As a Latinx performance artist, I knew our 2016 event was unique and vital to the Seattle community, showcasing Latina/x/o artists' identity and genre-expanding work. But none of us could imagine that our event would become part of worldwide university curricula inspiring a new generation of Latina/x/o artists. Academic performance historian Marvin Carlson wrote in Routledge's textbook "Performance: A Critical Introduction,” “There is a growing body of...artists who specifically identify themselves as Latinx, headed by...Xavier Lopez...featured in the first festival of Latinx performance, held at the Good Arts center...in Seattle... Latinx represents an important orientation in modern performance... concern(ed) with developing more inclusive and flexible attitudes toward designations of gender, race, and ethnicity...addressing this major reorientation of the field."
This entry was later updated to:
This is the final wording for the book until then, straight from the pen of Marvin Carlson "...and there is a growing body of theatre artists who specifically identify themselves as Latinx, headed by Xavier Lopez Jr. and Vicente Montanez. Lopez created the first festival of Latinx performance, held at the Good Arts center for experimental theatre in Seattle in 2016, in which Montanez performed. Lopez is also co-creator, with performance artist Katherine Adamenko of New York City, of Putoh performance, a melding of Chicano performance art and contemporary art inspired by Butoh."
As a child, before I even knew what art was, I would watch my father paint murals as part of the Los Angeles Chicano Art Movement, where I would tag along to the Mechicano Art Center on Whittier Blvd mentally devouring the exciting scenes of Latino artists expressing what it meant to be Chicano back then! Days passed as I watched my father paint his expressionist, politically charged murals, day-dreaming of my own future. Every month my parents would take us to the LA Museums and galleries, where we would see Warhol's “Brillo Boxes,” conceptual sculptures and the films of Joseph Beuys and Gilbert and George.
Later, in college, at the University of Nevada Reno and UCDavis, my mind was blown away by the work of Marcel Duchamp and the Dadas, who influenced my now, mixed media performances.
It was also during this time that I began to perceived an unspoken difference between how my heroes made art and how I--as a young Latino artist--was expected to.
Let me tell you a story. As a young artist, I searched everywhere for successful Chicano artists for a sense that my work had a place. When Duchamp or Beuys made their work it was about lives, their ideas, it reflected their view of the world. No one asked Marcel Duchamp to make work solely about his heritage—and he did not have to make artwork for the annual Halloween exhibition. I desperately wanted to make art that had meaning beyond other's expectations—art that reflected my own life and how I saw things? But I had no models, no history to fall back on. Because of this I did the only thing that I could, I decided that I would have to be my own model.
Ultimately, At UCDavis, critical theory, personal history and personal artifacts began to infuse themselves into my work opening it up to incorporate queer, feminist and other identity discourses. I created two theoretical treatises, "The Soft Cyborg," a variation on Haraway's "Cyborg" and "Putoh"--melding Japanese Butoh and Latino identity performance. In 2016, I co-curated "On the Edge: Latinx Performance Art Festival" the first all-Latinx performance art festival--apparantly--ever. I did this with Lauren Davis, La Sala Collective member and Assistant Director at Art Exchange Gallery. This led to me becoming part of university curricula across the globe when Marvin Carlson mentioned our event in Routledge's textbook "Performance: A Critical Introduction."
Today, Issues of gender, race and identity permeate my work and it is through performance that I seek to push the boundaries of how we perceive the essence of ethnic/cultural/Latinx performance, to give voice to underrepresented groups and, moreover, to expand the language of marginalized performance and even to broaden access through guerrilla and drop-in performances. As a conceptual artist, I am confronted with the sense that "Conceptual Art" is often considered to be an elitist, hegemonic realm. It has become visibly and conceptually associated with purity, intellectualism, masculinity and hegemony. As a Latino Artist who works with many materials that have been pared down to their core elements, minimalized and purified so to speak--creating fiercely personal narratives--I have been forced to deal with oversimplified views of who can make what and what art can be made.
I am part of a new breed of Latinx artists intent on expanding the themes and expectations available to minority artists--making art that is individual--defying traditional expectations of collective identity. I choose personal, everyday materials, a collage of sheets, candy, fake flowers, tin foil and personal items in order to tell my stories. This is an important conceptual, performative and material shift that cannot be overstated. It is a stance of liberation, which pushes the boundaries of expectations and dares to say that individual lives of color matter; which, in itself, is powerful and revolutionary, problematizing racial, masculine, cultural and identity essentialism in an intellectual investigation which is in no way post-race.
Perhaps the greatest engine that keeps me going is my over-developed desire to correct social injustices and my love for constant creation. Building community has always been one of my primary concerns; I have taught courses at UC Davis, UNR, Europe and art classes here in Seattle. I understand firsthand, the power of art to change a person and give their lives new meaning. Beginning at UNR, I have been in many art exhibitions, community events, auctions and live painting activities. In the last five years, I have been part of 8 teaching and artistic workshops with the Seattle Art Museum. In 2016, I was asked to put my dreams into action by programming an evening of performance art for La Sala Latinx Artists Network’s ‘La Cocina’ in Pioneer Square. This collaborative project entitled "On The Edge: Latinx Performance Art Festival," was the first all Latinx night of performance art. Up to that point, apparently, there had never been an all Latinx night of performance art in the Pacific Northwest. I had been wanting to get back into that part of my oeuvre. Not performances--that happens all the time--performance art--in all of its difficult to classify, irreverent, problematic, transient, impossible to document glory. In less than a month, we put everything together from scratch. I worked very closely with Lauren Davis of ArtXchange Gallery and Miguel Guillén as well as the rest of the folks at La Sala and La Cocina and the other performers. The night itself was not just historic; it was an amazing success! This magical event exceeded all our hopes. The first On the Edge Festival was a one-night event, small but expansive, dedicated to serving Seattle and the Seattle Latinx community, giving voice to local Latinx Artists presenting work that is rarely seen in our communities. What we created with On the Edge is a sense of freedom and inclusion that I have always searched for in my journey as a performer exploring themes of Latino/x identity, gender and class privilege. We had a very nice crowd and at least once, I heard a very audible gasp as I was on stage. There is something very real and very magical about doing something as visceral and honest as performance art in front of a live audience--it is an amazing feeling for the audience as well as the performer. Our night of performance had something for everyone and at the same time, the whole event was fundamentally individual and Latina/o/x, and is part of a larger conversation working not only to continue and preserve a set of cultural traditions, but seeking to redefine the nature of these traditions moving forward as we live at a time in which definitions of race, masculinity, gender and art are in flux
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