Awesome
Current mood: optimistic

Come Partake in the Inauguration of Galería's Picturing Immigration Series

"No Distance Is More Awesome"

FEATURED ARTISTS:

ANA ADARVE
ENRIQUE CHAGOYA
LIZ COHEN
JAMEX + EINAR DE LA TORRE
SERGIO DE LA TORRE
ANDY DIAZ-HOPE
FRANCISCO DOMINGUEZ
ANA T. FERNANDEZ
DOLISSA MEDINA
JAIME MENDOZA
JULIO CESAR MORALES
CAMILO ONTIVEROS + SHANNON SPANHAKE
DULCE PINZON
ALEX RIVERA
FAVIANNA RODRIGUEZ
LUZ MARIA SANCHEZ


In No Distance is More Awesome, nineteen contemporary artists from north and
south of the U.S./Mexico border look at issues related to immigration from critical
perspectives that counter those reflected in the media and public discourse.
Poverty, social inequity, and civil wars are all reasons for the mass migration from
south of the U.S./Mexico border. However, the economic imbalances generated by
global free market economies are a root cause. NAFTA, the North American Free
Trade Agreement between the U.S., Mexico and Canada, in particular, has been
blamed for the loss of hundreds of thousands of agricultural jobs in Mexico, a central
cause for the mass relocation of campesinos both to the maquiladoras (assembly
plants) that stretch along the U.S. /Mexico border as well as across the border to el
norte. In the U.S., the off-shoring of manufacturing jobs is at the core of the
tensions between advocates on both sides of the immigration issue: laid off
manufacture workers are victims of the same free trade agreements that prompt
immigration. Rather than protesting against the Government's complicity with
corporations that depend on cheap labor to boost their bottom line, anti-immigration
proponents choose instead to demonize the border-crosser.

In the wake of the failed immigration reform bill in Congress, immigrants are facing
harsher realities. Undocumented migrant workers are faced with human and labor
rights abuse: poverty-level wages, raids at the workplace, deportation, and hate
crimes. States and municipalities are enforcing extreme measures that further
criminalize their labor. With the backdrop of the "war on terror," right-wing
politicians, radio talk show hosts and vigilante groups, such as the Minutemen
Project, are instigating the rising tide of anti-immigrant sentiment across the
country. This systematic vilification is ever more tragic in the light of the steady
increase of immigrants who die crossing, reaching several hundred each year.

The quote, "No distance is more awesome than the few feet across borders and
frontiers," by Homi K. Bhabha that inspired the exhibition title, evokes the daunting
experience of immigration at the personal price of displacement, cultural loss, and
physical and spiritual risk. Referring both to this individual dimension and to the
larger framework of globalization, labor, border politics and the culture of fear, No
Distance Is More Awesome offers a wide range of interpretations from the
perspective of contemporary Latino artists. Featuring artworks that vary from the
direct approach of documentary and activist strategies to the suggestive means of
conceptually driven projects, the exhibition seeks to bring critical nuances and
texture to the current discussion on immigration.

Carolina Ponce de León
Curator

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LA BOMBA: A Midsummer Night’s Benefit for Galería de la Raza
Current mood: accomplished

A historical benefit celebrating the BEST of Chicano performance in the Bay

WHAT: LA BOMBA: A Midsummer Night's Benefit for Galeria de la Raza Features include: Guillermo-Gómez Peña, Jack Hirschmann, Jose Montoya Special Appearance by her majesty Ester Hernandez as the Sun Mad Queen! Guillermo-Gómez Peña impersonation contest! Special Prizes and more...

WHEN: Saturday, July 21 TIME: 7 p.m. – 10 p.m.

WHERE: CELLSPACE, 2050 Bryant St. SF, CA 94110 (415) 826-8009, info@galeriadelaraza.org

Info: Advance Tickets $25, $30 at the door, $50 V.I.P (includes drinks, appetizers and after party music with Manicato). Tickets can be purchased at the Galeria de la Raza, 2857 24th St. and online @ http://galeriadelaraza.org/eng/exhibits/BOMBA/curr_exh_bomba.html
Galería de la Raza/Studio 24 is proud to present a historical performance event for the summer featuring many of the Galería's most accomplished literary and spoken word Bay Area performers. LA BOMBA: A Midsummer Night's Benefit for Galería de la Raza will host twenty literary/spoken word, theatre and musical acts covering the stylistic wit, satire and intergenerational ethos of Chicano performance and literature. For thirty-seven years, the Galería has earned its reputation as one of the most avant-garde Latino arts spaces in the nation. Tethered to a long history of Latin American performance that blended a satirical edge while chronicling the lives of the disenfranchised, the Galería has continued to nurture generations of performers that have added a contemporary voice to this tradition. Winner of the 2006 SF Weekly's Best Art Gallery, the Galería has been known for exhibiting innovative artists from around the world. On a no less prominent note is the Galería's tradition of serving as a community venue for the powerhouse of Latino talent that's focused its literary and spoken word prose and poems in combating the negative stereotypes of Latinos in America. In 2006, the Galería showcased over thirty performances of original Latino works, including such established artists as Jose Montoya along with the mind warping prose of the all Latina Lesbian ensemble Butchlalis de Panochtitlan (this was 2005, but figured I'd throw it in there?). A testing ground for a new generation of performers to exercise their craft, Xicanopalooza and Teatrazo rocked the house with a measured mixture of guerrilla theatre and Latino alternative rock music. The nation's leading all-Latina theatre ensemble, Teatro Luna, premiered their new theatrical work "S-e-x-OH! in addition to leading workshops for local troupes.

LA BOMBA is a tribute to the hundreds of performers that have walked through the Galería's doors and delivered fresh and innovative works that have mesmerized audiences and brought them back for more. More importantly, ALL of the artists have generously donated their performance time in to support the Galería in continuing to showcase the best and brightest of Latino performance artistry.

Highlights of LA BOMBA include:
• Legendary Chicano poets (los veteranos) that were there at Galería's inception: Jose Montoya, Juan Felipe Herrera and Margarita Luna Robles.
• McArthur Genius and internationally renowned performance artist Guillermo Gómez-Peña.
• San Francisco poet laureate and special guest Jack Hirschman.
• The new-school spoken word powerhouses: Leticia Hernandez, Paul Flores, Meliza Bañales, Norman Zelaya, Jaime Cortez and Las Manas.
• Performance artists Praba Pilar and René Garcia.
• Direct from Mexico City, performance artist Violeta Luna.
• Theatre performances by Campo Santo, headRush and Maceo Cabrera.
• Video sketches by San Antonio's madMedia Collective.
• Music by SF Latin fusion band Manicato and KPFA's DJ Aztec Parrot.

All proceeds from LA BOMBA go towards funding the latest phase of Galería's artistic programs including visual art exhibitions; the Digital Mural project, a rotating public art series; the ReGeneration Project, a career development program serving emerging Latino artists, and the award winning Youth Media Project, an innovative youth arts education program which teaches digital art and new media classes in Spanish and English to Mission District immigrant youth.

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Archive

The Archive is a comprehensive database of curatorial and artist media that document Galería's exhibition history since its founding in 1970. You will find exhibition images, essays, interviews, reviews, curatorial statements, artist bios and portraits and much more to come.

You may search by YEAR or by ARTIST.

In certain instances we were unable to secure documents for some of Galería's early years. If you have information that will allow us to update our files please send us an email to archive@galeriadelaraza.org.

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La Mini Tienda

Come visit the back of the main gallery to view our newest addition to the space, the Mini- Tienda. In the Mini Tienda you will find many of the staple items found in our previous corner gift shop; Decorated candles, Helguera calendars, Chicano literature, pins, post cards, copal, and locally desingned shirts and accessories.

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YOUTH RIOTS!
Current mood: accomplished
Category: Art and Photography

The Galeria's Youth & Media Project is a new mentorship based arts program in the heart of the Mission. Designed to include the Mission's diverse histroy as well as address the issues critical to our communities, the programs's focus is to engage participants through ecperiential media workshops that integrate graphic arts, web design, documentary fim and music producing. Participants will hace access to Galeria artists both as teachers amd mentors who have debeloped programming that integrated the relationship abetween creativity, social awareness, and community building. Set in the Galeria's Stufio24 space, the workshops engage participants in the creation of art that pushes boundaries by channeling the energry and creativity of the Mission while cultivating a critical perspective of the social. cultural and political life that makes our community team with artistic energy.

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