<i>La resolana</i>: Chicano Artistic Imaginaries of Place, Race, and Activism in New Mexico and Texas, 1969–1985

<p>This dissertation examines the work of Chicana and Chicano artists who participated in a loosely interrelated network of artist collectives and communities in New Mexico and Texas from the late 1960s to early 1980s. Animated by the exigencies of the Chicano civil rights movement, they created work that, I argue, enacts a strategy that melds subversive historical revisionism and the reclamation of generational practices as a counter to the racist, whitewashed, and settler colonial-based imaginaries and mythologies that characterize the two states and their historical and contemporary self-fashioning. This strategy aligns with a locally-sourced paradigm that emerged among Chicano activists in northern New Mexico—la resolana—which forms the theoretical springboard and armature for the dissertation. Literally a sunny spot or glare, in northern New Mexico Spanish, resolana refers to the sunny, wind-protected side of a building where villagers convene to dialogue and exchange knowledge. Members of the Dixon, New Mexico collective La Academia de la Nueva Raza reclaimed and re-signified the term to encapsulate their practice of gathering and compiling local elders’ anecdotes, recipes, proverbs, and longstanding practices and lifeways for use as a pedagogical tool. This dissertation adapts the framework and brings it to bear on the visual arts and art history through an analysis of four artist case studies—Anita O. Rodríguez, Luis A. Jiménez, Jr., Melesio “Mel” Casas, and Santa C. Barraza—spanning communities across the two states and working in an array of mediums and styles.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Doctor of Philosophy

Level thesis:degree_level

Doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Art History

Grantor

The Graduate School and University Center of The City University of New York

Year dc:date.available

2025

Author dc:creator

• Gandert, Sonja

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Anna Indych-López

Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember

• Katherine Manthorne
• Caitlin Meehye Beach
• Michael Trujillo
• Josh T Franco

• Chicana/o Studies
• Contemporary Art
• Latina/o Studies
• New Mexico
• Texas
• Latinx
• Chicanx
• Southwest

Repository record dc:identifier

https://academicworks.cuny.edu/gc_etds/6308

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:academicworks.cuny.edu:gc_etds-7440