Face it, you didn't go to Miami this year... so why not party with us???
I am part of a massive group show at the SF MOMA and the opening is this Dec 2nd.
SHADOWSHOP GRAND OPENING ARTIST PARTY: Miami for the Rest of Us! Thursday, December 2 7:00 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. *note that Shadowshop closes at 8:30pm but the festivities continue in the SFMOMA atrium until 9:45pm.
Fifth-floor overlook gallery, SFMOMA 151 Third St. San Francisco, CA 94103
Join Curator, Stephanie Syjuco and the almost 200 artist participants of Shadowshop for the official Grand Opening Artist Party! Shadowshop features hundreds of affordable artists' multiples, small works, tchotchkes, catalogues, books, zines, media works, and other creative output.
Come out to meet and mingle with the makers, as well as snap up an early holiday gift or two. 100% of sales go directly to the artists! Current artists listed here!
----------------- SCHEDULE OF EVENTS: ------------------ 11am - 7pm: Museum open to the general public -- come early for pre-shopping and snap up those holiday deals!
7pm: Shadowshop artist party commences, including festivities on the rooftop garden hosted concurrently by Meatpaper magazine
7:15: Packard Jennings' unveiling of his special commission, "Vito Accconci," a limited-edition sculptural work available exclusively at Shadowshop!
8:30: Shadowshop closes for the evening but the festivities move downstairs for the concurrent Now Playing SFMOMA performances in the atrium and lobby.
---------------------- The Shadowshop Grand Opening Artist Party is part of SFMOMA's Now Playing performance events on December 2, 2010. Shadowshop is a project by Stephanie Syjuco in conjunction with the SFMOMA exhibition "The More Things Change" and supported by the Live Art program.
I am doing lots of art these days and traveling tons, but sometimes I suspect I may be working myself to exhaustion. It's been months since I had more than one consecutive day OFF, so on these few days off, I decided to make a list of the things that would really make me happy. I think its a good practice to do this. You should too.
What do I want? The Nov. 27th List:
I want to make art every day. I want to fight for the rights of my people, and for our pachamama. I want to be pain free in my body. I want to travel and talk about art everywhere I go. I want to learn how to medidate so I'm not so hyper all the time. I want to love myself everyday as much as I love myself today. I want to make animations and films with my graphics. I want to enjoy quality time with people I love. I want to really know myself and my inner garden I want to be in love with someone who I'm crazy about and is crazy about me. I want to be able to afford a lifestyle that allows me to do the things I want to do, like eat at great places and buy local and organic food. I want to be comfortable with being alone many hours of the day. I want to go to places where people are fighting for social change. I want to have short hair and embrace my tomboy side. I want to dance 80s music. I want to always speak truth and be authentic, even when it’s difficult. I want to live alone for a part of my life, like I did in Mexico City. I want to enjoy the moment. Not be thinking of what I am going to be doing tomorrow, nor be thinking about work. I want to have good posture when I'm at the computer. I want to be good to my dogs. I want to learn how to climb. I want to be a good auntie to my friends' kids because I don't want to have kids of my own. I want to exercise regularly without the fear of my breasts shrinking (they do). I want to sleep 9 hours a night.
What do I need to change in my current life to get here?
I first saw Laura Lopez in her cap and gown after following a twitter to this article.
At the time, undocumented migrant students were conducting sit-ins in congressional offices on Capitol Hill, risking arrest and deportation in order to draw attention to the DREAM Act.
Because I was working alongside the Trail of Dreams campaign, I knew very well the dreams of these undocumented youth - dreams that were worth even the most dangerous risks.
But still, there are moments when I am greatly moved by the sheer courage of these young people. I grew up in this country as a citizen. I have never known the fear of what it means to be stopped in the street by immigration agents, to be taken from everything you have known as a child and put in detention centers that ship you off to countries you have never even visited.
One afternoon, as I was getting my daily fix of immigration news, I saw Laura in this article, and I stared at her graduation photo for a long time.
Laura reminded me of a Chicana girl I had gone to high school with. I think I also took a liking to Laura because she went to the UC system, like me! This is what her caption read:
Laura came to America as a 1 year old baby on Independence Day. Since then, she has finished high school, graduated from the UC Santa Cruz, and become an advocate for her right to contribute to the country.
So I put her picture in my inspiration folder and was finally able to use it for a project I'm doing in collaboration with the Ca. Institute for Integral Studies. A modified version of this image is about to go all over public transit trains in the Bay Area. So this message is about to get viewed at least 10,000 times a day by BART riders.
I communicated with Laura and this is what she said when I asked her for an update on her case.
This month I turned 23 years old. I'm still undocumented. While I'm in the processes of legalizing, since I am from Mexico and there is a huge backlog, my 2005 application will not be read by an immigration judge for another estimated 18 years. I need the DREAM Act so that my time is reduced to the 6 years, albeit conditional permanet residency. I am part of the Bay Area DREAM Act Coaltion. I was able to apply and graduate from UC Santa Cruz, but like all other undocumented youth I couldn't qualify for federal or state financial aid so my parents and I both worked to pay all costs.
There are about 2 million youth who face what Laura is facing. These youth need for you to make a CALL to your members of Congress and ask them to support the DREAM Act.
It's simple and easy to do.
My crew at Presente.org set up this cool call-in system for you to document the call.
Here is a pic of Laura (right) doing a sit-in at Senator Reid's office on July 20, 2010. She can use your financial support. Due to “trespassing” charges following the civil demonstration, Laura is attending trials in D.C. Donations towards airfare & lodging appreciated. Donate by clicking here
And you can download this poster and share with your friends too! click here
One way we can fight the anti-immigrant hate that dominates the headlines, is by celebrating migrants and supporting their fight for justice.
Whether it's someone in your family who recently migrated (or even came a long time ago, like my parents), or a DREAMer youth who you have long admired (like the Trail of Dreams), or even someone who works in your building or your favorite restaurant, that worlwide special day when you can celebrate them is close.
So let's spread the word about it, because folks in this country hardly know it exists and we are coming up on the 10th anniversary!
Celebrating migrants is crucial during these highly troubling times, when conservatives are spewing out anti-immigrant and anti-Latino sentiment, and passing laws that are causing great suffering in our communities.
In the U.S. media, migrant's are consistently framed as "taking" from Americans, as a "drain' on resources. But the truth is that migrants make this country run, they literally feed the country (as noted by the amount of migrant labor in the meat industry and agriculture), and make it so that Americans' can have their cheap lifestyle.
And if we take it beyond the borders of the this country, the story grows more powerful. Migrant labor is sustaining the entire hemisphere. The amount of money sent back to Latin American home countries accounts for #1 or #2 exports in most cases, and migrant dollars exceed foreign aid year after year. That is some real economic power.
Yet those stories are rarely told, and so it's up to each of us to celebrate, honor, and show gratitude to the millions of migrant workers that make this country go. Join migrants’ rights supporters throughout the world in protest of abuse and discrimination against migrants, as well as in celebration of their lives.
Ten years ago, on December 4th, 2000, the United Nations proclaimed December 18 International Migrants Day.
2010 is also special because it's the 20th Anniversary of of the International Convention for the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families. Approved by the United Nations General Assembly on December 18, 1990, the Migrant Workers Convention (MWC) entered into force in 2003; to date, 44 countries have approved the Convention.
My friends at the National Network for Immigrant & Refugee Rights have put together a great list on how you can celebrate locally and make it a day of action. I've added some things as well. Suggested activities include:
Media events, blog entries, statements, press releases
Tweets, FB updates, and messages on social networks that celebrate migrants
Community receptions, dinners, cultural programs, film showings
City resolutions recognizing International Migrants Day
Protest events at local/state/federal offices against immigration enforcement programs like Secure Communities & 287g
You can also browse around this website and get yourself a copy of the poster I created 7 years ago for this day - click here.
When I was 10 I thought Madonna was the hottest woman on the planet!
She represented a lot of what I wanted to be, breaking rules, teasing boys and girls alike (as in sexy teasing), messy hair, loved to dance even by herself!
My blog entry about Madonna is gonna launch my new blog series, Flashback 80's Arte!
This week, although I'm drowing in work around DREAM Act, I really wanted to launch my new mini project. I think about 50% of my art pieces have been named after my favorite 80's songs, so I will disect each song and the piece is derived from it.
I'll start with a confession.
I totally love all the played out, cheesiest, ultra-pop, whitest 80's singers and bands you can imagine. I'm talking about the stuff most common folk like. Yes I like the indie, hard-to-find stuff, but nothing amuses me like Madonna, Cindy Lauper, Depeche Mode, Bruce Springsteen, Def Leppard, Journey! Yes, Journey!
I have three theories on why this type of music makes me feel really warm and comfortable. People make a lot of assumptions about me. Like - why would a girl from the Oakland hood, a first-generation, U.S.-born daughter of two Catholic, Latino immigrants, like this music SOOOO much? I'm sure I'm not the only one who loves 80's, but I think I'm definitely someone who goes out of my way to play every song at every party, and is permanently fixated on the genre.
So my first theory is that it's in my Peruvian genes to be stuck in the 80's. I'm not sure how many of you have traveled to Peru, but somehow, it's like a time warp down there. You turn on the English radio station and they play LOTS and LOTS of Journey, The Police, etc. In fact, they still bump that at the cool young folks parties (Like under 40 parties) and folks LOVE it. Plus you hear it in virtually every other taxi. It's not this bad in Mexico, I think because of the proximity to the US. But Peru? Well let's just say they are stuck in 1985. And that has rubbed off on my llama-loving, potato-eating, Inca genes.
My second theory is that 80's songs are what my whole family was listening to when we were all collectively learning how to speak English. I was blessed to have a father who taught me how to read and speak in Spanish before anything else. And so as I was growing up, my parents were learning how to speak English, and so was I. You could say, we were all collectively assimilating into US-pop culture.
And my third theory is that I took a strong liking to "white music" because it was one of the ways I could differentiate myself from my peers when I was growing up. It was the way I could claim some independence and gain some "I'm different" credit. Youth around me were bumping rap and hip hop when I was growing up, and of course I liked it, but it also began to remind me about some crazy events in my life, like seeing people around me suffer from violence.
Its not that I think music caused violence, of course NOT, but rap somehow became the soundtrack of very hard moments in my life. You know how many of us have a soundtrack in our head? I did as well. And so one way I could get away from the ghetto reality was to submerge myself in other forms of counterculture - like Rock en Español, like "white" rock, and heck, even art became that for me.
So my new series starts with Dress You Up.
Madonna's Like A Virgin album was one of those tapes my dad got for me that I would play over and over again and dance to in the mirror, with my beads and my neon biker shorts and bangs. (Funny that my dad got me all the cool music albums) "Dress You Up" was different from the other songs because it had some strong sexual undertones. I was always a curious girl and fantasized about naked people a lot, but there was one line that really stuck with me, "All your sheets are custom-made in..Looondoooon."
"Where is this place called London?" I thought to myself? It sounded like some faraway magical place. I would have never in my wildest dreams thought that I would end up in London 20 years later, in fact I never thought I would leave California. Somehow when I heard that line, I imagined rolling around in some soft sheets. Hmmmm.
So then a few years passed, and in my teens I became an ultra sex-positive sex educator, giving workshops to other youth around condom use and safe sex. This print I did last year, is about the process of me learning about my body, and feeling empowered to love myself. I was not one to look at myself in the mirror and talk negatively about my body. I would observe other girls doing that, but I rarely would. But it was mostly because my parents would always tell me I was beautiful. I also had strong Latino, gay, male role-models when I was workign in the sex-education field, and they were always very loving to me and helped me gain self-confidence.
I'm really excited about my new line of calendars, available now for $10.95. The PERPETUAL CALENDAR features 14 of my freshest, dopest, sexiest posters - including the first limited edition screenprint I ever made at age 19 with a big eye in the punani area. That's right! Here are some pages to preview.
Perpetual Calendar featuring artwork by Favianna Rodriguez $10.95 + $5 Shipping & Handling (plus CA tax)
Art Fans! The year is almost over and I’ve hardly spent time in the Bay Area, yet I’m working on exciting projects all over the world, and art is coming out of my ears! Your wonderful presence is requested at this annual event in my home and studio. I will be showing lots of my new work from 2009 & 2010! Please come and have a drink and dance with me. If you have been excited about my art, this is the time to come and get some cool new items.
FAVIANNA RODRIGUEZ OPEN STUDIO Sat. Dec 11, 2010 , 11 am -8 pm 1505 33rd Ave. Oakland, CA 94601 (Accessible by BART - Fruitvale)
art + lovely people + local food + music & beats
limited edition prints & posters
calendars, datebooks, zines
including just released Perpetual Calendar of Favianna’s work
books & journals
limited edition shirts, dresses & other wearables
lots and lots of art
organic yummy food delights + hot drinks
print demonstration
DJs: Max Champ, QuiXx, & Jonathan Rickert Spinning everything from funk to soul to electro to cumbias
This is a family-friendly event, and hopefully, a zero-waste event.
* Please note that this year, my fellow comrades and artists, Jesus and Melanie, will not be doing the Open Studio with me, but you can find their work by visting their website.
Nov. 5 @ 7 PM Art Lecture @ De Young Museum/ Koret Auditorium 50 Hagiwara Tea Garden Dr. San Francisco, CA 94118 Mission Muralismo Cultural Encounters In celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Mexican Revolution, I will be talking about how my work is derived from the political printmaking tradition of Mexico. This event is another dynamic program in the ongoing series Mission Muralismo in conjunction with the recently published book Street Art San Francisco: Mission Muralismo.
Nov. 6 @ 1 - 2:30 PM Calendar Signing @ Green Fest BOOTH 926 San Francisco Concourse Exhibition Center I'll be signing my new Perpetual Calendar and other goodies at Green Fest, the legendary Bay Area event! There is something for everyone at Green Fest. You can learn a new skill, listen to inspiring words from political, intellectual and cultural icons, munch on delicious cuisine, enjoy a glass of organic wine, peruse recent publications in the bookstore, sample fair trade chocolate and coffee, and engage with local nonprofit orgs!
I am here as an artist and cultural worker to explore and discuss cultural strategies that can be incorporated into a global agenda on migrant rights. Its a step in the right direction that migrant right groups recognize the value of incorporating artists in their strategies.
I will be displaying pro-migrant posters by Jesus Barraza, Melanie Cervantes, Ernesto Yerena, and myself at the PGA Cultural Diversity Fair on Nov 4-5, also in Mexico City. The fair will be at the Parque Alameda and it will include individual artists and music and dance groups, graphic arts, literature, exhibition and selling of handcrafts and cuisine of migrant individuals.
History is in the making. This will be one of the largest international civil society gatherings focused on one of the most contentious issues worldwide, migration.
“There is an unprecedented increase in hostility towards migrants around the world, including in the U.S.,” declared Colin Rajah, member of the PGA international coordinating committee. “As governments discuss ways and means to maximize the development benefits of migration, migrants themselves are being traded as cheap and disposable labor commodities.”
During the PGA, community- based, human rights, women’s, faith-based, labor, migrant workers and other organizations from Africa, Asia, the Americas, the Caribbean, and Europe will strategize and develop action plans to counter the growing government attacks undermining the rights of migrants.
This past week, a DC-based street artists successfully carried out a campaign against one of the dirtyest oil corporations around, Chevron. His tactics really inspired me because lately, I've been exploring ways of how artists can team up with national orgs to create positive images, about immigrants in particular.
I am an artist with two feet in two worlds. One world is the artist world.
Too often in the art world, I see artists developing some incredible concepts about social issues, but lacking the infrastructure or networks to distribute the work to organizations that could really benefit from it. The art lives in a gallery, usually disconnected from the people it would actually benefit.
And on the other foot, I am in the activist non-profit world, where too often, I see artists being viewed as external forces that are useful to call upon for an auctions or special events, but not as a valued members of a strategy team. In other words, the artist is often approached once a year for a donation - happens to me all the time.
Its time to break the silos and ask ourselves:
What if artists were integrated into the strategic process when organizations are brainstorming about how to take on a particular challenge?
What if organizations doing social justice work, worked hard to have artists on staff, of various disciplines, so that activism could happen in many mediums, not just the written word.
What if artists, inspired by the stories of the people served by organizations, went on to write poems, stories, novels, and songs about what they saw, and hence, share the plight of those who are most affected by our national policies.
While this work is being done by a handful of artists, but not enough to create a cultural movement - a movement that is just not about a certain piece of legislation or a policy plan, but a movement that addresses our cultural values of how we do things, the habits we have as a society. For example, I want to hear a love song about immigrants that goes mainstream. Where is the short story about the undocumented queer student that risks their own life for their community?
Maybe this sounds dreamy, but lets remember that during the Civil Rights movement, we witnesses a tremendous outburst of a new Black cultural identity, based in grassroots activism, that emerged in ALL formats, in jazz, in books, poetry, theater, even how people dressed and identified themselves.
Art and culture have a transformative power that can speak to audiences in ways that a policy report or news article can't. A few days ago, I was laughing out loud when I saw what my friend Cesar Maxit did.
He fooled Chevron and teamed up with the Yes Men and Rainforest action network to spoof an ad campaign that the multinational corporation was aiming to release. The Chevron campaign was a flop, hundreds of thousands of dollars wasted. Huffington Post writes:
The fun started last week when, as the New York Times put it, "pranksters" lampooned Chevron's ad campaign. Or, to put it another way, the fun started when the advertising strategy for one of the biggest oil companies in the world was officially punk'd.
