I create artwork about the Latino experience through individual slices of the life of the community, family and many other sectors of present-day society, both urban and rural. It is the collective that is important; it is the primary focus in all my work. The people in my artwork don’t have individual features; they are faceless, yet each one is important in defining the group, the community interacting and participating in its many rituals, social settings, and group functions such as work, play, school and family celebrations. But more than that, each artwork is only part of the total picture, the Latino experience, not as an isolated phenomenon but as an active, integral part of American society. This artwork illustrates the changing environment in the United States.

The demographics of this country are changing as the population of Latinos increases. The border as we know it is changing. The border is not longer just at El Paso, Juarez, San Diego or Tijuana. The border is here in Denver, it is in Los Angeles and in Phoenix. The border either expands or is shot full of holes. Cultures and languages mutually invade and affect one another. The United States daily receives uncountable migrations of human beings. This phenomenon is the result of multiple factors that include unemployment overpopulation and especially the enormous disparity in North/South relations.

In the postmodern age, my visual language speaks to the issue of international migration, focuses on shifting demographics, draws from pop culture by using existing community posters and seeks to present truth at a more local, personal level.

I began my prints by scanning some of my previously create works of art. I also appropriate some existing text usual in the manner of posters, flyers or forms. I then use photoshop to compose and design by overlapping images. Once I am satisfied with an image I will print the art work onto photo paper. I then create a transparent film through a photocopying process. I then overlay it on a solarplate, and expose the film and plate together to an ultraviolet light source. The surface of the plate is composed of a light sensitive polymer, which is also soluble in water. Wherever ultraviolet light strikes the surface of the plate, the polymer hardens, while the parts of the polymer blocked from the light by the opaque lines and marks of the drawing remain soluble. By washing the plate gently with a soft brush in tap water, the soluble residue washes away, leaving a plate with words, lines and grooves etched in to polymer. I then expose the plate a second time so that all the polymer that is left hardens. The final step in creating the etching is inking and wiping the plate as you would a traditional etching and then printing the image on a press.

Education
MFA, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado, USA [1995]
AAFA, Rocky Mountain School of Art [1992]
BA, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado [1980]
Certificate of Latin American Studies, University of Colorado, Boulder, Colorado [1980]

2005
“Land, People and Identity”, International Centre of Bethlehem, Bethlehem, Palestine.
Triumph of Our Communities, Gammage Auditorium, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona
The Border in Visual Language, French Alianza, La Paz, Baja California, Mexico
Perceptions of Christ/Images of Faith, O’Sullivan Arts Center, Regis University, Denver, Colorado
The Iowa Biennial Exhibition, Soros Gallery, Stockholm School of Economics, Riga, Latvia

2004
“War” Gallery Sovereign, Boulder, Colorado
“A Sense of Place: Mail Art Exhibit” Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, Boulder, Colorado
“Digital Libre: The Future of Chicano Art” Chicano Humanities and Arts Council, Denver, Colorado
“Contemporary Chicana and Chicano Art” Chicano Humanities and Arts Council, Denver, Colorado
“American Impression: National juried Printmaking Exhibition” the Ben Shahn Center Galleries, William Patterson Univeristy, Wayne, New Jersey
“Post Paradise” The Governor’s Palace, Tlaxcala, Mexico
The Iowa Biennial Exhibition, Project Art Gallery, University of Iowa, Iowa City, Iowa