Virtual Exhibition Now Open - ¡Presente!: 50 Years of Chicano & Latino Studies

2021 marks the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Department of Chicano & Latino Studies at the University of Minnesota. To commemorate the occasion, we developed an exhibition called ¡Presente!: 50 Years of Chicano & Latino Studies in collaboration with Comunidades Latinas Unidas En Servicio (CLUES) and the UMN Heritage Studies & Public History program. 

Hosted by CLUES in their St. Paul gallery, the exhibition documents the Chicano & Latino studies department’s five decades of scholarship and community engagement through a combination of archival materials and artwork from local Chicanx and Latinx artists.

About the Exhibition

¡Presente!: 50 Years of Chicano & Latino Studies is a multi-media exhibition that explores 

• Students’ mobilization efforts that ultimately created the Chicano studies department in 1971 and increased the faculty in the 1980s, 1990s, and 2000s.
• Female leadership among student activists.
• Cross-racial and -ethnic solidarities.
• Community-based pedagogies.

The curatorial team commissioned seven Twin Cities artists and two art collectives to produce work that is inspired by the department’s archival documents housed at the UMN Libraries Archives & Special Collections.

Contributing Artists

Luisa Armendariz & Margaret Ogas
Eric Garcia
Alondra Garza 
Cadex Herrera
Flor Soto
Xavier Tavera
Aleydis Valdovinos

Spoken Word Performances by the Palabristas

Lupe Castillo
Neri R. Diaz
Gabriela Erandi Spears-Rico
Marion Gomez 
David Mendez
Larry Lucio, Jr. 
Teresa Ortiz
Rodrigo Sanchez-Chavarria

Curatorial Team

Olivia Comstock
Karen Mary Davalos
Amber Delgado
Raquel Diaz Goutierez
Aaron Johnson-Ortiz
Ernesto Moreno
Kiara Padilla
Christina Martinez
Marah Mattison

Translation

Jennifer A. Dominguez
Alison Kraemer
José Garcia Balderas
Ivette Gonzalez

Digitization

Amanda Haugen
Samantha Porter
Denisse Santiago Ojeda