Axis Mundo: Queer Networks in Chicano L.A.

Annotation

This catalogue accompanied one of the best – if not the best – exhibitions organised within the framework of the Pacific Standard Time: Los Angeles / Latin American (PST:LA/LA) project developed by the Getty Foundation in 2017. Axis Mundo collects a number of essays, documentation and unpublished materials around the queer Chicana/o artists in Los Angeles from the 1960s to the 1980s. The editors depart from the work of artist and activist Mundo Meza in order to highlight a large scene and generation of experimental artists, collectives and music bands, whose practices brilliantly and bravely intersected various forms of social and political struggle.

Miguel A. López

This period witnessed tumultuous and inspiring political activism around identity and social justice, including the emergence of the Chicano civil rights, women’s, and gay liberation movements, as well as, later, the political activism of the AIDS epidemic. This was also a period of tremendous growth and experimentation in the visual arts, especially in Southern California, which saw the rise of numerous art schools, the establishment of many of the region’s core cultural institutions, and the founding of numerous alternative art spaces that supported Chicana/o, feminist, and queer cultural producers.