Descriptive Summary
Access
Publication Rights
Preferred Citation
Acquisition Information
Biography
Scope and Content
Indexing Terms
Descriptive Summary
Title: Linda Vallejo Portfolio,
Date (inclusive): [2004]
Collection number: 79
Creator: Vallejo, Linda
1951-
Extent:
.5 linear feet
Repository:
University of California, Los Angeles. Library.
Chicano Studies Research Center, UCLA
Los Angeles, California 90095-1490
Abstract: This collection consists of a self produced
portfolio of reproductions Ms. Vallejo's works: A Prayer for the Earth
HOPE, in the Midst of War, Death and Destruction Nature and Spirit Los
Cielos Tree People
Physical location: Currently stored at the UCLA Chicano
Studies Research Center Library Archive. In the future the collection
will be stored off site at the UCLA Southern Regional Library
Facility.
Language of Material: Collection materials in English
Access
Collection is open for research.To view the collection or any part of
it, please contact the CSRC at http://www.chicano.ucla.edu/
Publication Rights
All publication rights by permission only. Copyright has not been
assigned to the Chicano Studies Research Center. All requests for
permission to publish or quote from manuscripts must be submitted in
writing to the Archivist and/or the Librarian at the Chicano Studies
Research Center Library. Permission for publication is given on behalf
of the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center as the owner of the physical
items and is not intended to include or imply permission of the
copyright holder, which must also be obtained.
Preferred Citation
[Identification of item], Linda Vallejo Portfolio, 79, Chicano
Studies Research Center, UCLA, University of California, Los Angeles.
Acquisition Information
Item brought to the center by Chon Noriega on behalf of Linda
Vallejo. There is no deed on file but attempts to reach Ms. vallejo have
been made.
Biography
Linda Vallejo was born in 1951, her mother was born in Concord
California, and her father was born in San Angelo, Texas, and graduated
from UCLA in 1951. Soon there after he entered the United States Air
Force as a commissioned officer and the family moved to Germany. Linda
attended elementary school in East Los Angeles and Sacramento, middle
and high school in Montgomery, Alabama, in the early 1960s, and
completed high school in Madrid, Spain, in 1969. in 1973 she received
her BA in Fine Arts from Whittler College and completed undergraduate
studies in lithography from the University of Madrid, Spain and in 1978
she was awarded her MFA from Cal State University, Long Beach. Currently
Ms. Vallejo lives in Topanga Canyon, California, with her husband of
thirty-one years, Ron Dillaway. Her son Robert attends Georgetown Law
School in Washington, DC, and her son Paul is a graduate of UC Santa
Cruz. Ms. Vallejo has a brother, Tomas and a sister, Roseanne.
Chicano Indigenous Spiritual Community
In the late 1970s and early 1980s she studied Maya and Azteca dance with
Las Flores de Aztlan Troupe. During these formative years, Las Flores de
Aztlan presented teachings and workshops throughout the State of
California at cultural centers, universities, and in traditional Native
American and Chicano ceremonies that included Fiesta de Maiz and Dia de
Los Muertos in Los Angeles, Fiesta de Colores in Sacramento, and Chicano
Park Day in San Diego. Over the past twenty years, she has participated
in and supported traditional Native American ceremony in South Dakota,
California and Arizona. She served as a community volunteer for the
Native American Religious Society, California Rehabilitation Center,
Norco, for fifteen years between 1986-2001. For the past twelve years
she has hosted the All Nations Women's Tea Circle, providing a social
celebration focusing on indigenous values and traditions for women to
become familiar with and participate in traditional ceremony and
culture. The All Nations Women's Circle has created and donated giveaway
baskets for the Annual Many Winters Elder's Gathering in San Pedro for
the past ten years, and hosted a dinner celebration for the Annual
Ancestor's Walk, feeding over 200 dancers, supporters and their families
for the past eight years. Linda has also supported the Southern Door men
and women's monthly Inipi circle, and has been dedicated to this circle
for eight years.
ARTIST STATEMENT
"Nature is not only all that is visible to the eye, it also includes the
inner pictures of the soul." Edward Munch
My first memory of painting was at four years of age and it has
continued as my life's dedication. My goal as an artist has been to
consolidate multiple, international influences gained from a life of
study and travel throughout Europe, the United States and Mexico. My
creative influences are many and varied. They include the surreal,
violent, and spiritual images of Picasso, Goya, and Dali, Turner's
mysterious and glorious skies and cloud formations, Rothko's distant
horizons and soft edges, the monumental forms and brilliant coloration
of the Mexican muralists Rivera and Siqueros, and the sensual power of
Georgia O'Keefe's landscapes. I have also been deeply influenced by
international contemporary artists such as Kaoru Arima's (Japan)
haunting manipulated newspaper collages, Ana Mendieta's (USA) uncanny
use of nature and natural materials combined with photography, Lee
Bontecou's (USA) nature-inspired, mixed media "crystalline" sculptural
forms, Harum Farocki's (Czechoslovakia) monumental digital photographs
and videos, Isa Genzken's (Germany) complex digitally-based mixed media
sculpture, and Mangelos' (Croatia) postproduction digital paintings and
sculptures. Finally, I have always had a keen interest in ancient
architectural sites, history, and mythology. I have visited several
sites in both Europe and Mexico, studied ancient philosophy and
symbolism, and participated for the past twenty years in indigenous
ceremonial rights. All of these influences have been brought together to
create two environments entitled:
A Prayer for the Earth and HOPE, In the Midst of War, Death and
Destruction.
During the first twenty years of my career, my painting and sculpture
investigated humanity's fundamental and metamorphic relationship with
nature through the completion of over 200 "fantastic realism" landscape
oil and acrylic on canvas paintings and 50 earth-based sculptures made
of found tree fragment and handmade paper. As I continued to explore
images to articulate the significance of our relationship to the natural
world, I began looking for ways to incorporate these paintings and
sculptures into a three-dimensional presentation. After much
investigation and experimentation, I produced A Prayer for the Earth and
HOPE, In the Midst of War, Death and Destruction.
A Prayer for the Earth was originally presented at The Carnegie Art
Museum in California. This first environment combined paintings
representing the beauty of nature; earth-based mixed-media sculpture
focusing on a symbiotic relationship to nature; a central "mandala" of
manipulated photographs with images of pollution juxtaposed with images
of international indigenous cultures in the act of ceremony and prayer;
all surrounded by a mixed media assemblage depicting earth, water, fire
and air. A Prayer for the Earth has been successfully installed at the
Los Angeles Natural History Museum, the Los Angeles Craft and Folk Art
Museum, and the Orange County Center of Contemporary Art in 2006 and
2007.
HOPE, In the Midst of War, Death and Destruction, an installation
originally produced in 2003 in response to 9/11, is a political and
spiritual statement focusing on the reconciliation of opposites: the
spirituality and tranquility of nature juxtaposed to the carnage and
violence of war. This original installation combined paintings inspired
by Goya's Desastres and a central "mandala" of manipulated photographs
containing images of war dead (Civil War, WW I and II, Korean Conflict,
Vietnam, Iraq, Auschwitz and Hiroshima) surrounded by an assemblage of
natural forms and symbols representing HOPE.
After continued research and development, both A Prayer for the Earth
and HOPE, In the Midst of War, Death and Destruction have become
environments with accompanying mixed- and multi-media sculpture and
collage components. This newest series of digitally based works have
been designed to reveal the complexity and obscurity of postmodern life
and experience, and to serve as "juxtaposing" elements within the
environments. Censored, GTMK?, The Ferris Wheel, Postmodern Trash, and
Earth's Altar utilize pre-produced wood and plastics, newspaper pages,
and recycled products in combination with mixed media and manipulated
digital images taken from the Internet and my own paintings. The
environment is installed in one or two rooms, with paintings and
collages placed on walls, sculpture placed on walls and pedestals as
appropriate, and the central "mandala" composed in the center of the
floor space. Walls and floor may be painted in brilliant colors to unify
the multiple aspects of the environment.
A Prayer for the Earth and HOPE, In the Midst of War, Death and
Destruction present interlocking, juxtaposing painting, sculptural and
collage elements that surround the viewer, pressing them to search for
the question: "What is the value of nature in calming and resolving the
confusion and losses created by the far-reaching postmodern problems of
raging pollution and war?" The environment draws the viewer into a space
where their attention is divided between images that portray the loss of
natural resources and human life juxtaposed with images of the beauty
and solace of nature and the natural world. My goal is to create a space
that communicates the idea that without nature humanity, history and
culture as we know it are lost, that nature is the thread that encircles
and describes all of us, regardless of gender, race, age, or creed, and
finally, that nature is beyond politics, religion, market, and even
art!
What critics and curators say about the work:
William Moreno, Executive Director, Claremont Museum of Art, California,
states, "What makes Linda Vallejo's art so compelling and relevant to
contemporary life? For one, her broad command of a variety of mediums:
painting, sculpture and site-specific installations are all within her
prolific oeuvre. There is nearly something for everyone. Ms. Vallejo's
interests and subject-matter spans are considerable. Themes of beauty,
consumption, war, excess, world pollution, iconic references to
international indigenous peoples and earth-based installations all
reside in her works. Ms. Vallejo has a natural affinity and bond with
the natural world and that connection is reflected in her ethereal
works. Her paintings of surreal, electrified and transformed landscapes
suggest a more vibrant and alluring reality. Color and energy swirl
throughout the canvasses and transport you into her alternative world.
Her work is not held hostage by fashion or trend – rather she is
a singular voice with apparitions all her own. Such visualizations and
the tactile nature of the work resonate in a contemporary and abstracted
world – we crave the "here, now and hope" of a less complicated
life. No commitments are implied in her work, but rather veiled
assurances and alternatives. Such well-composed and thoughtful gestures
seem hard to come by in our image and information-saturated lives. Ms.
Vallejo's posture is one of deep concern and commitment. One can't ask
for more than that."
Dr. Betty Ann Brown, Art Historian and Critic, states "Linda Vallejo who
participates Native American ceremonials, is keenly aware of the
sanctity of the oaks. "Electric Oaks" combines beauty with expressionist
intensity. Looming above a sacred circle, these paintings unite imagery
with spiritual action. The saturated colors and sense of dynamically
charged landscape evoke the work of Vincent Van Gogh, who once wrote,
"Keep your love of nature, for that is the true way to understand art
more and more." Vallejo would agree.
Scope and Content
This is a one item, .5 linear foot collection of a self produced
artist catalog:
Portfolios
A Prayer for the Earth
HOPE, In the Midst of War, Death, and Destruction
Nature and Spirit
Los Cielos
Tree People
Indexing Terms
The following terms have been used to index the description of this
collection in the library's online public access catalog.
Subjects
Linda Vallejo