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2018 Spoken/Unspoken: Forms of ResistanceDescription
SANTA CRUZ, CA – (January 11, 2018) As part of Santa Cruz’s countywide SPOKEN/UNSPOKEN exhibition series, the Sesnon Art Gallery at the University of California, Santa Cruz highlights a collection of artists and activists engaged with forms of resistance. The term “resistance” can represent various profiles from opposition to struggle; it can also portray resilience, strength, courage, and standing up for basic rights. Many artists examine the strength behind resistance and challenge the status quo from politics to art making.
Selected artworks cover a range of outspoken topics of social justice from land rights to human rights, and in a variety of unspoken print media and conceptual practices. Many of the works in the exhibition are from Self Help Graphics, a print studio and gallery founded in 1970 in the heart of East Los Angeles, dedicated to the production, interpretation, and distribution of prints and other art media by Chicano/a and Latino/a artists.
With over 20 artists, this exhibition features work by: Ruth-Marion Baruch, Irene Carvajal, Jo Hanson, Laura Kina, Hung Liu, Yolanda Lopez, Irene Lusztig , and Yoko Ono, along with artifacts about Angela Davis and posters from the Guerrilla Girls. Self Help Graphics artists are: Laura E. Alvarez, Maria Elena Castro, Yreina Cervantez, Dolores Guerrero-Cruz, Raquel Gutierrez, Jean LaMarr, Alma Lopez, Laura Molina, Rebekah Miles, Delilah Montoya, Kimberly Robertson, Favianna Rodriguez, Marianne Sadowski, and Consuelo J. Underwood
This exhibition cannot capture all types of activism or resistance. Instead, this grouping offers a diversity of topics and artistic approaches focused on particular moments and themes—from questions of immigration and representation to the fight for equality—that remain relevant today. At the core of the exhibition is the concept that artists play a critical role in transforming our time and shaping the future.
The Sesnon Gallery encourages student and faculty research and will incorporate print media for messaging, free silk screening workshops, and inclusion of audio and video documenting forms of spoken resistance that continue from generation to generation.
Forms of Resistance is sponsored by the UCSC Arts Division, History of Art and Visual Culture department, Chicano Latino Research Center, the Institute of the Arts and Sciences at UCSC and ARRT, a local Santa Cruz Art Collective.
In conjunction with the Sesnon Gallery exhibition, The Museum of Art & History (MAH) will host a public lecture: Art Transforms Communities on Friday, Feb. 9, 5:30 -7:00 p.m. with guest speakers Betty Avila and Alexa Kim from Self Help Graphics in Los Angeles.
