Title
Cruzando el Rio Bravo
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Description
Color lithograph on paper, 38.75 in. x 28.5 in. A famous artist of the Chicano art movement, El Paso artist Luis Jiménez combined Pop Art with Chicano social commentary to celebrate the downtrodden and marginalized, such as immigrants who cross the Rio Grande (or Rio Bravo) to pursue the American Dream. This border crossing is based on the artist’s grandfather carrying his wife and son across the Rio Grande from Mexico to El Paso. Despite the dangers of such crossings, immigrant families demonstrate heroic spirit in search of a better life. Jiménez later rendered this study into a series of painted fiberglass sculptures that pay homage to the countless immigrants who undertake the perilous trek to the U.S. Luis Jiménez (1940 – 2006) was an El Paso, Texas native, best known for his large-scale, brightly colored sculptures immersed in the Chicano iconography of Texas and New Mexico. Jiménez studied art and architecture at The University of Texas in Austin and in El Paso. He eventually traveled to Mexico to study with the Mexican muralists Diego Rivera and José Clemente Orozco, and he was also influenced by regionalists Thomas Hart Benton and Grant Wood. After completing school, he went to work for his father making neon signs and car decals. In 1966, Jiménez moved to New York and joined the Pop Art scene, making painted fiberglass figurative works inspired by the everyday lives of Latinos living in the Southwest. His work shows his concern for working-class people and those who have suffered from discrimination. Jiménez was and remains respected in Latino communities for his perspective and narrative of the culture of Mexico and the Southwest. His artwork emulates popular Cholo car culture, demonstrated in his use of fiberglass, spray paint, and imagery consisting of Aztec emperors, border crossing, and vaqueros riding wild broncos. His works are in the collections of the Albuquerque Museum, the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., the El Paso Museum of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Art Institute of Chicago, and the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, among others.
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