Artist Talk with Cynthia Weiss & Ricardo Serment
Updated: Feb 7, 2021
An artist talk with Cynthia Weiss and Ricardo Serment. An overview and recap of the collaborative project, “Luchadores por Justicia”.
LUCHADORES POR JUSTICIA
Artists, Ricardo X. Serment & Cynthia Weiss
This collaborative project between artists Ricardo X. Serment, and Cynthia Weiss was created to honor essential workers who have given their all during this pandemic. The luchadores and luchadoras in the front windows of Pilsen Arts & Community House include a heroic educator and an environmental activist. In the back gallery, Ricardo’s paintings honor luchadores that work on the front lines of grocery stores, in medicine and health care, and in the fields harvesting the food that feeds us all.
Flying above the figures in the window are a flock of golondrinas. Sparrows are known to fly and gather together during migration to protect one another; they are a symbol for mutual aid and support within communities confronting adversity together.
Ricardo’s work as a printmaker includes images of luchadores rooted in narratives connected to Mexican folklore, myths, traditions, and current issues. Cynthia’s cut-Tyvek imagery speaks to threatened ecosystems, issues of climate change, and hope for mutual aid and sanctuary in the human and natural world. The artists worked back and forth within their aesthetic vocabularies to create new visual language to honor community members, healers and activists for social justice and change.
Acknowledgements:
Thank you to Teresa Magaña, Pablo Ramirez, and Tommy Reyes from Pilsen Arts & Community House for their support in hosting this collaboration in their beautiful space.
Thank you also to Mike Nourse, Tulika Ladsariya, Aaron Rodgers and Scotti Estes from the Hyde Park Art Center.
This collaboration is part of Hyde Park Art Center’s MAKE TOGETHER program that has brought together teams of alums from the Center Program to create new collaborative works that: collide art forms, address important topics, and connect with a public audience.