The border region has long been a place where art is used as a tool for social change. The different problematic dynamics that we experience have created an art movement that focuses on protest and solidarity, with many artists building socially-engaged practices that develop alongside and intertwine with their professional careers. This way of making art, however, is not specific to the border region. Countless artists throughout the world have made use of their practices to take advantage of the power of art as a way to communicate ideas, incorporate underrepresented communities, and fight for a more just future.
It is on this stage that LxsDos, consisting of wife and husband team Christian Pardo and Ramon Cardenas, developed and co-curated the show Gráfica Libre. The team brought together over 30 artists from the border and beyond to celebrate and elevate people that, through their work, continue to fight for the betterment of their communities. The exhibition puts forward a collection of work from makers that have worked in the public realm, hence the title Gráfica Libre or “free graphics,” combining their social messages with art accessibility through print, graffiti, street art, and other practices that aspire toward mass dissemination of ideas.
The artist selection includes those that have influenced or have been influenced by LxsDos’ practice throughout the years, as is the case with the work of Mexico City-based collective Gran OM. Besides sharing an extensive collection of their offset litho prints that are on view throughout the space, Gran OM also helped create its identity as well as the lineup posters found in the atrium of the Region One Gallery that hosted the show.
The collective has been active since 2006, creating attractive graphic visuals with deep, direct messages that question our realities while proposing new ways of living. Their work, which incorporates prints, muralism, and performance, has focused on socio-political issues pertinent to Mexico and Latin America, such as farmers’ rights and gender violence. With their images, Gran OM directly reminds the audience of their collective power, while also exerting our right and responsibility to protest.
Caledonia Curry, artistically known as Swoon, is known for her pioneering work that incorporates social practices and public work through profound, long-term projects that envision and utilize the transformative role of public art in communities. Trained as a printmaker, Swoon often creates large-scale relief prints that are then pasted up in the streets of the many places she works in.
For Gráfica Libre, the artist shared a collection of prints—some of which are finished off by hand with paints and collage—of her extensive body of work, including a portrait of Sylvia Elena, a victim of femicide in Ciudad Juárez. The artist worked closely with Sylvia’s family during a project she developed in the border city during 2012, an example of Swoon’s commitment to working alongside communities and her special focus on healing trauma through art. This portrait was originally pasted up in the city in collaboration with Juárez-based artist Juan Carlos Reyes, who is responsible for the stencil work around the print. The pieces displayed show the remaining part torn off the original paste-up.
Juan Carlos Reyes is part of the local contingent of artists whose work is included in the exhibition. Reyes has built a practice as a multimedia artist, with a special focus on muralism and community-engaged work. Through his experience, Reyes has engaged underprivileged communities in the city for over ten years with workshops, classes, and collaborative projects. For his participation in the exhibition, however, the artist relied on studio art practices to create a collection of pieces that make use of his knowledge in 3-dimensional work.
El caminante #2 is a mixed media collage depicting three people carrying brick houses on their back, a clear allusion to the migrating essence of the border that has materialized and exploded in recent years, as well as the heaviness of leaving home for an unknown, hopefully safer, place. The same image is replicated in El caminante #1, a simple but rough embroidery piece that, through its physicality, alludes to the hardships experienced by people in migration. Additionally, Reyes’ work allows us to understand that although the exhibition is built around public art, the work produced by the participants goes beyond and incorporates an intricate and detailed studio practice, which informs and is informed by the work produced on and for the streets.
The work of Nabil Gonzalez, El Paso-based artist and educator, looks into the rooted problem of forced disappearances. During the last three decades Mexico has experienced different waves of missing people: women, rural students, migrants, and others are all victims of a sinister reality that has put the country on high alert, creating a collective psyche in which the country seems to be forever looking for (or easily forgetting) the estimated 100,000 people missing. Gonzalez created the series Los que fácil se olvidan (Those who are easily forgotten) with monotype print on stonehenge paper, a total of four pieces that depict silhouettes of people with a monochrome scheme, alluding to the countless victims of the violent phenomenon.
By removing detailed features in the human figures, the artist prompts the viewer to imagine who the bodies could belong to, giving space to an interpretation that can go from the personal to the societal. In some of the prints, the silhouettes are faded and mixed, visually expressing the way the victims’ identities and memories fade away, becoming only a number in the statistics of a failed state.
Colombian artist Erre makes a powerful appearance in the exhibition. Her work, which focuses on the representation of women and their role in society through stencil and graffiti, showcases the impact female-identifying artists have been making in the male-dominated field of street art. With striking, colorful, and bold illustrations, Erre’s work depicts women in potent roles with agency, not only offering the audience a different way of looking at them, but more importantly, providing an alternative image on which the younger audience can see themselves reflected. Combining direct messages, such as “Hazlo tu misma” (Do it yourself) and “Destruye” (Destroy), with young female figures in actions of protest and rebellion, Erre’s work encapsulates the strength women have not only in art, but also in the fight for equality and social justice.
At the heart of Gráfica Libre’s artists’ practices we find a questioning of highbrow, contemporary artistic scenes, which are often elitist and status-quo conforming. Exhibiting work that is found on the streets—which is easily replicated and distributed and often happens under the radar of the law—the creators get rid of the agents that gate-keep what is deemed important or good art (or even just what art is). The exhibition elegantly brings back the work into a building with a dynamic that—far from confined—offers an alternative, community-focused structure that horizontally validates art and continues the freeing of the mediums.
Perhaps one day, with the help of these artists, we can equally achieve the liberation of oppressed communities across the world.
