Pilsen

Chicago’s Pilsen neighborhood, which was once so rich in culture and predominantly hispanic, is now unrecognizable. When walking down 18th street you don’t see the corner stores, little dollar stores, or as many hispanic owned businesses as before. The last few years have been dedicated to gentrifying the city, an attempt to erase the decades of culture and traditions. Pilsen has a history of activism, and is full of murals, and recently, art has been used as a medium in which people convey their activism.

What is artivism?

Artivism is the combination of art and activism, and it originated from Chicano culture. Artivism has started to be used in the Pilsen neighborhood as a means to do art, while at the same time being political. Artivism is used as a means to raise awareness towards issues that people might not care about be it not for this art. Artivism is not only creative, but it also sends powerful messages that engage the viewer. It is used to give voice to people that are often marginalized, and murals is one of the ways it is displayed. It is reinventing the way in which we view life. We can use art to make a difference, to raise awareness, to criticize, to unite people. In Chicago, there are a lot of different issues that artivism addresses. Pilsen is a neighborhood full of artivism. The “Prevent World War III” mural by Marcos Raya that I will be analyzing criticizes everything from the U.S. involvement in Colombia, all the way to the 2016 presidential election. 
 

Marcos Raya

Marcos Raya is a Mexican Chicago-based artist who combines politics and technology into his art. His work explores the sociological impact of technology, and calls for political action. The elements that his work includes is Mexican folklore, American pop-culture, Chicago-Style Pop-Expressionism and Rasquachismo. His work ranges everything from sculptures to paintings and murals. He is well-known in Pilsen for his art murals, and even has collections in the National Mexican Museum in Chicago, the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, the Alfred Smart Museum at the University of Chicago, the Menil Collection in Houston, the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston,and the Museum of Notre Dame in Indiana.



Raya is heavily influenced by his Mexican roots, and moving to Chicago in the middle of the Civil Rights Movement further helped him express his political beliefs through his artwork. Being an immigrant from Mexico, Raya struggled with alcoholism and portrayed this in one of his portraits called “3 A.M., Sunday Morning”, and used his Chicano identity as a source of inspiration combined with political statements in order to contribute to the artwork in the Pilsen neighborhood of Chicago. Raya even did a painting where he depicted himself as Frida Kahlo. His art ranges from self portraits (including one where he depicts himself as Frida Kahlo), to physical objects combining psychological and medical proportions,  to installations in museums. While he is known for his murals in the Pilsen neighborhood, “The Fallen Dictator” remains as one of his most political pieces, as in more recent years he is becoming known for his surrealist paintings and installations that are more modern and reflect the sociological effects of modern technology.

How does artivism describe the Latinx experience? How does it criticize the United States?