2022 Terra Lectures in American Art: Decolonising Art History through Latinx Art

Asco, Spray Paint LACMA, chromogenic print by Harry Gamboa, Jr., 1972

The 2022 Terra Lectures in American Art centre on Latinx art, with an emphasis on Chicanx (Mexican American) artists, and the theme of migration – of people, ideas, and artworks, from the seventeenth century to today. Art and activism converge as these lectures move across disciplinary, chronological, and geographical borders. We consider new approaches to “American” art, its borders, and contact zones. By posing strategic questions, these four talks demonstrate avenues of inquiry to decolonise art history.

Lecture 4  “Counter-storytelling Chicanx Art and Conceptualism” presented by Professor Charlene Villaseñor Black 

Despite the alignment of much Chicanx art with conceptualism and neo-conceptualism, US artists of Mexican American descent have been systematically excluded from mainstream histories of these art movements. Employing Counter-Storytelling, a methodology from Critical Race Theory, as well as the concept of implicit censorship, this lecture reorients the history of conceptualism from the viewpoint of the Chicano civil rights movement. How have Chicanx artists, from the 1960s to today, responded to their exclusion? How can counter storytelling help reveal artistic responses to censorship?

Lecture open to all to attend. Directions to Worcester College here.