Label Text"I want to create a popular art that ordinary people
can relate to as well as people who have degrees in art.
That doesn't mean it has to be watered down. My
philosophy is to create a multilayered piece, like
Hemingway's (The) Old Man and the Sea. The
first time I read it, it was an exciting adventure story
about fishing.The last time, I was deeply moved."
Luis Jiménez
Having grown up in El Paso, close to the Mexican border, Jiménez devoted his career as an artist to observing and honoring the traditions and present day activities that make up Chicano culture. This sculpture is from a series about the rituals of the annual Fiesta celebrations that take place in areas with large Mexican and Mexican-American populations, such as San Antonio, Tucson, and the Hondo Valley of New Mexico, where Jiménez was living at the time. Appropriately, the figures are depicted as "real people" with normal, everyday attributes, rather than as idealized heroes or heroines. Merging past and present customs, the artist shows the female figure in traditional Mexican clothing, while her male companion wears contemporary, working-class cowboy threads. Separated by the man's sombrero laid on the ground between them, they are preparing to perform a traditional dance. In the figures' poses and gazes towards one another, Jiménez reveals the anticipation of a strong physical energy about to be unleashed. As was characteristic of his art, there is also the implication that sexual tensions and desires may be driving them.
(David Rubin, Label Text 2007)
This resource has been made possible in part by the National Endowment for the Humanities: Exploring the Human Endeavor.
