Josefina Quezada

Josefina Quezada (circa 1925 - May 2012)[1] was a Mexican-born Chicana muralist, photographer and supporter of the arts in Los Angeles. There are twelve murals in Los Angeles created by Quezada.

Biography

Quezada was born in Mexico City.[2] She grew up in the Mexicaltzingo neighborhood of Guadalajara.[3] In the 1940s, she studied at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).[3] She first came to Los Angeles in 1971, when she was hired to restore David Alfaro Siqueiros' América Tropical mural.[4][5] She and Jaime Mejía opted to preserve the mural at the time.[6] Quezada worked with Shifra Goldman and Jesús Salvador Treviño to document the mural and the work done to preserve it.[2] Quezada spent around thirty years living in the United States.[3]

In 2005, Quezada was honored by the Jalisco Secretary of Culture for her decades of work as an artist.[7]

Quezada died in Mexico in 2012.[2]

Art

Quezada made two murals in Mexico and twelve in Los Angeles.[7] She was also a noted photographer.[7] The Los Angeles Times wrote in 1975 that her "laborious bordertown genre scenes need to break out of a stiff, confining style."[8] Quezada's work connected "women's labor in Latin America to Chicana labor in the United States."[9] Oscar Castillo who has documented the work of Chicano artists, said that she gained inspiration from family in friends when choosing what to paint.[2]

In 1978, a mural she designed, Tree of Knowledge, or the "Read" mural, was completed by artists from the Chicana Action Service Center (CASC).[10] Tree of Knowledge uses symbols to emphasize understanding one's own "historical roots," and is also a celebration of "the community of readers."[11] The mural was restored by the Social and Public Art Resource Center (SPARC) in 2012.[12]

Quezada created a mural with Michael Schnorr for Chula Vista High School in 1982.[13] In 1983, she was part of a show of mural art at El Centro Cultural de la Raza at Balboa Park.[14]

Her work was featured and honored in the Second Women's Biennial of photographers in 2005 in Guadalajara.[3]

References
  1. Fuentes, Ed (30 August 2012). "Monthly Mural Wrap: A Dozen Tags for August, 2012". KCET. Archived from the original on 29 September 2017. Retrieved 25 September 2017.
  2. Borden, Tessie (16 June 2012). "Josefina Quezada: A Lifetime of Fighting for Public Art". The Autry Blog. Autry National Center of the American West. Archived from the original on 4 April 2015. Retrieved 27 March 2015.
  3. Carillo, Eduardo (13 June 2005). "Segunda bienal de mujeres fotografas" (PDF). Graceta University (in Spanish). Retrieved 25 September 2017.
  4. Davidson, Terry (1982-11-07). "Spartans of Legend CV High Mural". Chula Vista Star-News. p. 12. Retrieved 2017-09-24 – via Newspapers.com.
  5. "Josefina Quezada". Mural Conservancy of Los Angeles. Archived from the original on 22 April 2017. Retrieved 25 September 2017.
  6. Treviño, Jesús Salvador (2001). Eyewitness: A Filmmaker's Memoir of the Chicano Movement. Houston, Texas: Arte Publico Press. pp. 214. ISBN 9781611921434. josefina quezada mural.
  7. Mesinas, Samuel (7 June 2005). "Josefina Quezada recibe hoy homenaje". El Universal (in Spanish). Retrieved 2017-09-25.
  8. Wilson, William (1975-06-23). "Chicana Artists Still Seeking Idenfication". The Los Angeles Times. p. 49. Retrieved 2017-09-24 – via Newspapers.com.
  9. Davalos, Karen Mary (2017-07-25). Chicana/o Remix: Art and Errata Since the Sixties. NYU Press. p. 60. ISBN 9781479849505.
  10. "Tree of Knowledge (aka Read)". CultureNOW. Retrieved 2017-09-25.
  11. Barnet-Sanchez, Holly; Drescher, Tim; Ybarra-Frausto, Tomás (2016). Give Me Life: Iconography and Identity in East LA Murals. Albuquerque, New Mexico: University of New Mexico Press. pp. 238, 240. ISBN 9780826357489 – via Project MUSE.
  12. "Restoring 'Tree of Knowledge' - 2012". SPARCinLA. Retrieved 2017-09-25.
  13. Davidson, Terry (1982-11-07). "Spartans of Legend CV High Mural". Chula Vista Star-News. p. 1. Retrieved 2017-09-24 – via Newspapers.com.
  14. Branscomb, Max (1983-05-12). "Chicano Artists Paint Murals and Politics". Chula Vista Star-News. p. 7. Retrieved 2017-09-24 – via Newspapers.com.
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