Judith F. Baca: Killed by a Placa

Judith F. Baca is a Mexican American who was born in Los Angeles on 1946. She is a muralist painter, monument builder and a professor at the UCLA Chicana/o Studies Department. Her artwork focuses in community aspects of social justice. For example, in Killed by a Placa (1974),  she was able to invoke the daily gang warfare in East Los Angeles. After one of her crew members died by the gang warfare, she felt the need to confront the brutality of street violence and the departure of many individuals who were close to her. Which is why, through the wood stain of paper of Killed by a Placa, Baca was able to provide "...an immediate and direct expression of personal angst, it also makes a broader statement about violence on the inner-city streets" (Lopez 56). With the use of community presence and her artwork, she was able to speak out about the systematic violence happening in the inner-city. The one and only violence that was killing young boys on the streets.

Although this painting provokes a nostalgic feeling, I was able to resonate by thinking about my hometown in the Coachella Valley. Similarly, there is violence that occurs due to gang violence. I remember that there was a point where bodies were found early in the morning; which it was obvious that the gangs were causing this alarming feeling in the community. Not only that, but it also made me think about the systematic oppression of how Latinos and African-Americans are the ones who are more likely to be incarcerated and are the ones who make up the highest percentage of incarcerated men. It's very frustrating how this judicial system can sentence a Latino more years, for the same crime, than a White individual. How is this social justice?