How are you spending your days during stay-at-home?

I am trying to walk, exercise, eat healthy and keep safe with my family first. Since my studio in San Diego is closed, I have been drawing, writing, designing and working on an artist book project. 

How has this impacted work?

First in practical terms, I have not been able to produce objects. I also have a couple of exhibitions that had to be suspended. One at Royale Projects and the other a retrospective at MUAC (Museo Universitario de Arte Contemporáneo) in Mexico City that was supposed to go to the MARCO (Museo de Arte Contemporaneo) in Monterrey and then to the San Diego Museum of Contemporary Art in La Jolla. The Museums in Monterrey and San Diego are struggling economically and that is creating problems too for MUAC. Conceptually and politically I find the situation as an interesting opportunity to rethink the purpose and mechanisms of distribution of art and ideas.

Is there an artwork that currently resonates with you at this moment and why?

There are a lot of artworks that are resonating with me right now. On one hand I am thinking in works that we presented at the gallery in the last two solo shows I had. In the first show some pieces were dealing with iconoclasm, abstraction and racism like “Whitewashed America.” This piece relates to the “América Tropical” mural of David Alfaro Siqueiros painted in Los Angeles in the thirties. His rendition of a crucified Native American was considered unacceptable and then painted white. In my version it ghostly reappears in the refractions of pearlescent shiny paint over white in a sort of monochrome fetish finish abstraction. These issues have become very relevant nowadays as we question the meaning and function of monuments and flags such as the confederate ones and their removal.  

In terms of historical artworks is hard not to think in the Goya series of etchings called “Los Caprichos” as current national politics seem to become a current theater of surreal stupidity with terrible deadly consequences. 

Your exhibition ‘Plata o plomo o glitter’ presents themes of police brutality, corruption, and the power of protest comparable to current events in the US and the Black Lives Matter movement, can you speak on the similarities and differences between the US & Mexico?

Women have been the visible victims of police brutality in Mexico, Chile and some parts of Latin America while here in the United States have been African Americans and other people of color. In both places people have been organizing and protesting more successfully bringing attention to the issues hopefully leading to change. Racism and sexism at the end are both expressions of similar power abuse. 

In early conversations about this exhibition, you talked about living through the Rodney King Riots, what was this experience like for you?

At the time I was doing my MFA at Calarts. I was in the suburbs in Santa Clarita isolated with the freeways closed watching on television the city burning. The times were really violent, with a lot of racial tensions and gang violence. I remember being stopped by police with the classic argument “you look like the suspect” meaning I was wearing a baseball cap, looking young and “urban” and driving a cheap car. Fights and gun shots were frequent and I witnessed some in car shows and the streets. I was in a Pomona car show that ended up in a well-known fight. The moments produced interesting culture like the best rap music, political bands like “Rage Against the Machine” and art as well. I remember the artwork of a peer called Donald Ferguson who I guess perhaps influenced some of the pieces of my last show since he used parts of LAPD patrols and did interesting photographs of gangsters and police. Brian Cross, Alan Sekula and Mike Davis produced interesting writings and photography as well. I produced a series of customized baseball caps and some other work reflecting in appropriation, politics, popular culture, race and representation. 

One Tijuana police hood titled “Burnt” is only clear coated to show the damage caused by fire, what happened to this auto part and what is the significance?

I found that hood in a junkyard where the Tijuana police kept damaged patrols. The hood was burned. I was told it was burned a few years ago by the Sinaloa Cartel when it was fighting against the Tijuana cartel. As I was painting and customizing patrol parts this hood seemed to be an abstract painting and an art piece already in itself. It looked interesting. We clear coated it to preserved it better. That gesture made the hood glossy and more like an intentional painting, so it is somewhere between a painting and a ready-made or conceptual art. It is also an index, a historical object and forensic evidence.  

Where did the title “Y La Culpa No Era Mia” derive from? 

“Y la Culpa no era Mia” (it was not my fault) comes from a feminist chant and performance that became very popular first in Chile, then Mexico and Latin America and eventually worldwide last year. It was performed in Los Angeles in front of “Urban Light” by Chris Burden at LACMA. The chant or song was written by the Chilean feminist collective “Las Tesis.” It is called “Un Violador en Tu Camino” (A Rapist in Your Path). It is very catchy and performed by women with their eyes covered in marches. The particular phrase I used refers to blaming women for being raped by what they were wearing or where they were. “Y la Culpa no Era Mia, ni donde estaba ni como vestía” it was not my fault, nor where I was or what I was wearing. 

What do you imagine for the future of the art community and world at large as we rebuild together? 

Hopefully we will rebuild in a more responsible way, in a more equitable way. It cannot continue the extreme accumulation of wealth of a few people at the expense of everybody else. Health and education (culture included) and the freedom they imply are basic human rights and not a privilege based on class, gender or race. The democratization of art depends on the democratization of wealth.