent neologisms like Latin@ and Latinx (and including diasporic artists who sometimes reject those particular labels).

Art_Latin_America features some 150 works of art by 99 artists (about a third of them women) from twelve countries, including twenty-five born in the United States: among the artists in the show are Ansel Adams, Olga Albizu, Lola Álvarez Bravo, Francis Alÿs, Gunther Gerzso, José Clemente Orozco, Roberto Matta, Ana Mendieta, Liliana Porter, Alice Rahon, and Grete Stern. Rather than a chronological survey, the exhibition is organized in eight broad thematic sections—Identity and Territory, War and Loss, Protest and Propaganda, Farmers and Workers, City and Country, Saints and Rituals, Models and Mothers, and Gesture and Geometry. These themes are not intended to summarize complex cultural, political, or economic phenomena, like gender or labor. Instead, they should be seen as visual nodes or points of collision. The project elevates rather than eludes the peculiarities of this single institutional collection, formed as it was in fits and starts, through donations and purchases, and guided by varied players, according to no strictly calculated plan. More than any recent exhibition of its type, Art_Latin_America embraces diversity—aesthetic, of course, but also in terms of the artists’ background, experience, residence, and point of view—thereby pushing the concept of “Latin American art” almost to its conceptual limits. By drawing from an expansive pool, and by allowing space for new connections, Art_Latin_America aims to generate ideas and narratives that canonical works alone would not have revealed.

On View Feb 7 - June 9, 2019

Dioses Nuevos Opens at Chrysler Museum of Art!
San Antonio-based artist Michael Menchaca connects his contemporary art practice with the Chrysler Museum’s ancient Mesoamerican collection in Dioses Nuevos. On view January 25–June 30, 2019, the dynamic, new, mixed-media installation will be created specifically for The Box project space at the Chrysler.

Menchaca’s work combines video game imagery; vibrant, graphic wall text; and sculpture with references and iconography from Mesoamerican historical codices (pictorial history books). He often creates twenty-first-century deities, based on those from the ancient world, engaged with current sociopolitical issues, such as immigration and political bias that impacts Latinx, Chicanx, and Mexican immigrant communities.

Featuring original music composed by Lucy Galarza
Curated by Kimberli Gant

Michael Menchaca, the San Antonio-based artist behind a new multimedia exhibition at the Chrysler Museum of Art, says he hopes his work will help visitors feel more connected to the museum's ancient Mesoamerican collection. "Los Nuevos Dioses" will be on display from Jan. 25 through June 30, 2019.

New Video Documentary
The staff at the McNay Art Museum did a wonderful job of creating video documentation of my recent exhibition 100 Years of Printmaking in San Antonio: Michael Menchaca. Click on the video above to learn more about my printmaking practice, and the process for putting together my largest printmaking installation to date.
*Video courtesy of McNay Art Museum
Special Thanks to Clayton Price and the McNay A/V team
Watch on Youtube

View Event Page

I had the honor of joining Neil Fauerso on this week's edition of Glasstire's Top 5 and the privilege receiving the top spot. Check out this week's Top 5 on Glasstire.com

Read Glasstire Best of 2018

Donate to RAICES
Whether your donation is going toward helping separated families, unaccompanied minors, detained asylum seekers or general use for most pressing needs, your contribution will make a difference in someone's life. Thank you for helping RAICES increase the scope of our mission, one client at a time. Donate to RAICES now

*video courtesy of RAICES

Recent press on my upcoming exhibition at the Chrysler Museum of Art (Norfolk, VA) in the Alt Daily. READ ON ALTDAILY.COM

Dioses Nuevos at Chrysler Museum of Art

My upcoming show at the Chrysler Museum of Art (Norfolk, VA) is almost here. The exhibition page for my show is now online. Visit the Chrysler Museum of Art website to see it in action. More soon...

2018 Endless Biennial

Opening Reception: Friday, December 7, 6 - 9 PM, featuring a piece by Gabriel Garza

Endless Editions is pleased to present the third edition of the Endless Editions Biennial, an open submission-based curatorial project featuring artworks by over 100 artists. On view at EFA Project Space from December 7 - 21; the show is produced by Anthony Tino and curated by Oakland-based artist, curator, activist, and storyteller Lukaza Branfman-Verissimo. This year’s biennial takes on the theme of OPTIMISM. Is optimism inherently positive? Does the term belie the complexity of what it is to look to the future? The 2018 Biennial questions the idea of optimism and examines how we engage with it as a tool for survival.

Artists: Marcela Pardo Ariza, Shelly Bahl, Sarula Bao, Mitsuko Brooks, Angela Conant, Sage Dawson, Ricki Dwyer, Sarah Farahat, Divya Gadangi, Sair Goetz, Nicki Green, Iris Grimm, Maya Gulassa, Katie Hargrave, Andrew Kodama, Fermín Jiménez Landa, Cara Levine, Andy Li, Joseph Liatela, Mark McCloughan, Michael Menchaca, Be Oakley, Aparna Sarkar, Rachel Cardenas Stallings, Jia Sung, Kaitlin Trataris, Lindsay Tunkl, Raphael Villet, and Lulu White, and more.

Curated by: Lukaza Branfman-Verissimo

“In a world that is hard to live in, one often questions the use of the word ‘optimism.’ On the one hand, optimism references a possibility for hope in the future - a hope in part thanks to all the incredible work that queer, trans, people of color, womxn, activists, culture makers, artists, and educators are doing. On the other hand, the confidence of optimism, like when people say ‘why can’t you just be optimistic about the future?’ can make some feel uncomfortable. It feels like optimism doesn’t always hold the complexities of what it means to look towards the future or a successful outcome.”

- Branfman-Verissimo on the biennial’s theme, OPTIMISM


Press Release

New Limited Edition Screenprint for sale!

Meet my brand new limited edition screenprint in partnership with the McNay Museum Store (San Antonio, TX).

Print Title: Dentro Un Mundo De Águilas
Year: 2018
Paper Size: 11" X 14"
Medium: Screenprint
Printed and signed by the artist
Edition: 25

Museum Members receive 20% off
Museum Visitors receive 10% off

*See store for details

Enjoy special discounts, exclusive offerings and more. Be a Patron and support your cultural institutions this holiday season. Start your shopping at 11 am. All current Museum Members will receive an additional 10% discount on all purchases in the Museum Store.

PSBN Press Release

Find me at the following NYC Print Week locations:

International Fine Print Dealers Association
Ruiz-Healy Art Booth #128
Location: River Pavilion, Javits Center
11th Avenue at 35th Street
New York, NY 10001

WEDNESDAY 10/24 6:30 – 9pm Preview (tickets required)
THURSDAY 10/25 12 – 8pm
FRIDAY 10/26 12 – 8pm
SATURDAY 10/27 12 – 8pm
SUNDAY 10/28 12 – 6pm

@ifpda
#CollectPrints
#IFPDA
#HelloHudsonYards

+

E/AB Fair
Overpass Projects Booth #A05
Location: The Tunnel
269 11th Avenue
bet. 27th and 28th Streets

269 11th Avenue
bet. 27th and 28th Streets
THURSDAY 10/25 3 – 6pm (VIP)
VIP Preview 10/25 6 — 9pm (VIP + Ticket Holders)
FRIDAY 10/26 12 – 8pm (FREE)
SATURDAY 10/27 12 – 8pm (FREE)
SUNDAY 10/28 12 – 6pm (FREE)

@eabfair
#EABfair #EABfair2018

100 Years of Printmaking in San Antonio: Michael Menchaca now on view at McNay Art Museum
October 18, 2018 to January 6, 2019

For the final chapter of the series of exhibitions celebrating San Antonio’s rich printmaking tradition, Michael Menchaca will transform the McNay’s Lawson Print Gallery into an immersive environment of prints, paper installations, and video. A graduate of Texas State University and the Rhode Island School of Design, Menchaca has created a highly individualistic lexicon of signs and symbols that speak to the Mexican American experience, including immigration and the melding of cultures in South Texas.

Sunday Noon–5 pm
Monday Closed
Tuesday Closed (except for tours)
Wednesday 10 am–6 pm
Thursday 10 am–9 pm
Friday 10 am–6 pm
Saturday 10 am –5 pm

Visit McNayArt.org for details

New Prints in Progress

2018 Migrant Grand Caravan prints are currently in production at Overpass Projects, RI. This is a digital rendering of the proposed printed image, but due to the nature of the screenprinting process, is subject to change during production. Will share the final result once finished.

Creative Standard Summit
I'll be speaking at the Creative Standard Summit in Austin, TX. Hope to see you there!

Teaser for 100 Years of Printmaking in San Antonio: Michael Menchaca

Sharing a trailer for my upcoming exhibition at the McNay Museum, San Antonio, TX. Thanks to Paul Feuerbacher and the team at the McNay Museum for putting this video together. More soon!

New Animation!

I'm excited to share a brand new digital animation. “Enter The Border” is a digital animation created as test footage for an ongoing video game project sharing the same namesake. The game will function as an early 1990’s arcade “beat ‘em up style” genre video game where players fight against a number of enemies and defeat level bosses to reach the final mission and ultimately “Enter the Border” as the title suggests. The digital animation was developed during the level design process for the proposed gameplay and features a number of playable characters combating level obstacles and enemies.

This animation will be included in an upcoming exhibition at the South Bend Museum of Art. Details below:

Michael Menchaca : Codex Animations
South Bend Museum of Art
120 South Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd
South Bend, IN 46601

October 7 – December 30, 2018

Hosting a LatinX Printmaking Panel Discussion at the 2019 SGCI Printmaking Conference

This upcoming spring, I will be leading a panel discussion titled LatinX Printmaking at the 2019 Southern Graphics Council International Printmaking conference Texchange SGCI : 2019 from March 6 – 9, 2019.

This panel will address the Latinx ethos in contemporary printmaking, with a particular focus on Texas. Topics will range from historical prints distributed as a propaganda tool to influence Texas legislation, the exchange of ideas through printmaking, to the ethics of addressing "trending" issues within contemporary prints. The legacy of printmaking within latinx communities in the U.S. is undeniable, but is even more so in Texas, a state sharing a physical border with Mexico. The panelists will also discuss why printmaking is their chosen medium for expressing their political views, any difficulties experienced producing or exhibiting their work, and their perspective on what it means to identify as a latinx artist today. The theme of Texchange is connected to the Latino heritage within the Tejano population that identifies with both U.S. and Mexican cultures.

More details to come.

Are you a LatinX Printmaker?
Apply by Sept. 23rd here
*Photo courtesy of SGCI

Pacific States Biennial North America
My print Gotta Catch 'Em All!, 2016, has been selected for the 2018 Pacific States Biennial North American printmaking exhibition. Helen Frederick selected a total of 79 works for the PSBN exhibition at the University of Hawaii at Hilo Campus Center Gallery and the East Hawaii Cultural Center.

Dates:
November 2, 2018 — December 28, 2018

100 Years of Printmaking in San Antonio: Michael Menchaca

My upcoming show at the McNay Museum (San Antonio, TX) is underway and I'm working full speed to carry out an exciting conclusion to the 100 Years of Printmaking in San Antonio series curated by Lyle Williams, Curator of Prints and Drawings at the museum.

The exhibition page for my show is now online. Visit the McNay website to see it in action.

2018 NALAC Leadership Institute Fellowship

I'm honored to be participating as a fellow in the 18th National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures Leadership Institute, taking place July 16-21, 2018 in San Antonio. This year's class is the largest ever! Thirty artists and arts administrators are convening for a week-long rigorous program in arts management and leadership development.
Learn more

Photo by Luis Garza. Photo courtesy of NALAC.

Work included in Radically Ordinary: Scenes from Black Life in America Since 1968

Press
Published June 7, 2018 by Alyssa Weinstein
Alumnus enjoys life as a San Antonio artist
Read Here

"Texas State alumnus Michael Menchaca has made a name for himself as a printmaking artist in San Antonio.

Menchaca is known for his controversial and politically explosive art, as it contains anti-Trump elements. Menchaca’s art has made him distinct from other artists by creating art dealing with the issues of the Mexican-American border and immigration.

Menchaca graduated from Texas State in 2011 with a degree in printmaking. He then attended the Rhode Island School of Design where he earned his masters in fine arts in 2015.

Menchaca has resided in his hometown of San Antonio since then with girlfriend Suzy Gonzalez, a Texas State alumna who graduated with a degree in painting. The two have been successful artists individually and collaboratively. ..." Read Here

San Pedro Creek Culture Park Now Open, San Antonio, TX

After centuries of history, decades of dreaming, and years of planning, the San Pedro Creek Culture Park is finally here. Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff and Bexar County Commissioner Paul Elizondo welcome you to the next chapter in the San Pedro Creek’s legacy.

Public art, cultural programming, and artistic design features presented in the park express what is authentic about San Antonio’s culture today and explores the historical significance of the creek through a contemporary art lens. This unique site provides an opportunity for artists to explore a wide variety of project types, distinguishing it from other cultural amenities in the city.

Art Features:

1 art installation (metal screening) around flood bypass tunnel inlet – depicting the night sky in 1718
4 tile murals that tell the story of how San Pedro Creek brought forth life, growth and diversity in our community
5 locations of historical text and poetry by John Phillip Santos etched in the limestone walls along the creek
16 colorful tile designs by Michael Menchaca commemorating the people, culture and history of our community that can be seen throughout the creek on benches and artistic design accents
3 restored bridges with ceramic artwork by Diana Kersey depicting the stories behind the street names

Show Review
Glasstire - Published April 28, 2018 by Neil Fauerso
Michael Menchaca: Vignettes from San Antonio
Read here

"Some cities have artists who become sort of visual ambassadors for the aesthetic and culture. When I imagine New York in the 1980s, all the graffiti in my mind is Basquiat pieces. In San Antonio, we’re quite lucky to have dazzling, insouciant artists like Cruz Ortiz and Michael Menchaca, rather than, say, New Orleans’ anointed chronicler James Michalopoulos whose, woozy, viscous oil painting are like if Thomas Kinkade went on a absinthe and Ambien bender. (This actually is sort of how Kinkade died).

In the ecstatic current show at Ruiz-Healy in San Antonio, Menchaca took the howling, void-like desolation he felt from the election of Donald Trump and turned to creativity as a way of catharsis:..." Read here

Press
La Prensa SA - Published April 5, 2018 by Ricardo Romo
Michael Menchaca; S.A. artist, continues growth

Read Here

"Michael Menchaca’s “Vignettes from San Antonio,” at Ruiz-Healy Art gallery in Olmos Park introduces new works dedicated to celebrating his memories, his Latino heritage, and vision of San Antonio. The large mixed media pieces also connect us with history, folklore, and popular culture.

Menchaca is a gifted graphic artist and printer, but in these new creations he has expanded his artistic creativity to collage and portraits. He considers his work a reflection of his upbringing, his home, his city and family. It is for him a personal story including nostalgic memories. ..." Read Here

Vignettes From San Antonio

Ruiz-Healy Art, San Antonio, Texas, is pleased to present a solo exhibition of Michael Menchaca. The exhibition “Vignettes from San Antonio” opens to the public Wednesday, March 21st from 6:00 -8:00 pm and will be on view through May 12, 2018.

Michael Menchaca earned his MFA from the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design in 2015 with a concentration in printmaking. A San Antonio native, Menchaca is known to juxtapose images from popular culture with Mesoamerican iconography. Vignettes from San Antonio is a new series of work that is inspired by the artist's hometown. Large collage works speak to the cultural landscape of San Antonio and are made to correspond with the city’s celebration of it's tricentennial anniversary. Highlighting such iconic San Antonio scenes as Easter weekend at Brackenridge Park, the campus at San Antonio College, and the Battle of Flowers Parade, Menchaca expands his personal codex to include San Antonio specific iconography.

This series finds inspiration in the narrative works of Faith Ringgold and Carmen Lomas Garza. Menchaca creates original designs and motifs to explore personal memories with place. In his signature style, his works play with both repetition and scale with overlapping figures, patterns, and multiple windows of storyline and fable. Menchaca harks back to a long tradition of visual storytelling spanning many centuries and across many cultures.

"Adelante!" Public Art Murals now on display at the Consolidated Rental Car Facility (CONRAC) at the San Antonio International Airport

The artwork celebrates 300 years of San Antonio history, focusing on the airport’s culture, architecture and role in aviation history.

Artist in Residence

I'm delighted to be working with Master Printer Jill Lerner at the Segura Arts Studio at the University of Notre Dame. Together we will be publishing a brand new series of original fine art etchings by yours truly. Looking forward to sharing the finished images with you early 2018.

*Update* Will be working on photo litho, photo etching, and laser cut woodblock prints.

More on Segura Arts Studio here

Segura Arts Studio History:
Previously known as the Segura Publishing Company, this organization was founded in Arizona by Tamarind Master Printer Joe Segura. With the new name and new location in the Notre Dame Center for Arts & Culture, Segura continues his mission: to collaborate with important artists to make works accessible to the market and influential collections.

The Segura Arts Studio focuses on three areas of artistic endeavor: print processes that further the creative possibilities; production of works by underrepresented artists who explore issues related to self-identification; and work that dispels outdated and culturally biased beliefs about life in the United States, concentrating on the issues of immigration, acculturation, and assimilation.

The Segura Arts Studio challenges preconceived notions of the print via a combination of traditional processes as well as nineteenth-century photographic techniques. Established and emerging artists are invited to embark upon collaborative ventures with the studio’s staff to create relationships, develop ideas, and produce original works of art. The studio provides artists with an arsenal of equipment and technical skill that can be used to develop projects of any scope and that would often be impossible for the artist to bring to fruition working alone.

NYC Print Week 2017
IFPDA Print Fair & EAB Fair

IFPDA 2017, Ruiz-Healy Art, Booth #500
The 2017 Fine Art Print Fair will take place in the River Pavilion at the Javits Center in New York City. Enjoy the Fair’s river views and proximity to the High Line, the Chelsea Arts District, and the Whitney Museum of American Art.
River Pavilion, Javits Center 421 11th Avenue at West 35th Street; October 26–29. Thursday–Saturday 12 p.m.–8 p.m., Sunday, 12 p.m.–6 p.m.

Editions/Artists’ Books Fair 2017 at the Tunnel, Overpass Projects, Booth B14
Presented this year by the Lower East Side Printshop, the EAB Fair showcases contemporary prints, multiples, and artists’ books from publishers around the world.
269 11th Avenue; October 26-29; 11 a.m.– 7 p.m.

Press
Auburn Plainsmam - Published October 5, 2017 by Emma Rygiel
Video Games and Art Collide in New Biggin Exhibition
Read Here

"Challenging the stereotype of video games’ unrealistic nature, artist Michael Menchaca explored themes they share with history to debunk this fallacy through his production of a thoughtful and progressive collection.

Featured in the Biggin Gallery and presented through the department of art and art history, Menchaca’s exhibit “Exegesis” has officially opened. Filled with colorful, humorous and technologically infused pieces, Menchaca illustrates an intriguing artistic direction.

Continuing until Nov. 3, the exhibit combines themes found through video games with personal experiences, the history of the past and current events. Sparking conversation through each piece’s ambiguity and meaning, Menchaca illustrates the power of art to communicate and have an impact on its viewers. ..."
Read Here

Solo Exhibition at Auburn University

Making new works for an upcoming solo exhibition titled EXEGESIS at Auburn University, Alabama. The show will include new digital works as well as new works on paper. Stay tuned!

Biggin Gallery
108 Biggin Hall
Auburn University, AL 36849

October 5 – Nov 3, 2017

Tile Artist for the San Pedro Creek Culture Park

I'm excited to be designing various ceramic tiles that will be featured throughout the San Pedro Creek Culture Park, officially opening to the public in May of 2018 in San Antonio, TX. The San Pedro Creek is the natural resource that brought early settlement to the central Bexar county region located in present day San Antonio.

Read more

Online review on Glasstire

My current exhibition, Xenelasy and Dissension at BLUEorange, Houston, TX has a review in the online Texas art publication Glasstire. Read it here

IPCNY New Prints/New Narratives: Summer 2017

My print Gotta Catch 'Em All!, 2016, is included in the upcoming show at the International Print Center in New York. Press release follows.

"International Print Center New York (IPCNY) announces the fifty-sixth presentation of its New Prints Program, a biannual, juried open call for prints created in the preceding twelve months. Titled Just Under 100, the exhibition was selected by artist Katherine Bradford, and features 98 artists from both the United States and abroad. Countries represented in the exhibition include Croatia, France, Italy, Serbia, and Thailand, as well as Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Artists: Golnar Adili, Andranik Aroutiounian, Martin Azevedo, Felipe Baeza, Bob Barancik, Mark Barry, Anne Beresford, Kathleen Bonanni, Caeli Carr-Potter, Veronica Ceci, Liz Chalfin, Tiberiu Chelcea, Allie Christisen, Ella Coon, Jonas Criscoe, Sage Dawson, Mark Dion, Nancy Doniger, Craig Drennen, Louise Eastman, Timothy Evans, Michelle Farro, Joe Fattori, Gro Finne, Robert Fitzmaurice, Joanne Freeman, Jess Frost, Tara Geer, Leslie Giuliani, Klara Glosova, Trisha Gupta, Libby Hague, Takuji Hamanaka, Amber Hany, Lois Harada, Dominica Harrison, Yuji Hiratsuka, Cooper Holoweski, Cary Hulbert, Su-Li Hung, Sophie Isaak, Martha Ives, Frances Jetter, Warranutchai Kajaree, Susan Kaprov, Neah Kelly, Petra Kriletić, Elsa Lama von Buchwald, Rejin Leys, Joseph Lupo, Beauvais Lyons, Renee Magnanti, Erica Mao, Leonardo Marenghi, Paolo Marino, Michael Menchaca, Katie Michel, Carrie Moyer, Pierre Muckensturm, Kristin Powers Nowlin, Ernesto Ortiz Leyva, Giuseppe Pernigotti, Serena Perrone, Snezana Petrovic, Adam Pitt, Chayan Pol-asa, Michael Prisco, John Rapczak, Jolynn Reigeluth, Minna Resnick, Mark Rice, Ross Sheehan, Jess Sheridan, David Sheskin, Nomi Silverman, Wendy Small, Erin Smith, Janis Stemmermann, Elisabeth Stevens, Valerie Syposz, Eszter Sziksz, Rhiannon Skye Tafoya, Julia Talcott, Saralene Tapley, Lina Tegtmeyer, McKinzie Trotta, Phumelele Tshabalala, Jeanne Verdoux, Vilja Virks-Lee, Alejandro Waskavich, Carol Wax, Karen Whitman, Peter Williams, Jan Wurm, Hai Fei Xie, JooHee Yoon, Tomas Zemla, and Jeremy Zini.

Presses and Publishers: Overpass Projects, Dieu Donné, VanDeb Editions, LeRoy Neiman Center for Print Studies – Columbia University, Planthouse Gallery, Rotland Press, Cade Tompkins Projects, TechTao, Elecrow Technology, LuxeLab, American Art Editions, Edinburgh College of Art, Rayographics, Inc., Galerija Događanja, Coronado Print Studio, K. Caraccio, Milestone Graphics, ESP Printing, Bleu Acier, Gosspress, and Ross Sheehan Studio."

Edition Review in Art In Print
by Britany Salsbury, from Art In Print Volume 6, Number 6

"Edition Review
Michael Menchaca, Gotta Catch ’Em All! (2016)
Screenprint, 24 x 18 inches. Edition of 25. Printed and published by Overpass Projects, Providence, RI. $600.

Michael Menchaca describes his work as a “digital codex”—a phrase that captures the juxtaposition and, sometimes, tension between the pre-Columbian and contemporary cultures that he cites. If this cultural collision has echoes of Enrique Chagoya’s codices [see Art in Print Mar–Apr 2012 and July–Aug 2013], Menchaca’s focus on videogames takes his visual language and content in a different direction."

Read Here

Prints for sale at 2017 McNay Print Fair

Saturday, March 4, 2017 - 10:00 AM - Sunday, March 5, 2017 - 5:00 PM
This event is 10am-5pm on March 4th; NOON-5pm on March 5th

The McNay Print Fair is the only event of its kind in the Southwest. More than a dozen dealers from around the U.S. bring thousands of prints, drawings, watercolors, and photographs to show and sell over the course of the two-day fair. The event is a great opportunity for novice and seasoned collectors alike to hone their connoisseurship skills, get to know and learn from respected and informed dealers, and perhaps go home with a newfound treasure. Participating dealers have something for every taste and budget from old master prints to contemporary drawings and photography.

Over the years, the McNay Print Fair has placed high quality art in the homes of our community, providing us with a solid and growing collector base. Come raise a glass in celebration of our 21st year!

Fine Print Exhibition

OPENING: March 3, 2017, 6-8pm
Hotel Emma Main Lobby
136 E. Grayson St.
San Antonio, TX 78215

CLOSING: March 31, 2017, 6-8pm
CAMMIE Awards 2017
Linda Pace Foundation CHRISpark
111 Camp St.
San Antonio, TX 78204

ARTISTS:
Cynthia Emma Alderete
Sabrina Alfaro
Linda Arredondo
Kim Bishop
Lisette Chavez
Danielle Cunningham (DC)
Jennifer Ling Datchuk
Janet Lennie Flohr
Michael Menchaca
Amada Claire Miller
Sable Mirelez
Anthony Rundblade
Michael Stoltz
Hiromi Stringer
Luis Valderas
Rikkianne Van Kirk

Exhibition at University of Connecticut

MESTIZX NATION

On view
January 26 – March 10, 2017
Monday – Friday 10 am – 4 pm

Public Talk
January 26th from 5 – 6pm – Art Building, VAIS room 109

Exhibition and Artists’ Reception
January 26 from 6 – 7 pm – Art Building, CAG

Counterproof Press Residency
January 25 – 30th – Printmaking Studios, Bishop Center

The Contemporary Art Galleries will present an exhibition of artworks including paintings, prints and videos by Texas-based artists Suzy Gonzalez and Michael Menchaca. Prior to the artists’ reception, Gonzalez and Menchaca will present a public talk on their artwork at 5pm in UConn’s Art Building. This event is open to the public, and free of charge.

Gonzalez and Menchaca will be on the Storrs Campus from January 25 through January 30, making fine art prints with UConn’s Counterproof Press, a collaborative venture between the Department of Art and Art History and the Creative Writing Program in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

The artists’ residency and exhibition are partially funded by Counterproof Press and a UConn Academic Plan Grant.

Exhibition at Ruiz-Healy
Perennial Boundaries

"In a time when the upcoming elections have border policies at the forefront of the agenda, Ruiz-Healy Art has organized an exhibition of contemporary art rooted in the socio-political experience of the U.S /Mexico border and Texas. RHA is pleased to present Perennial Boundaries, an exhibition showcasing the artwork of Margarita Cabrera, César Martínez, Fernando Andrade, and Michael Menchaca.

Perennial Boundaries examines the infinite thread that a manmade confine such as a geographical divide creates. The works included in this show provide the viewers with insights into the interests and concerns that have guided the creative impulses of these artists in their careers. Each artist is working in a unique and individualistic practice informed by their personal experiences from living on either side of the border. This exhibition is an eclectic mix of homage and critical discussions of living in la frontera and immigration issues."

Exhibition on view October 27, 2016 - January 21, 2017

Artist In residence at Wassaic Project, NY

I am collaborating with Suzy Gonzalez for the month of June at the Wassaic Project in Wassaic, NY. So far it has been a learning experience. We have started to put the gears in motion for multiple works. Exciting times!

Skowhegan Alliance Screening
I will have a video included in Divisions, a video program of work made by Skowhegan alumni, on May 4th, 7:30pm 8:30pm. The screening will take place in May at Skowhegan's New York program space, 136 West 22nd Street New York, NY, 1001, USA

Fine Arts Work Center Solo Show
As part of my fellowship, my solo show at the Hudson D. Walker Gallery at the Fine Arts Work Center went on view. Here are images of the work.

PAAM Fine Arts Work Center 2015-16 Fellows' Exhibition
I'm so thankful to be surrounded by our talented FAWC Fellows. We have a group show at Provincetown Art Association and Museum that just opened. If you can manage, come visit Provincetown and see it before it closes Feb. 28th. Here is some footage of my piece.

Artists:
Sarah Aubry
Erin Diebboll
Heidi Hahn
Marisa Manso
Isaac McCaslin
Michael Menchaca
Jennifer Packer
Aaron Richmond
Amy Ritter
Dave Walsh

Fine Arts Work Center
Happy to announce my fellowship for 2015-2016 at the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA. I'll be joining this group of lovely people:

VISUAL ART:
Sarah Aubry
Erin Diebboll
Heidi Hahn
Marisa Manso
Isaac McCaslin
Michael Menchaca
Jennifer Packer
Aaron Richmond
Amy Ritter
Dave Walsh

WRITING:
Leslie Marie Aguilar
A.H. Jerriod Avant
Tia Clark
Allison Davis
Christa Fraser
Anushka Jasraj
Sara Eliza Johnson
Sophia Lin
Asako Serizawa
Safiya Sinclair

Studio Update on the blog.

Prints for sale on Artspace

Link
ABOUT THE WORK

"Index of figural archetypes and recurring pattern ornamentation is Menchaca’s own allegory that re-imagines the history of the Americas. He presents metaphors of contemporary social issues with a uniquely pre-Hispanic visual vocabulary. His symbols and motifs harken to those of ancient South American culture specifically; however, his imagery speaks widely to human communication and history.

This print was created on the occasion of State of the Art at The Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art."

Crystal Bridges Exhibition Rated No. 1 Must-See by Artnet News

Link

This show is getting a lot of press. Most recently it made “The 25 Must-See Museum Shows Around the World”, on Artnet.

"No. 1 on the list was State of the Art, the exhibition of contemporary American art by emerging and undiscovered artists at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville."

Roger Williams National Memorial Park

Sept. 11th is the unveiling of mine and Suzy Gonzalez's first collaborative commissioned public artwork at the Roger Williams National Memorial Park in Providence, RI.

The 1st Artist in Residency (AIR) premiere
through the Roger Williams National Memorial Park

Thursday, September 11
5:30–7:30pm
284 North Main Street

4 pieces of public art created this summer by participants from 4 local organizations —
RISD: grad students Michael Menchaca (print '15) and Suzy Gonzalez (paint '15)
The Steel Yard
Riverzedge Arts
Tomaquag Museum

and rooted in the interpretive themes of Roger Williams National Memorial
are installed in the park this fall and stay up through the summer of 2015
as part of the national memorial's 50th anniversary celebration.

State of the Art: Discovering American Art Now

I'm happy to be included in this upcoming show at the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art.

Press Release:
On November 11, 2013, the second anniversary of the museum’s opening, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art announced a major new initiative to discover and exhibit recently created artwork from across the United States. As part of the initiative, museum president Don Bacigalupi and assistant curator Chad Alligood traveled to all regions of the country to visit nearly 1,000 artists in studios and conduct hundreds of hours of one-on-one conversations. Now, planning and research is complete and the museum has selected 102 artists for the resulting exhibition, State of the Art: Discovering American Art Now, debuting at Crystal Bridges on September 13.

During 2013 and early 2014, the Crystal Bridges curatorial team logged more than 100,000 travel miles, crisscrossing the country to visit artists, all in search of the most compelling American art being created today. Traveling to communities large and small, the museum sought to discover artists whose work has not yet been fully recognized on a national level.

The result of this unprecedented journey is a one-of-a-kind exhibition that draws from every region of the U.S., offering an unusually diverse and nuanced look at American art. The 102 artists selected range in age from 24 – 87, including 54 male and 48 female artists from across the country.

Randy Kennedy of The New York Times posted about it online in the Arts Beat blog. You can read it online here.

OtherPeoplesPixels Interviews Michael Menchaca
Here's a recent Interview on my latest.

Screen Printing in Sri Lanka
In case you're interested, I've posted an entry to my blog regarding my time in Sri Lanka:
A Screen Printing Workshop in Northern Sri Lanka

Southern Graphics Council 2014 San Francisco
I'm excited to attend the SGC San Francisco conference this year! I will be in full swing showing my latest prints at the open portfolio. If you happen to see me around the city please stop and say "hi". I look forward to meeting new and old friends on the west coast. See you soon!

Sustainable Strategies
If you're interested in our Sri Lanka wintersession experience you can read about on RISD's news page here.

Visit the DesineLab blog to read about our experiences in Sri Lanka:
DesignLab Blog

Sri Lanka
I am honored to be a recipient of a Peter St. Onge Memorial Travel Grant from the Rhode Island School of Design. This coming January I will be fieldworking on location in Sri Lanka with the landscape architecture program at RISD. Our research is based on reconstructing the post-war climate that has left thousands of widowed women and children in desperate need of sustainability. This is an amazing opportunity to reach out to a community in need and use art and design to make a positive change. More soon.

RISD
First Semester in the MFA program at RISD. Will have plenty to share soon.

IPCNY
New Prints/New Narratives: Summer 2013 is now on exhibit at the International Print Center New York.

IPCNY
508 West 26th Street Room 5A
New York, NY 10001

On View: June 13, 2013 - August 9, 2013

Illustrated Checklist

In the Newspaper
Happy to be featured in the San Antonio Express News today.

New Prints/New Narratives
Excited to be included in IPCNY's New Prints/New Narratives: Summer 2013 show this summer. Details below:

New Prints/New Narratives: Summer 2013
National Academy Museum, NYC
1083 5th Avenue
New York, NY 10128

June 13 - August 9, 2013

Regards from Vermont
I'm on residency at the beautiful Vermont Studio Center. What an amazing experience it has been. With spring right around the corner, it's a fitting transitional period for me both personally and professionally. I look forward to sharing with you my progress as I develop more ideas and imagery.

Love,
Michael

Printeresting Feature
by Jason Urban

Link

TALKING ART WITH MICHAEL MENCHACA

Laguna Gloria // 3809 W 35th St, Austin TX 78703 // FREE

Learn more about the animated video and prints in New Works: Michael Menchaca that are inspired by Pre-Columbian codices, creation myths, and migration stories. Michael will be in conversation with Lucia R. Henderson, PhD candidate in Art History from University of Texas.

Lucia Henderson came to the University of Texas at Austin in 2006 as a Harrington Doctoral Fellow and will graduate this spring with a PhD in Art History. She received her Master’s degree in Art History from the University of California, San Diego and her B.A. in Archaeology from Harvard University. Lucia’s scholarship focuses on the art, symbolism, and ideology of Pre-Columbian civilizations. She is trained as an archaeological illustrator and has presented and published work on a diverse range of topics, including the ceramics of the American Southwest, ancient Mayan iconography, and Aztec religion.

Talking Art is a forum for visitors to engage more deeply with AMOA-Arthouse exhibitions by attending and participating in gallery talks led by exhibiting artists and other experts in contemporary art and culture. All talks are free and open to the public.

Serie Project Feature
Serie Project Blog

KLRN Video
A video profile on the Estampas De La Raza Exhibit can be found at this Video link

Top 10 Visual Arts of 2012
Thanks to Andy Campbell of the 'Austin Chronicle' for his generous mention of my New Works exhibit in his top 10 list.

New Works:Michael Menchaca
My first one-person show at a museum is on exhibit through Feb. 17th 2013. Please take a look if you get the chance.

New Works: Michael Menchaca
AMOA/Arthouse Laguna Gloria
Gatehouse Gallery
3809 West 35th Street
Austin, TX 78703

December 13, 2012 — February 17, 2013

"Uniformly Varied" at BLUEORANGE Contemporary
Some friends of mine have opened a gallery in Houston, TX. The inaugural show is up until Nov. 30th. If you have a chance please take a look.

1208 West Gray
Houston, TX 77019
November 10 - November 30, 2012

On Glasstire

Drawing Workshop at the McNay Museum
I had my very first drawing workshop yesterday at the McNay Museum. I was super impressed by the energy in the kids drawings. Kids have a great way of working out their ideas simultaneously on the paper. They were really great teachers to me!

Estampas De La Raza on Amazon
The catalogue for the show of Chicano prints from the 1960's– on is available through AMAZON.
This exhibition is on view at the McNay Museum in San Antonio, TX until Jan. 27, 2013. Curated by Lyle Williams.

The People of Paper: New Figuration from the Serie Project
New Exhibit Curated by Tatiana Reinoza at the Latino Cultural Center opened Sept. 14th. If you're in the Dallas area be sure to catch this incredible show before Nov. 8th with prints from the Serie Project in Austin.
Link

The Artpace Blog
Chalk it Up Showcase Artist Preview
Written by Chris Castillo

C H A N G A R R I T O
I'm participating at the CHANGARRITO project at Mexic-Arte in Austin on Sept. 1st and 2nd. Come see new drawings and t-shirts for sale from Noon to 3pm!

Animated Feature has been Funded!
Thanks to the generous donors who helped fund my USA Project Codex Migratus Animatus! Soon, I will embark on creating my first animated feature. Look for updates on the production of the film here.

Serie Project Interview Online
Here is an online interview with Kelly Grajeda from my Serie Project Residency.

Press
read here

Luminaria
Here's a Luminaria overview on TPR

Pastelegram Online Review
A online review for my show titled Of Migratus has been posted on the site Pastelegram.

Solo show at RedSpace Gallery:
I'm exhibiting a new video installation piece in a show titled Of Migratus. Opening reception is at RedSpace gallery in Austin, TX, on March 24, 2012.

The show runs from March 24 — April 15 2012.

Serie Project XIX:
I will be participating in a residency at Coronado Studios. Look for a brand new print with the official Coronado Studio label by the end of March. The Serie Project strives to share the wealth of Latino culture with all communities by producing, promoting and exhibiting limited edition fine-art serigraphs created at Coronado Studio.

Luminaria 2012:
I am excited to announce that I will be doing a performance at Luminaria in San Antonio, TX titled Sacred Dance of the Migratos on March 10, 2012.
For this performance I will be wearing an Electroluminescent Cat Suit dancing to choreography that fuses a mixture of cultures. Listen to an interview with TPR here. Luminaria is located at the HemisFair Park, in downtown San Antonio, TX.

Update: Event has been postponed until May 5th 2012.

*Update: Fundraising unsuccessful. Will try again another time.
Kickstarter Project Launched
Send Michael to Argentina
I'm trying to raise $7,377 (airfare included) to travel to Buenos Aires, Argentina for an Artist Residency at Proyecto Ace. Proyecto Ace is a non-profit artist in residence program located in Buenos Aires, Argentina. I've been invited to do a SUB-30 Production Residency where I will make a site-specific, full-scale installation based on my Codex Migratus project.

The residency is from April 9 to April 26, 2012. During that time, I will be researching, visiting the city, and constructing my installation in the gallery space. I plan on letting my first-hand experience of crossing borders and interacting with a new country influence my project.

This is a fairly new residency program that doesn't have funding yet. So, it's up to the artist to come up with the funds to participate in this residency. If I don't meet my goal then no rewards are given out to you and no money is given for my residency. (If I don't raise $7,377 then no Argentina for Michael and no rewards from Michael!!)

New Kickstarter Project Launched:
Buenos Aires is the capital city of Argentina with a rich immigration legacy that ties it to countries from all over the world. This trip would be a tremendous resource for my project! Your support will help me write deeper into the mythology of the narrative for the Codex Migratus. New experiences mean more story for you to benefit from as the work moves towards global immigration matters!

Thank you for your interest in my project! Anything helps!!!

For a donation of $100 or more, you will receive this LIMITED EDITION PRINT!

-Michael Menchaca

Strength In Numbers MIAMI:
The Skowhegan class of '11 has an ever-changing installation project at SCOPE MIAMI 2011 titled STRENGTH IN NUMBERS. You can spot some prints of mine if you look closely at the link. If your in Miami this week please check it out!

Artist Foundation of San Antonio Awardee:
I have been awarded my first artist grant from the Artist Foundation of San Antonio!