On December 9th Natalia Anciso’s 2nd graders got on stage to read out their first set of poems to an audience of other second graders and family members, followed by enjoying some treats and celebrating their accomplishments.  This occasion marked a milestone in our collaborative project called I Am Me And I Am Part of Us, that Natalia and I, colleagues since 2011, developed.  With this project, elements of TWAICB curriculum complement Ms. Anciso’s Social Emotional Learning and Social Studies teaching objectives to help students learn about respecting others and valuing their own personal stories.  The students are writing poems about who they are as people, and by the end of March 2023 will have considered what it means to be part of a greater community, using creative writing and visual arts to help express their ideas, all of which will be put into a book that the students will receive at their full culminating presentation.

Connect through Alma Sagrada: Cultivando Ritmos Naturales, an art exhibit at Pajaro Valley Arts in Watsonville, CA. It is our responsibility to acknowledge our past and current relationship with the land we occupy as a way to learn about and help revitalize its sacred systems, as well as our own vitality, and the vitality of our communities.

We recognize this land has been heedlessly stripped of its natural inhabitants through colonization, exploitation, and industrialization. For generations, all of us, regardless of personal origin and history, have been affected by this devastation and we can no longer ignore our collective responsibility to heal from this cycle of trauma.

A short while back I was interviewed by Clifford Brooks  for The Blue Mountain Review.  I got word that the June 2021 issue was just released. Read my interview (pages 98-100)` and be sure to check out all of the other incredible work in this publication.

Natalia Anciso Solo Exhibition

To support the commission of a new site-specific installation and solo exhibition by Natalia Anciso inspired by stories of migration at MACLA. The Natalia Anciso Exhibition will include an artist talk, question & answer session, as well as a community engagement activity for audience members to participate. In addition to the new work, MACLA will also present existing work by Anciso. In order to support the exhibition’s educational efforts, the artist’s career, and the broader field of contemporary Latinx art, MACLA will commission a scholarly essay and document the exhibition in a brochure that MACLA will share with their national peers.

Opening excerpt from article:
During the run-up to Donald Trump’s 2017 inauguration, the city government of the District of Columbia, anticipating throngs of protestors in attendance, released a list of items that would be banned from ticketed viewing areas on the U.S. Capitol grounds. Backpacks, weapons, and explosives were unsurprisingly listed, but signs, posters, and banners were also flagged as forbidden. For Aaron Huey, founder and Creative Director of Amplifier, a Seattle-based design lab dedicated to “amplifying the voices of grassroots movements through art and community engagement,” these latter restrictions—which seemed purposely designed to squash displays of dissent—represented both a worrying development and a creative opportunity.

The XicanX: New Visions catalog was designed by Madison Serna. It includes a forward by Yadhira Lozano, a curatorial essay by Dos Mestizx, artwork and statements by featured artists, and select interviews held by Claudia Zapata. XicanX: New Visions opened at Centro de Artes in San Antonio, TX on February, 23rd, 2020, and later became an online exhibit at dosmestizx.com. Exhibiting Artists: Natalia Anciso, Daphne Arthur, Efren Ave, William Camargo, Lisette Chavez, Arleene Correa Valencia, Rebekah Crisanta de Ybarra, Emilia Cruz, Ben Cuevas, Celeste De Luna, Josie Del Castillo, Yvonne Escalante, Audrya Flores, Eric J. Garcia, Joel "rage.one" Garcia, Nabil Gonzalez, Lisa Guevara, Lilia Berenice Hernandez Galusha, Xandra Ibarra, Erick Iñiguez, Michael R. León, Mark Anthony Martinez, Robert Martinez, Yvette Mayorga, Gilda Posada, Irene Antonia Diana Reece, Xavier Robles Armas, Natalia Rocafuerte, Alán Serna, Ana Treviño, Jesusa Marie Vargas, Tanya Garcia / Juan Ortiz, Kalli Arte Collective, Las Imaginistas

Juxtaposing beautifully colored, watercolor-drawn indigenous flowers of Northern California against stark, monochromatic images meticulously rendered in pen, I was inspired to focus my piece,  Oakland Rises (End the Criminalization of Our People) on the hope and determination that youth of color bring in the face of systemic racism and criminalization.

As a Bay Area educator, I focus much of my work on inequities in the public education system, bringing to light issues such as school push-out, elementary genocide, and the school-to-prison pipeline. Narrative change is essential in combating racial discrimination and criminalization of youth and young adults of color. Oakland Rises (End the Criminalization of Our People) aims to encourage dialogue and action around these issues to help create change.

I dedicate this piece to the youth and young adults of color in Oakland, who have been working to change up the narrative. We see you. We hear you.

Natalia Anciso has a real eye for color. She has to—she’s an artist. But you don’t have to see her work—which prominently features the bright hues of near-neon flora— to see how Anciso has mastered the use of bold, vibrant colors.

When we meet at Royal Ground Coffee, she emerges through the glass double doors in a cobalt blue t-shirt, scarlet pleated skirt, and indigo glasses. Framing her face is a pair of wood-carved earrings, big red roses in full bloom. She’s impossible to miss.

Though the palate she wears is loud, Anciso herself is surprisingly soft-spoken. Anciso is an artist of inarguable renown; her work has been exhibited around the world, and she’s been featured in high- profile magazines like Elle and Latina. She even earned a shout-out from former Secretary of Education John King, Jr., who said, “How can we expect a student to become the next Kara Walker, Natalia Anciso, or Kehinde Wiley if she’s never analyzed a painting, or had the chance to deeply study American history?” Clearly, Anciso is kind of a big deal.

Check out my piece, La Pisca, featured on the cover of Norma Elia Cantú‘s new poetry collection, Meditación Fronteriza.

Meditación Fronteriza is a celebration of culture, tradition, and creativity that navigates themes of love, solidarity, and political transformation. Deeply personal yet warmly relatable, these poems flow from Spanish to English gracefully. With Gloria Anzaldúa’s foundational work as an inspiration, Meditación Fronteriza unveils unique images that provide nuance and depth to the narrative of the borderlands. Written by the award-winning author of Canícula, Cantú has crafted a collection which carries the perspective of a powerful voice in Chicana literature— and literature worldwide.

La Frontera - The Border: Art Exhibitions May 2nd-November 17th, 2019 The Escalette Collection is deeply invested in acquiring and displaying art that engages with issues central to the lives of people living in southern California. As debate about the U.S./Mexico border has become ever more salient and polarizing, we recognize a responsibility to foreground work that takes part in this conversation. The artworks featured in the exhibition La Frontera-The Border: Selections from the Escalette Permanent Collection of Art form the nucleus of this effort. This exhibition, which developed into a campus-wide exploration of the subject, introduced us to many other artists whose work is dedicated to the subject of borders. We were privileged to meet some of the photographers from the “BorderClick: Tijuana/San Diego” initiative, and are delighted to be adding six of their works to the Escalette Permanent Collection. We are grateful to Phyllis and Ross Escalette for their endowment that allows us to grow the permanent collection each year in ways that respond to current events, ideas and concerns. The Guggenheim Gallery shows local and international contemporary artists and is committed to generating exhibitions that bring work situated within current artistic and intellectual dialogs to our students and curriculum. La Frontera-The Border: Art Across the Border presents a selection of works examining the subject of the U.S./ Mexico border from personal, satirical, and political perspectives, as well as the cultural and psychological implications of the physical wall. From artivist aesthetics (a term coined by Dr. Guisela Latorre in Border Consciousness and Artivist Aesthetics: Richard Lou’s Performance and Multimedia Artwork) to personal histories, these works explore the border’s effect on the lives of the communities on both sides, as well as the political significance of this delineating landmark.

Natalia Anciso creates art predicated on realities and legends of her upbringing. Her works are visual records of family, community, and border culture along her native Rio Grande. These Borderlands are currently ravaged by poverty, human trafficking, and the escalating Mexican Drug War. The Rio Grande cuts one land and people in two, like a wound, bleeding a legacy of pain, tears, and struggle that have beset the area for generations. Anciso's family has resided in this geographic territory for over four generations.

Ripped from the headlines, brutal stories of drugs, war and murder on the border became the subjects of alumna Natalia Anciso’s series “Flora and Fauna.”

One of the pieces, “Madre y Hijos,” shows a grieving mother kneeling over the bodies of her sons, both covered in delicate flowers drawn in orange, red and purple colored pencils. The subjects in each piece of the series are carefully sketched in graphite, fading into the background as viewers first focus on the vibrant colors. 

Anciso said the contrast between the harsh and the delicate, the beautiful and the painful, represents the complexity of being from the border. Raised in the small town of Mercedes in the Rio Grande Valley, Anciso’s family had been in the area for generations.

To mark ELLE's 30^th anniversary, we assembled 35 of the world's most accomplished 30-year-old women for an epic, bicoastal production shot by legendary photographer Mark Seliger at five New York City locations—the Lower East Side, Minetta Tavern, Central Park, The Staten Island Ferry, and Seliger's own West Village studio loft—and on the West Coast, at Malibu's Paradise Cove Beach and, ironically, at Universal Studios' old New York-themed back lots.

Accomplished dreamers all, they see 30 as we do: It's no longer a deadline, it's the starting line. So what does the modern 30-year-old look like? To what does she aspire? To paraphrase Freud, what does she want? As this group of outstanding musicians, comedians, politicians, artists, activists, novelists, athletes, and actors—all of whom are 30 this year—prove, the answer is: everything. This. Is. 30.

Opening excerpt from article:
When family tales are passed from generation to generation with no single point of origin, when history fails to document years of pain and struggle, when personal identity becomes too complex to describe in a single sitting, when memory and imagination mingle in the land of dreams, this is where art comes in very handy.  For young Latina artists, art is an invaluable tool to archive the past, understand the present and activate change in the future. Yet, as with many underrepresented populations, Latina artists and the work they produce are often silenced and overlooked. An exhibition entitled "Y, Qué? (And What!)" is here to change that.

Opening excerpt from article
What a difference an "a" makes.
The one that this year displaces an "o" in the title of the annual summer exhibit at Mexic-Arte Museum signals a first in that institution's longtime support of artists early in their careers. What has been for almost two decades now the "Young Latino Artists" show, presenting work by artists age 35 and younger, will be the "Young Latina Artists" show in 2014. While women have had their work included in numerous "YLA" exhibits over the years, this will be the first time since 1996 that the show will feature art exclusively by women.

Opening excerpt from article:

"The cannibal is a creature that threatens the collapse of identity and ethics, and instills anarchy in the social order."

As the non-profit group that runs the MexiCali Biennial describes it, "The cannibal is a creature that threatens the collapse of identity and ethics, and instills anarchy in the social order" and "can change our relationship with art, and perhaps with the world itself."

Cannibalism is the theme for the latest biennial. That's more than two dozen artists taking, consuming, and gaining the power of the thing or the person consumed.

We talked with curators Ed Gomez, Luis Hernandez, and Amy Pederson about the show, which includes work by Fred Alvarado, Natalia Anciso, Marycarmen Arroyo Macias, Ana Baranda, Juan Bastardo, Sergio Bromberg, Helen Cahng, Matthew Carter, Carolyn Castaño, Enrique Castrejon, Tony de los Reyes, Deborah Diehl & Arzu Arda Kosar, Dino Dinco and Rafa Esparza, Veronica Duarte, Roni Feldman, Kio Griffith & Carmina Escobar, Zoè Gruni, HELL- (0) featuring: Michael Dee, Martin Durazo and Ichiro Irie, Daniel Lara, Candice Lin, Juan Luna-Avin, Matt MacFarland, Dominic Paul Miller, Flavia Monteiro, Nancy Popp, Peter Bo Rappmund, Christopher Reynolds, Cindy Santos Bravo, and Fidelius X.

Opening excerpt from article:
Upon entering the 2013 MexiCali Biennial, visitors will be asked by a security guard to position their heads in the oval opening of a steel panel, where a camera will document their faces. In order to be admitted to the exhibition, visitors must agree to do this.

Opening excerpt from article:
The San Jose Museum of Art's new show, Mexicanismo, features works of irony and heartbreak by 13 artists.

The glistening black moustache spirals downward and outward—riotous parentheses for the red-veined drinker’s nose protruding far beyond the shelter of a towering sombrero.

Pop-eyed, dilated, soul-patched and stylishly draped, the 4-foot figure, sculpted impossibly of vividly transparent blown glass, stands with shoulders flung back, belly thrust forward, hands angling up from the wrists, in a “Whaaa—hey, man, I didn’t do it’ gesture.

El Immortal by the de la Torre brothers welcomes visitors to Mexicanismo Through Artists’ Eyes, just opened at San Jose Museum of Art.

Opening excerpt from article:
Oaxaca, Mèxico.- El Centro de Arte Contemporáneo de Bruselas Reciclart, presenta este 27 de octubre, una proyección de imágenes del trabajo más representativo de los últimos tiempos realizado por artistas visuales mexicanos y oaxaqueños.

La proyección tendrá lugar en el Estudio Marcel, recinto de proyección e intercambio artístico de las diferentes disciplinas visuales, convertido en un punto de referencia para la comunidad de Bruselas, Bélgica.

Opening excerpt from article:
There's SO much going on in the visual arts this week and weekend, it's impossible to take it all in - three art fairs (ArtPad at the Phoenix Hotel, ArtMkt at the Concourse Exhibition Hall, and the San Francisco Fine Art Fair at Fort Mason, plus at least six MFA shows (San Francisco State University, the San Francisco Art Institute, Mills College, the California College of the Arts, the University of California, Berkeley, AND Stanford University) are all up at the moment!