September 15-October 15 is Hispanic Heritage Month. In honor of that, I wanted to take a look at the Chicano Art Movement. Chicano (or Chicanx, or Xicanx) art refers to work made by people who identify as Mexican-American, or who are of Mexican descent, especially as associated with the Chicano Art Movement. The Chicano Art Movement came about in the 1960s-1970s https://artincontext.org/chicano-art/ and is the visual expression of the the Chicano Civil Rights movement  

The movement celebrates and asserts Mexican American culture, identity and rights. Much of the work touches on Mexican Muralism of the 1920s through 1940s and precolombian art, along with many diverse influences and topics, including family ties, popular culture, Mexican history, propaganda, and everyday life in the barrio.

Poster art, especially related to boycotts, and other social justice actions are a major aspect of this movement.

Viramontes, Xavier. Boycott Grapes: Support the United Farmworkers Union 1973 Contributing Institution: UC Santa Barbara, Special Research Collections. Also available at the Library of Congress https://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2022666169/

United Farm Workers, Sponsor/Advertiser. UFW boycott lettuce. United States, None. [Between 1965 and 1980] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2015649388/.

Check out the Mission Grafica collection for examples in the Library 

Mural art is another major expression:

Highsmith, Carol M, photographer. A portion of artist Melchor Ramirez's mural honoring Chicano activist Cesar Chavez in a small park bearing Chavez's name in Tucson, Arizona. To his right is a depiction of the Aztec goddess Tonan. In an adjacent portion of the sweeping mural, historical figures Leo Tolstoy and Mahatma Gandhi are shown. United States Tucson Arizona, 2018. -03-14. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2018663098/ .

Highsmith, Carol M, photographer. Mural on side of La Chiquita Bakery depicting Mexican-American family life in San Antonio, Texas. United States San Antonio Texas, 2014. -04-15. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2014631985/ 

Some of the posters and murals incorporate imagery from earlier Mexican print media. The José Guadalupe Posada prints published by Antonio Vanegas Arroyo available through the Library are great examples:

People of my generation are familiar with Cheech Marin as a comedian, but did you know that he has created the largest private  collection of Chicano art? His collection is now at the center of The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture, in Riverside, CA (associated with the Riverside Art Museum): There’s a good article in the New York Times about Marin’s collection and the Cheech. 

I put together a very incomplete collection of resources related to the Chicano Art Movement. Do you have anything to add? 

Chicano Art Movement:

• https://www.artsy.net/gene/chicano-art
• https://sva.libguides.com/latinxart/chicanoart 

Blog posts on Chicano art from the Library:

• Artwork by Chicano Movement “Artivist” Mario Torero https://blogs.loc.gov/catbird/2017/09/artwork-by-chicano-movement-artivist-mario-torero/
• ​​Celebrating Hispanic Heritage in Murals https://blogs.loc.gov/picturethis/2020/10/celebrating-hispanic-heritage-in-murals/
• The Chicano Civil Rights Movement https://www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200197398/

Chicano/Xicanx art collections and exhibitions:

• Interview with the curator of an exhibition of contemporary Xicanx art at the Museum of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia https://creatorsvancouver.com/curating-xicanx-dreamers-changemakers/
• Digital accompaniment to the exhibition, with great images and notes by artists and the curators: https://xicanxart.com
• The Cheech: https://cheechmarin.com/chicano-art/ 
• The Mexic-Arte Museum in Austin, TX  https://mexic-artemuseum.org
• National Museum of Mexican Art https://nationalmuseumofmexicanart.org
• Smithsonian Exhibition on Chicano Graphics https://americanart.si.edu/exhibitions/chicano-graphics
• University of California, Santa Barbara digital collections https://www.library.ucsb.edu/special-collections/cema/digitalChicanoArt https://www.library.ucsb.edu/special-collections/cema/chicano-latino-collections
• Family, Homeland, Revolution: Stories of the Chicano Movement https://www.mexicanmuseum.org/chicano-movement

Mural Art:

• https://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/entries/chicano-mural-movement
• https://www.chicanomuralsofcolorado.com