Roberto Esteban Chavez (August 3, 1932 – December 17, 2024) was an American artist, known as "a major figure within U.S.
Latinx art history whose work has influenced generations of artists that followed." His personally symbolic portraits, public murals, and "funny-grotesque" paintings reflect the multicultural landscape of
Los Angeles
Los Angeles, often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, most populous city in the U.S. state of California, and the commercial, Financial District, Los Angeles, financial, and Culture of Los Angeles, ...
. His work has been exhibited in the Getty Center's
Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A., 1945–1980, the
Smithsonian’s Our America: The Latino Presence in American Art exhibits and at the
Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City.
Background
Chavez was born in Los Angeles, California, to Mexican immigrants who left the chaos and dangers of post-Revolution Mexico. Chavez and his seven siblings were raised in the Maravilla neighborhood in
East Los Angeles
East Los Angeles (), or East L.A., is an unincorporated community and census designated place (CDP) situated within Los Angeles County, California, United States. According to the United States Census Bureau, East Los Angeles is designated as ...
, which at the time was inhabited by a mixture of working class families, mostly Latino, but also Jewish, Mexican, Armenian, Italian, Russian and Japanese emigres.
Chavez earned his
Master of Fine Arts
A Master of Fine Arts (MFA or M.F.A.)
is a terminal degree in fine arts, including visual arts, creative writing, graphic design, photography, filmmaking, dance, theatre, other performing arts and in some cases, theatre management or arts admi ...
in 1961 at the University of California at Los Angeles, where he met and worked alongside
Charles Garabedian,
Gordon Rice,
Eduardo Carrillo and
Maxwell Hendler. In the early 1960s, Chavez became part of the "emerging gallery scene along La Cienega Boulevard" at the Ceeje Gallery, which in contrast to the
Ferus and Landau Galleries that often exhibited New York artists, highlighted local, ethnic and women artists.
Chavez died in
Arivaca, Arizona on December 17, 2024, at the age of 92.
Murals
In the mid-1970s, Chavez began painting public murals throughout the city of Los Angeles, especially East L.A. where the La Raza political movement was gaining ground. His 1972 anti-war mural ''Porque Se Pelean? Que No Son Carnales'' became part of artist Sandra de la Loza's Mural Remix show at
LACMAbr>
Mural Remixed
In 1974, Chavez painted ''The Path to Knowledge and the False University,'' a 200-foot mural on the East Los Angeles Community College campus, where he worked as an arts educator and chair of the Chicano Studies department. Although the mural was destroyed by the college, the mural, its impact and the political questions surrounding the destruction were detailed in two museum exhibits: "Roberto Chavez and The False University: A Retrospective" at the Vincent Price Museum and "Murales Rebeldes: L.A. Chicana/o Murals under Siege" Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA Beyond Borders in 2017.
Later exhibitions
*
Advance of the Rear Guard: Ceeje Gallery in the 1960s ArtCenter School of Design, Pasadena, California. October 2023 - March 2024.
*
Zapata Después de Zapata Museo del Palacio de Bellas Artes, Mexico City, Mexico November 2019 - February 2020.
*
Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA
**''MURALES REBELDES!: Contested Chicana/o Public Art'', LA Plaza de Cultura y Artes, Los Angeles, September 2017 - March 2018; San Francisco, California Historical Society, April - September 2018; Sacramento, California Museum, July - December 2019.
**''A Universal History of Infamy'', August 2017 - February 2018, LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art
*
Our American: The Latino Presence in American Art', Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC, October 2013 - March 2014, National Tour through 2017
*
Pacific Standard Time: Art in L.A. 1945 - 1980 exhibits:
**''Art Along the Hyphen: The Mexican-American Generation'' Autry National Center, Los Angeles October 2011 - January 2012
**''L.A. Raw: Abject Expressionism in Los Angeles, 1945-1980, From Rico Lebrun to Paul McCarthy'', Pasadena Museum of California Art 2012 January - May 2012
*
Roberto Chavez and The False University: A Retrospective', Vincent Price Art Museum, September - December 2014
References
Further reading
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
External links
''El Tamalito del Hoyo'' by Roberto Chavez, 1959, oil on masonite at the Smithsonian American Art Museum.
"Self-Portrait with Speedy Gonzales" by Roberto Chavez, 1963, oil on canvas.
"Ladies Art Class, Sawtelle" by Roberto Chavez, 1967, oil on canvas.
"Jueves" by Roberto Chavez, 1992, Print Poster. Center for the Study of Political Graphics.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Chavez, Roberto Esteban
1932 births
2024 deaths
UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture alumni
Painters from California
Painters from Los Angeles
American artists of Mexican descent