He went to San Antonio College on an art scholarship but didn’t finish, frustrated by its approach to art education. The family moved to San Antonio, where Hernandez attended Edgewood High School and recalled the 1968 student walkouts that challenged the lack of equal educational opportunity and the “severe punishment” for speaking Spanish. They may not have known he was born in Childress before his family moved to Robstown, said his brother Armando Hernandez, and that his birth name was Juanito. Many of his friends didn’t know he was fast deteriorating. He told them he didn’t want to be a token. He’d tell them to circle back once they acquired some. When museums invited him to speak, he’d ask how many works of Chicano art they had in their permanent collections. He’d say they weren’t “safe” enough for such venues. “It’s understood internationally.”Īt home, it wasn’t as appreciated by non-Mexican American movie-goers, much like Hernandez’s depictions of pachucos and rucas didn’t make their way into museums, though the Metropolitan Museum of Art did acquire his work. “That’s why the film is a cult classic,” he said. “With others, it’s a story of the underdogs.”īorrego was especially moved by seeing two Muslim women perform scenes from the film, reciting words from its fictional gang, Vatos Locos.
#Blood in blood out artist movie#
If you’ve been lucky enough to see “Blood In, Blood Out” with a group of die-hard fans, you’d know how much the movie is revered, its dialogue memorized.Īctor Jesse Borrego, who played artist Cruzito in the film, has been amazed how it has transcended its Chicano roots.įor some, it’s an immigration story, he said. Joaquin Castro asked the Library of Congress to add “Blood In, Blood Out” to its film registry along with 24 other films, including “The Ballad of Gregorio Cortez” and “Walkout.” If you’ve not seen the film, put it on your must-see list.Įarlier this year, Democratic U.S. Tributes began arriving shortly after his death - from across the street and across town and from Hollywood and beyond. Hernandez, who was 69 when he died Saturday, would say the call made “all his dreams come true in an avalanche.”
![blood in blood out artist blood in blood out artist](https://static.dw.com/image/59810520_303.jpg)
The struggling artist’s life was about to change with 30 paintings he’d produce for the Taylor Hackford movie, “Blood In, Blood Out.” As a nod to the bloodied delights of Halloween, here's eight artworks made with the horror and power of gore.His wife answered the next call and urged Hernandez to take it because Hollywood was indeed calling. This is especially true for women, who’ve unsurprisingly recycled the biological waste of their monthly cycles into material for art about their condition. Post-AIDS, blood-dripped art is often deemed political. The artist’s historical attraction to blood, then, isn’t one of convenience, but rather, one of risk-taking.
![blood in blood out artist blood in blood out artist](https://i1.ytimg.com/vi/GfsJ54-s_7Y/maxresdefault.jpg)
Plus, given that its organic matter, blood doesn’t conserve easily. It is, for example, illegal to transport blood and other biohazard substances using government bureaucracies. Art that’s splattered with blood shocks us back into our corporeality.įor artists, blood presents a host of challenges and liabilities. The grossness around blood is connected to the grossness we've been programmed to feel about our own bodies it's a side effect of alienation. Most viewers find bloodied work icky and off-putting-which is ironic given that, like all bodily fluids, we all carry them within. There’s something risky about using blood, something dangerous in its potential impurity.
![blood in blood out artist blood in blood out artist](http://media.brownpride.com/murals/adan/tormenta_nocturna.jpg)
Blood has been sanitised from most of our daily doings the risk and power of blood flows quarantined in our veins.Īrtists use blood in their work to physicalise its stakes, to add to its aura. Despite its consecrated role in religion and ritual, within our modern institutions blood has become a hazardous pathogen, a dirty disease-carrier. Mesoamerican cultures drenched the earth with ritualistic blood shedding Catholic ceremonies transform wine into the blood of Christ. Blood animates the veins of the living, and through its sacrificial letting, can connect us with the sacred.