Cheech Marin Conjures Up ‘Chicano Visions’ at the De Young
When you think about Cheech and Chong, we bet you imagine a three-foot bong and a lot of smoke. How about one of the most celebrated collections of Chicano artwork? Didn’t think so. Over the years, between making movies about his once beloved cannibis sativa, Cheech Marin has amassed a collection of spectacular paintings that celebrates the expressions of his native Mexican-American culture. Amid the raging debates over immigrant rights, Marin has decided it’s finally time to share with us the Chicano way of life from a different perspective – that of the artists who live it everyday.
We have to admit, there’s been a lot of hype about his show and we were worried it might fall short of our expectations, but oh, were we wrong. The show is complex in that it covers a lot of ground across three major exhibitions: Chicano Visions: American Painters on the Verge, presenting the vibrant works of a wide range of the country’s leading Chicano artists; Chicano Encounters: Local Places & Global Communities featuring prints and posters by Chicano artists working with San Francisco’s Mission Cultural Center; and Chicano Now: American Expressions, a 5,000-square-foot interactive multimedia exhibition.
Image: La Pistola y El Corazon II, George Yepes
Are you still with us? Good. While the paintings in Chicano Visions are stunning with their colorful palettes and dizzying compositions, the show is really more about the politics, culture, religion and ethos of the Chicano community and works better as a social studies lesson than a show of excellent work.
The most fascinating piece from the collection is a work by the youngest of the represented artists, Vincent Valdez, titled, “Kill the Pachuco Bastard.” In this violent and dark painting, Valdez depicts a brutal bar fight between Chicanos and Navy sailors during the time of the 1942 Zoot Suit riots in Los Angeles.
For those of you scratching your heads, Pachucos were Chicano youth who developed their own subculture, wore unusual clothing like Zoot Suits and spoke their own dialect (sort of like the pirate hipsters who hang out at the Beauty Bar on Saturday nights).
In 1942, the murder of a young Pachuco man ignited a firestorm in Los Angeles and the racial tensions that had been building up over the years boiled over, resulting in a citywide dragnet of 600 Chicanos. Among those accused of murder was a young Pachuco named Hank Leyvas -- the poster boy for an entire generation of rebellious Chicano kids who refused to play by the old rules. As he and 16 other boys headed to trial, the mood of the city turned violent.
Valdez manages to capture that mood by skillfully filling his canvas with frenzied movement in an almost Hieronymus Bosch-like style. Except there’s no humor in the misery of his figures. Instead there is only murder, rape and despair.
Not all of the work in Chicano Visions is as depressing or dark as Valdez’s, much of it celebrates the Chicano culture or glamorizes it, as in the case of George Yepes, who creates beautifully stylized portraits of the Madonna and the Virgin of Guadalupe which are wrought with scandal for their overt sexualization of the religious icons.
Once you’ve had your fill of Chicano history in Visions, the exhibition flows into Chicano Encounters, a supplementary timeline of prints and posters for and by members of the San Francisco Chicano community. Starting in the mid-70s, the prints touch on everything from HIV testing to the political and social struggle, identity and culture within the Mission District. It is obvious that many of the posters were printed by hand, but it only adds to their authenticity and we found it amazing how so many of the issues facing the community 30 years ago, remain relevant today.
Lastly, the most entertaining part of the exhibition is Chicano Now, offering expressions of Chicano cultural style through the eyes of the nation's premiere Chicano performing and independent film artists including Bay Area favorites Cultural Clash, Guillermo Gómez-Peña, Lourdes Portillo and Gustavo Vazquez. Visitors can select a song on the jukebox, try salsa dancing, get behind the wheel of a lowrider and learn more about the many customs and contributions of Chicano society. We especially loved the Day of the Dead installation with its sweet, flowery altar and really couldn’t be torn away from the mechanized lowrider model. In fact, we kind of want one of our own now.
And so it goes without saying that Cheech Marin has done a great service to his community by allowing his collection to tour the country and we only hope that more Americans will be inspired to own lowriders, er, we mean appreciate Chicano culture and the color it brings our fair cities.
“The artwork presents our interpretation of the Mexican-American experience to American audiences in diverse parts of the nation and helps bring the term Chicano to the forefront of the art world,” says Marin. “When you view the art and understand the many interpretations, whether social or political and even religious, you see a 360-degree view of the Chicano experience.”
Chicano
De Young Museum
50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Drive
Golden Gate Park
Hours: Tues. through Sun., 9:30 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Friday: Open until 8:45 p.m.
Images: Kill the Pachuco Bastard!, Vincent Valdez and Room on the Verge, Pattsi Valdez