Final Post

I have always loved art and I have always been inspired by how many different types of art there are in the world. But this class has taught me about how important it is to discover art and artists of color. Before this class, I had no idea about how many Chicana artists there were and how significant their artwork was to their culture. I loved learning about the diverse backgrounds each artist has come from and how some of them have many different backgrounds that make them Chicana, but even other identities, such as Cuban and Japanese. I loved seeing the different styles and mostly color that's used in Chicana art, it made me realize how much color is so important to indigenous backgrounds and how beautiful it can be. I loved seeing the culture in every piece I saw, and even the pieces that didn't have much culture in it,  but still spoke about difficult issues like the environment and the control of the border. This class showed me how diverse and beautiful art can be, especially how the support and awareness of art made from women of color is so important for our education.

Letter to Yreina Cervantez, Week 7

Dear Yreina,
I think you are absolutely epic, to start out with. I admire your dedication to your art and to your culture. As a college student, professors always tell me to work towards and write about the things that wake me up in the morning. Every morning, I wake up to thought of what it means to be black and what it means to be cultured. My culture and the culture of others is what drives me to be successful. I want to dedicate my life to finding out what the true meaning of diversity and cultural awareness means to the world, and how much of a better place it would be if people could understand and appreciate it. When I look at your art and see the woman you are, you make that dream very real and obtainable. Being able to see who you are through color, paint, and vision is a true blessing and thank god for women like you.
If I had anything to ask you, it would be how did you find this place in your life when you knew who you were? How did you discover the importance of your cultural background as a woman of color? I know for a lot of people, their family and love has influenced them to know who they are. For me, My mother and father always instilled in me to be proud of being a black woman. I had black barbies, black Betty Boop's, black super heroes, went to visit black Santa Claus' during Christmas, and I had many books. But as a grow into a young woman, I am finding it difficult to find my identity and place in society. There are rules that I don't fall under as black or as a woman, and sometimes I find that it literally drives me crazy. So as a Chicana woman, how did you discover this comfort ability? Being a woman of color comes with so many complexities and I admire your devotion and clarity that you provide for women of color like myself to see and learn from.

Response to Ashley Uvina on Carlee Fernandez, Week 6

I thought it was great how you found a connection with Carlee and her connection with her art and identity. I think it's very interesting how identity can play a very important role in where we, as minorities, feel accepted. I really connect with Du Bois' idea of Double Consciousness; the feeling that you always have two identities no matter what you try to do. You have the native part of you and the American part of you. Often we find that people try to put us into one box, or to not even include us in the box at all. I think Carlee's art also truly represents who she is. I think her art lets it speak to it's own form of identity, without being just Chicana, or just fashion, or just simply art in general. I do also believe that no matter what she does, her art will always represent the Chicana in her,and that is something beautiful that she can give to this generation and the ones after. I also feel the same feeling of being in limbo with the black community. I joined a Latina based sorority and I get some backlash from the black community because of it. But that's the beautiful thing about this dual identity, this art, and even this life. There are so many beautiful things to identify with or as, and there should never just be one definition to who you are. So I think you should embrace your state of limbo and educate your Chicana community and even outside of that about your own struggles. We are social creatures and we are not meant to be put into one or even two boxes. We are infinite until the day we die, and maybe even beyond.

Week 5

I really enjoyed the presentation on Yreina Cervantez because her work incorporated the aspects of culture and digging in her roots in order to find her inspiration. I was very happy to know that her work was featured in the Fowler Museum because it is one of my favorite museums and overall favorite places to be. Yreina's artistic spirit and beliefs that more women should be in the field of art made me inspired because I too believe that it is a male dominated field. Women should be able to have the opportunity to express themselves and have a means of coping with a society that sees them as inferior. I believe art of any kind is a true spiritual and healing mechanism for women of color especially to gain power for themselves and I believe that Yreina is the perfect image for that.

I really enjoyed the pieces that were shown in class that Yreina painted. My favorite was the painting of Frida pregnant with twins. I thought it was beautiful that she painted her idol in the most beautiful light and giving her the thing she wanted the most, which was children. I loved how beautiful Frida looked and how Yreina incorporated the aspects culture with the Jaguar. The fact that the artist put her own face in the mirror that Frida holds in her hand shows her love for the fellow artist and her devotion to her own art and culture.

Week 3 Sketchbook Stencil

My stencil was a picture of a rose because I forgot the print out of my original stencil at home. My original stencil was a picture of an older black woman with a handkerchief on her head. For me, this symbol held a special place in my heart because it shows the long road of adversity that my ancestors had to face as an African, as an American, as a slave, and as a woman. Her old age symbolized wisdom and also a connection to the motherland, where I personally believe all African American people should go one day in order to really take a look back at history. It reminds me of the same thought of Aztlan, an original place that we call home and and where we will return when we die. The figure of the woman was very detailed and probably would have taken me a long time since this was my first time every creating a stencil.
The rose stencil that I used came out better than I expected and I was really glad that I took my time to cut out each piece. I think a rose had its own symbol within itself. A rose can meet beauty, hardship, love, peace, overcoming obstacles to get to the beautiful, etc. Personally, I believe all those meanings are tied in together so the rose ended up being a perfect stencil to put on the front of my book.

Week 2

I personally have not had the image of La Virgen Guadalupe growing up as a child. I come from an African American background, but my family was not that religious. My mother always believed in God, but she has always had difficulties in having faith in a certain religion. My grandmother was always a religious woman, she had converted to almost 4 different religions over her life. At one point she was a Buddhist, another a christian, another she practiced Judaism, another she was a Muslim, and then again, back to Judaism. She believed in all kinds of forms of faith and God, and it was hard for my mother to believe in the effects of religious faith as she grew up. So when she had me, we rarely ever went to church. At one period in my life though, we went to church all the time, but my mother was always uncomfortable. She did not like the yelling and performance that came with praising god; she felt that she could have love and and appreciation for the lord without having to be in church. So we never went back and she raised me to believe that god was alive and well, but that I could love him and pray to him in the confines of my home.

It was not until recently that I began to go back to the church. My father has come back into my life in powerful speed and now has an even stronger faith in Christianity and God. He believes that God is the reason why my brother and I are apart of his life again, and he wants us all to praise the lord for it. I attend church with him, but there are no figures that are as prevalent and impactful as La Virgen Guadalupe. The only thing close to her that has influenced my life is the bible and the Buddha. When I was younger, my grandma would take me to Chinatown in San Fransisco every week and buy me a toy. We would have the best times together, always eating candy and sharing laughs. But every morning before we left, she would make me rub the belly of a very small, very round, jade Buddha and promised me that it would bring me good luck. Of course, I believed her and would never skip a day.

Until one morning my mother caught me doing it and slapped my hand. She told me that there was nothing in rubbing the Buddha's belly that god couldn't fix with the words of the bible. She bought a very beautiful baby blue bible with a white angel on the front that was an easy read for children. So in some ways, I guess the bible was my own version of La Virgen Guadalupe because it was a symbol of hope for me.

McNeal, Jasmine

Hello, my name is Jasmine McNeal and I am from South Central, Los Angeles. I am African American and I'm a World Arts and Cultures major. I really enjoy immersing myself in the education on other cultures and I value the connections I can make to my own. I'm also excited to be taking this class because I'm interested in learning about what it means to be Chicana and how art can influence the Chicana identity.

In There's No Place Like Aztlan, The author discusses how Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz feels a sense of displacement from being in Oz versus her home in Kansas. I appreciated that comparison between Dorothy trying to find her identity in an "uncivilized" city, which was Oz and how indigenous artists who are also displaced are also on a journey to find their homeland, which is equivalent to identity. I also see a trend in the African American culture with the connection to the homeland as well. There is a trend in African American culture where some of us hope to find peace and return home to our Motherland of Africa. There has also been a longing for identity in the community to find a piece of ourselves that was taken from us in slavery. There is a similar comparison to Aztlan, which Gaspar De Alba describes as, "... the reclamation of 'the land of our birth', a lost or stolen motherland that was taken involuntarily"

Artist for Presentation Nora Chapa Mendoza

I choose Nora Chapa Mendoza for my presentation