Chavez, Lilibeth (week 9)

I really enjoyed Hector Diaz’s presentation on Martha Ramirez Oropeza from this last week. I found her work to be very relatable in my life and especially of interest because she spent a lot of her life living in the San Fernando valley to which I am a native. Martha Ramirez is a muralist, painter, performer research, and culture preservationist. I found her work with sustaining Nahua culture and language fascinating as sustaining communities is a work of culturally sustaining pedagogies. Her dual participation in academic research in combination with artistic expression really spoke to me, because while I consider myself an artist it is not necessarily the characteristic I first identify by, instead, I would consider myself an academic on the forefront and an artist secondly, so to see someone like Martha who has advanced her academic career profoundly while also being a recognized artist is admirable. I really enjoyed her work “Mother Nature,” where the figure of a woman is blowing life into the plants because it emanates such a natural peace that I relate to when I’m connecting with nature. It also is a reminder that at the center of everything is mother nature. I really enjoy Martha’s style of art as it is very simple and easy on the eyes while simultaneously engaging one’s mental and spiritual scape. Overall, I found Martha to be very fascinating in her academic and artistic endeavors. I am so glad that Hector introduced me to a new artist who is not only from our UCLA community but from my own community of Pacoima. In the conversation, I also learned about the mural mile located in Pacoima as well, so it was very insightful to find art and artists in my community when for long I considered art to be a thing of the upper class.