Progress in Process: A Catalogue [with] In Process [poster] [Chicanx muralism, Galeria de la Raza]

San Francisco: Galeria de la Raza/Studio 24, 1982. Catalog: staplebound in wraps. Illustrated throughout 35 pp. [with] Offset poster: 12 x 21 in. Both very good. Item #10569

The rare exhibition catalog and poster for this series of ephemeral murals by 20 Chicano artists, including foundational figures in the scene, such as Patricia Rodriguez, Yolanda López, Daniel Galvez, and Michael Rios.
The exhibition, conceived as an open studio setting over two months in 1982, featured a number of influential and lesser-known Chicano and Chicana artists. Many were involved in Mission Gráfica, La Raza Graphics, and other important but short-lived arts projects during the Chicano movement. 
Many of the artists were also of indigenous heritage, and in their political-artistic work in the years since this show, have continued to engage with these identities. Among them is Patricia Rodriguez, one of the founders of Mujeres Muralistas, who later worked as a teacher at the Institute for American Indian Arts. 
The open studio concept allowed for ongoing painting, criticism, and community engagement, breaking down conventional barriers for community members to engage with gallery and museum artwork. This catalog documents the murals throughout its pages, providing a rare record of the ephemeral work.
Founded by a significant group of Chicano artists and activists in 1970, including Rupert García, Manuel Villamor, Ralph Maradiaga, and René Yañez, Galeria de la Raza was a central node of the Chicano civil rights movement in San Francsico, acting not just gallery but community center. It offered for a place for celebrations of Chicano culture and artwork not accepted by the mainstream. 
Though the poster advertises 19 artists, the catalog lists 20 – the Black woman artist Regina Mouton was a late addition, invited to collaborate with Juan Fuentes. Together, they painted “The Last Supper,” depicting military leaders dining over the bodies of children – an explicit critique of the dictatorships ripping across Latin America and the Global South, and further positioning the exhibition within a Third Worldist political-artistic project.
The exhibition later traveled to several more Chicano arts spaces throughout California, adding mural panels from more artists, including Royal Chicano Air Force (RCAF) artists José Montoya, Juanishi Orosco, and Esteban Villa, though we have been unable to locate any traces of these later shows. The murals, likely painted on Masonite panels, have not survived. 
Ephemera from the early years of Galeria de la Raza remains remarkably scarce, and documentation of this important exhibition especially so. OCLC locates 8 examples of the catalog as of June 2026, and none of the poster.
“The show is its process. The artworks are merely archaeological remnants.”

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