Join us in our galeria tonight for the opening celebration of “Hechizos”, a show that gathers a powerful circle of hechiceras casting spells & offering interactive installation, photography, & poetry. Join us in celebration of our matrilineal kinships and the impulse to conjure, create, & heal.
Presented by Leticia Hernández-Linares, Evelyn Orantes, & Anna Lisa Escobedo conjuring together with an amazing circle of artists & poets.
Featured Artists: Leticia Hernández-Linares, Evelyn Orantes, Anna Lisa Escobedo, Flavia Mora, Naomi Quinonez, Rebeka Rodriguez & Lucia Ippolito
Hechizos Opening Celebration: Sunday, March 26th 6 P.M Hosted by Leticia Hernández-Linares. Featuring poetry by Naomi Quinonez, Genny Lim, & M.K. Chavez
BIOS;
Leticia Hernandez-Linares. The daughter of Salvadoran immigrants, Leticia Hernández-Linares is an interdisciplinary, bilingual writer, artist, and racial justice educator. She is the author of Mucha Muchacha, Too Much Girl & Alejandria Fights Back! ¡La lucha de Alejandria! A five-time San Francisco Arts Commission grantee, she has lived, created, and protested in the Mission District for over two decades.
Anna Lisa Escobedo is a visual artist, muralist, artivist, event producer, cultural worker, and networker. She is the Calle 24 Latino Cultural District co-founder and chaired the Cultural Arts Committee with over 20 active members. Her most rewarding accomplishment is working directly with the community and artists. She has worked on numerous art projects and community-based organizations in the San Francisco (SF) Bay Area. Anna Lisa's goals are to support artists, creators and grow the vibrancy of the arts and culture ecosystem in the Bay Area.
Evelyn Orantes is an art educator, curator, cultural producer and hechizera. With two decades of cultural work under her sparkly belt, she delivers meaningful moments of honor, discovery, memory and inclusion.
Lucía González Ippolito is a Mexican-American artist, teacher, and activist born and raised in the San Francisco Mission District. Growing up in a Latino neighborhood that has been vastly impacted by gentrification, Lucia felt it her duty from a young age to focus on cultural/political themes in her artwork. As a muralist, she directed and designed the Mission Makeover Mural, that covers issues of wealth and displacement in the Mission District and the Women of the Resistance mural, depicting 38 women activists; both murals in San Francisco’s Balmy Alley.
Rebeka Rodriguez Mondragón is an artist, curator, and cultural producer. She works in photography, video and collaborative generated projects and happenings. Her work explores the body as a site for personal and collective histories, desire, community and queer aesthetics.
Naomi Helena Quiñonez. Naomi Helena Quiñonez is a poet, educator and activist and author of three collections of poetry, Exiled Moon, The Smoking Mirror and Hummingbird Dream/Sueño de Colibri. Quiñonez has edited several critical & literary publications, holds a PhD in American history, has received numerous awards, contributes to the scholarship of Latina/os and women of color.
MK Chavez is an Afro-Latinx writer and educator. She is the author of Mothermorphosis, and Dear Animal (Nomadic Press), and the lyric essay chapbook A Brief History of the Selfie. Chavez curates the reading series Lyrics & Dirges and is co-director of the Berkeley Poetry Festival.
Genny Lim of Chinese-Chukchi ancestry was born and raised in San Francisco's North Beach back in the day when it was Little Italy with the aromas of brewing Hills Brothers Coffee and Salami Factory wafting in the morning fog to the clang of the Powell and Mason cable car screeching down the hill overlooking Alcatraz in the Bay. “I taught myself poetry reading Zen and the Beats of North Beach. I won my first literary prize at age nine in the 500 words or less SF Examiner wiring contest about a country girl named Winona who nurtured her runt calf into winning a 4-H Blue Ribbon. A total city girl fantasy, since the closest to the country I'd ever been was Golden Gate Park.”
Dr. Ayodele Nzinga is a multi-hyphenated artist; a brilliant actress, producing director, playwright, poet, dramaturg, performance consultant, educator, and community advocate. She is the director of the Lower Bottom Playaz, Inc., and she holds a Ph.D. in Transformative Education & Change. She is the first Poet Laureate of Oakland.
Anna Christine Rodas is an itinerant teacher and educator from the San Francisco Bay Area. She holds a Master’s Degree in Community Development and worked in this field both here in the Bay Area and internationally. She also holds a PhD in Spanish and her academic research in Central American Literary Studies explores the social realities of war, violence, and trauma. Her most recent collection Entre cenizas y palmas was published with Nomadic Press in 2021.