Historical Presence

The U.S war with Mexico (1846) marked what scholar David G. Gutiérrez calls the “Mexican-American dilemma.” The outcome of the war led to ethnic Mexicans being given the rights of American citizens but denying the possibility to exercise them, thus “Americans planted the seeds of continuing ethnic discord in the region.” (Gutierrez, 1995) The assertion of U.S war with Mexico instead of U.S-Mexico war, is intentional to indicate how this conflict became the precedent set by the large expanding global power fueled by “manifest destiny” at the expense of the citizens from the latter country: the U.S, given their westward expansion, had greater military power, a larger population and more political/economic stability whereas Mexico had greater instability since they were under the dictatorship rule of Profirio Diaz after they had just gained independence from Spain. There were serious repercussions for the ethnic Mexicans of the Southwest: loss of land, loss of ways to make a living, loss of access to making a living, loss of the possibility of acquiring any generational wealth. The resulting peace Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (1848) after the war falsely promised the rights of American citizenship and, despite this, still enforced taxes and the duties of one; Mexicans were particularly vulnerable due to the low literacy and the lack of translated documents to Spanish. 

The treaty sparked associations with whiteness as a form of survival but as Julia Dowling (2014) states in “Mexican Americans and the Question of Race,” legal whiteness of ethnic Mexicans would often actually make it more difficult to combat racial discrimination. Mobilization efforts began brewing such as LULAC (The League of United of Latin American Citizens, founded 1929) that would evoke proximity to a white identity (emphasizing European or Spanish ancestry) to La Raza Unida politics that tended to reference indigenous roots and encouraged the recognition of their cultural history/identity. Mexico, up to and after the treaty, was itself already contending with racial discrimination with government officials predominantly pushing a “mestizo” mixed heritage ideology/identity that erases the specific histories of the diverse peoples of the country (Native, African, Asian, etc.)

The outcomes of nation-building in both the U.S and Mexico in creating a clear history and identity although can be based on certain facts, what is left out can be dangerous. The history can often be embellished and selective to maintain a romanticized view of a country’s origin, ignoring the harsh realities of its formation. In the U.S it was on the grounds of a religious based “manifest destiny” that it expanded to the west; this expansion resulted in the murder and displacement of original inhabitants. In regards to Mexico, it was the “mestizaje” ideology that attempted to create a uniformity between citizens, ignoring the great carnage from the initial Spaniard’s invasion. 

Miscegenation/Mestizaje in Mexico worked to create a national identity to remedy confrontations between the Spanish (the conquistadors of New Spain post-Conquest) and the indigenous (Zaptoec, Aztec, Mexic, etc that occupied the lands pre-Conquest)—although descendants of African slaves, and those from global networks (Filipino merchants, travelers from other part of Asia, travelers from other parts of Europe and U.S) were largely not included in these imaginaries although were part of the make-up of the population (Oles, 2013). Jose Vasconcelos (1882-1959), the minister of Education in Mexico in the early 20th century and is known to idealize mestizaje notable in his work “The Cosmic Race” (Vasconcelos, 1925). As Mary Coffey (2012) emphasizes, Raza Cosmica pushes a post-revolutionary mestizaje concept that elevates racial miscegenation to a transcendent eugenic principle: “Vasconcelos argues that  a ‘mixture of races accomplished through the laws of social well-being, sympathy, and beauty’ will lead to a cosmic race ‘infinitely superior to all that have previously existed.’” Vasconcelos, although indicates the positives of mestizaje, still situates “Indian blood” as part of a race problem that contributes to “Mexico’s lack” in terms of “moral strength” with this “lower breed that produces madly” in the country and other part of Latin America. (Coffey, 2012, p 7) This transcendent “cosmic” mestizaje ideology resulted in a strategies like indigenismo that supported the mixing aspect but radically opposed the aspect of Indian as a “lower-breed” and, rather, celebrated this indigenous ancestry; however, although there was this is a positive recognition, it still remains problematic in viewing the current, existing, native tribes as a thing of the past. In “Art and Architecture in Mexico” (2013), James Oles contends that to encompass the cultural diversity in Mexico, we have to shift our focus from mestizaje to a more inclusive concept of hybridity.

 As for the state of Puerto Rico, for hundreds of years after 400 years under Spanish rule they would soon face a new intervention from the Spanish American War (1898). The country is known for being one of the last two Spanish colonies of the New World that experienced the longest period of Hispanic influence compared to other Latin American countries. Given this, Puerto Rico has also been credited as one of the world's oldest colonies having been under some form of military occupation or protectorate status since 1508 (Russell Schimmer, 1998). Before Spanish colonial rule, the land was known as Borinquen/Borikén (the land of the brave lord) to the dominant native Taíno occupants. The promise of gold is what led Christopher Columbus to the island and upon his arrival subjugated Tainos to servitude and inhumane treatment (primarily working in gold mines) so much so that it resulted in severe declines in their population. In 1508, Puerto Rican archeologist, Don Ricardo Alegria, calculated that, at most, the island had some 30,000 inhabitants circa 1508; however by 1530 it was reported that only 1148 remained and only got fewer in number by all the way up to 1898. A population prevalent as well were the African slaves who were brought in 1513 to work the land after gold reserves were nearly exhausted; they worked in cultivation of vegetables (fruits, vegetables, grains, corn, plantains) and tobacco  (Russell Schimmer, 1998). 

 The Treaty of Paris (1898) granted the land from the Spanish to the U.S which is when early farming activities had evolved into the wealth-generating plantation system from cultivating sugarcane, tobacco, and coffee. About a decade later the Jones Act was enacted in 1917, promising the rights of a U.S citizen to Puerto Ricans; and, much like what came from the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, there were certain limitations to exercise these rights. For Puerto Ricans, after the island (or “profit Island”) was claimed as a territory, they were given citizenship status enacted by the Jones Act of 1917. However, it is considered a  “second class” status since they were denied equal rights to political participation; they do not hold the constitutional right of trial by jury, they have no representation in Congress, and the President can veto any act of their legislature. Meléndez points out in Puerto Rican Migration and the Colonial State that the effects of the Jones Act falsely promoted the status of Puerto Ricans to U.S citizens, when in reality it was a move to continue “colonial governance” which involved utilizing their migration to U.S or stay in Puerto Rico as labor based. Once again, there is a clear recurrence of empty promises and liminal rights given by both Mexicans and Puerto Ricans. For Puerto Ricans, specifically, Jorge Duany, describes this self perception as a persistent colonial condition that views them as “Puerto Ricans first, Americans second” which can become divisive:

Demographically and geographically, Puerto Rico is a nation on the move, as well as a nation without a state. At this juncture, Island intellectuals are sharply divided between those who believe that Puerto Ricans should fight for independence to preserve their cultural identity and those who believe that this struggle necessarily invokes a homogenizing, essentialist, and totalitarian fiction called ‘‘the nation.’’. (Duaney, 2002, p. 13)

The U.S utilized Puerto Rico as an example of modernization and industrial development for the rest of Latin America. Additionally, although Puerto Rico was given the promise by the U.S of bringing investment to impoverished regions, it was ultimately  the investors and elites that reaped the profits which resulted in irreversible changes to the Island and its residents. (Fernández, 2012, p. 35)

Since the Jones Act (1917)  granted citizenship to those born on or after April 11th 1899 it marked both the establishment of the U.S as the controlling government body and the freedom of movement between Puerto Rico and the U.S. In the text “Puerto Rican Chicago” Mirelsie Velázquez writes how from the mid-1800s to the early 20th century Puerto Ricans migrated to cities like New York (groups such as students, merchants, political exiles, etc) to escape unwelcoming economic and political changes. Their migration was particularly encouraged by the U.S and Puerto Rican governments.

Gabriela Arrendondo (2008) in “Mexican Chicago,” brings forth the stories and lives of Mexicans living in Chicago in the early 1900s, eager to leave the economic and social unrest in Mexico to fill labor shortages as a result of World War I (steel, meat-packing, railroad industries, etc). She notes that, although the city was a particular attraction for industrial opportunities, it was not always the initial destination for migrants but, often, a journey taken enroute to another destination or after already having experienced Southwestern states (the arena of Mexicans with generations of family before the border crossed them in 1848). Scholar Lilia Fernández (2012), as well, in her book “Brown in the Windy City” indicates how many Tejanos (Mexican-Americans from Texas) particularly would come to the city in search of higher wages, contributing to the growth of the ethnic-Mexican enclaves at the time; which functioned as ports of entry for Mexican migrants in the expanding urban landscape. 

Puerto Ricans were also prevalent on the routes to fill job shortages, with a majority of them in New York; Velázquez (2022) writes that by 1920, forty-five U.S cities reported the presence of Puerto Ricans. According to John Flores (2018) in “The Mexican Revolution in Chicago”, the Mexican population in Chicago increased to more than twenty thousand with them representing the following: 40 percent of the maintenance-of-way railroad workforce of the city, 12 percent of steel and metal employees, 5 percent of meatpacking workers, and about 15 percent of all cement, rug-manufacturing, and fruit-packing laborers.

 The landscape by this time, through the Great Migration would see southern African-Americans with similar aspirations of work have been and increasingly began occupying the city which had in its residence as well: ethnic whites (Poles, Italians, Germans, Greeks), native-born “white” Americans, white Appalachian migrants, and in some cases Native Americans (the native Potowatomi, Ojibwe, Miami, Odawa and other nations were largely expelled from the area already)  (Fernández, 2012, p. 2).

Once the war ended, the Great Depression shook the nation and Mexicans were quickly scapegoated as the reason for the job-shortages and suffered from major deportations fueled by anti-immigration rhetoric. As Leonard Ramirez (2011) writes in “Chicanas on 18th street,” The population shifted down from twenty to sixteen thousand Mexicans in 1930 resulting in fewer single men, more women and children and more families with married couples. This is considered one of the stronger “pushes” of the push/pull factors that has and continues to impact the diasporan Latine experience in the U.S. The “in and out” of the population refers to the concept of the “revolving door” where Mexicans were pushed in for labor and out for threat to jobs. As Jenkin (1977) says in his journal, “Push/Pull in Recent Mexican Migration to the U.S”, “changes in the rate of migration from Mexico to the U.S. should be consistently related to changes in the economic conditions of the two countries” Therefore, the migration or push of immigrants were reliant on the U.S needs, which decided if they greeted with open arms or not. 

From the depression brought major job shortages from demand drops in sugar and coffee exports which further fueled migration to the U.S. Additionally, the rhetoric pushed by the U.S and Puerto Rican government of “overpopulation” was also a major contributor to leave the Island to “ameliorate the demographic pressures allegedly hampering Puerto Rico Economic development”; the overpopulation argument placed blame on Puerto Ricans for their social ills. (Velázquez, 2022, p. 12)

From World War II Mexicans as well as Puerto Ricans faced another major “pull” and became subjects of state-sponsored mass labor importations programs in the United States, serving as viable labor pools to fill American economic labor needs; “pull” refers to the factors that results in an individual settling in a country whereas “push” refers to the reasons (whether poverty, lack of social mobility, violence or persecution) that may cause an individual to leave their home (Bruzzone, 2020).With the “El Norte” desire still persistent, led to many programs created such as the Braceros and Emergency Farm Labour initiatives for agriculture and railword work for Mexican migrants. Whereas for Puerto Rican migration came initiatives like Operation Bootstrap/Manos a la obra and the Migrant Division program made for a similar purpose.

 In 1951, Operation Bootstrap was launched to industrialize Puerto Rico by creating work programs—for foundry, steel and domestic work— that would lure companies to hire people for low paying jobs. Male seasonal contract agricultural laborers and female domestic servants were sent to the U.S mainland. This act was in efforts to try to modernize the island and serve as a catalyst for economic production with the push of “autonomy” of a certain homogenized view of the Puerto Rican position in relation to the U.S; which is to help the growth of their colonizers (Jorge Duaney, 2002). 

Until the 1950s, mainland Puerto Rican communities were predominantly concentrated in the U.S. Northeast, primarily in New York City. The postwar migration of contract laborers contributed to the increase of Puerto Rican communities in various midwestern cities, including Chicago, Illinois; Milwaukee, Wisconsin; and Gary, Indiana. (Jimenez and Santiago, 2017, p. 4) Operation Bootstrap promoted the exchange of U.S capital for Puerto Rican surplus labor but, as detailed in “Puerto Rican Nation” (Jorge Duaney, 2002), this initiative was an anomaly since instead of capitalizing on the islands abundant resources and labor power it “cast a majority of the population into forced idleness, underemployment, and a restless circulation between colony and metropolis.”

 “Following Operation Bootstrap, came the next step, which is the preparation of Puerto Rican working class before their migration to the U.S. This was called the Migration Division: ‘In Puerto Rico, the government used its bureaucratic institutions, like the Departments of Labor and Education, to advise and organize the flow of migrants to the United States, be it as  individual migrants.’ (Meléndez, p. 11)

As mentioned above, the Migration Division Program was a more organized form of the “Revolving Door” concept, but with a more consistent trajectile movement of migration to the U.S; the difference firmly being the geographic location and the political power standpoint. The program was initiated in 1947 and was meant to provide migrants with information about job opportunities, training programs, settlement assistance, and for assisting in the transition to the U.S. They had four regional offices in New York, Chicago, New Jersey and Cleveland to supervise these services. Mérida Rúa (2012) writes in “Grounded Identidad” that after the decline of manufacturing jobs in the U.S, coinciding with the dense concentration of Puerto Ricans in New York, resulted in this program to assist US industries and manage migration via redirecting migration westward. In 1956 the promotional film “Un amigo en Chicago” was circulated by the Migration Division to persuade potential migrants of the relative ease in finding employment, better salaries, and desirable housing options in Chicago; program representatives would also investigate employment opportunities in Chicago for Puerto Ricans in New York and Puerto Rico (Rúa, 2012).

Pérez (2004) writes how it was the 1940s that brought a larger wave of Puerto Rican migration to Chicago with only a handful of Puerto Ricans coming from New York in the 1930s. Greatly influencing this migration was the recruitment by Chicago-based employment agencies like Castle, Barton and Associates that hired Puerto Rican men for foundry work and women for domestic labor. These workers resided in both the inner city and the surrounding Chicago suburbs. 

It is estimated by Rúa that by 1954 that between five-thousand and twenty-thousand Puerto Ricans were in Chicago. Puerto Rican women, particularly, were already great contributors to wage-earnings during the 1920s and 1930s for U.S needlework companies doing piecework in their homes, as a result they were also part of labor activism to reform it. However, with the withdrawal of the companies from Puerto Rico, led to increased migration from rural to urban areas and to the United States (Amador, 2015, p. 70). The women would soon have involvement in the Migration Division program which is known for providing them a steady bridge to the U.S to do household labor (live-in and/or live-out, babysitter, mother’s helper, nursemaid, etc.). In regards to Mexican migration to the city, their push/pull factors, although similar, had a particular additive vulnerability due to their legal status.

The Bracero program (1842-1962) resulted from talks between American officials from the Department of Agriculture, State, Labor and Justice, the War Manpower Commissions and the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs exploring the idea of importing temporary Mexican laborers. The first five hundred workers arrived in California and, although initially most then on would arrive in the Southwest, many worked in crops and orchards in Midwestern states (Illinois, Michigan, Ohio, Minnesota, Wisconsin) as well as early as 1944 (Fernández, 2012, p. 30). 

To U.S companies, Mexican laborers were an ideal mobile, nonunion, noncitizen workforce lacking legal protections and would shoulder layoffs associated with seasonal agricultural work and the fluctuation cycles of industrial production. As John Flores (2018) writes in “The Mexican Revolution in Chicago,” labor agencies typically enlisted Mexicans to work in midwestern agriculture but after arriving in Chicago they often used opportunities to work for industrial and manufacturing plants that offered immediate jobs and higher wages. The braceros were predominantly from the Bajío region of Mexico (Guanajuato, Jalisco, Michoacán, and Querétaro).

Even though the Bracero program, specifically, hired Mexican male migrants only, Mexican women were not absent in migration and occupations in the U.S despite the fact that Mexico had gendered policies preventing women and children to leave with male migrants for fear of losing too many nationals and decreasing labor for their own railroad and agricultural systems. During World War II, particularly, Mexican women contributed to the wartime efforts through their work at the defense industry factories. These positions allowed them a unique opportunity to have better working environments and pay; giving more autonomy in the home. Many women had pride for contributing to the war efforts, stating they did the job “for their country” (Escobedo, 2013, p. 77). This was contradictory to the treatment many of these women received, often left with the least desirable jobs, lesser pay compared to their male counterparts  and with the gender exploitations forcing them to stay at home. One of the women in the article said: “Hitler was the one that got us out of the white folk kitchens.”(Escobedo, 2013, p. 74). 

After the war even though Mexican women would largely be rendered back to the home as the carer and companion, many still remained working (albeit on top of the home duties). As Arrendondo stresses, migration impacted the women differently depending on the geographical and cultural contexts exposed to them as well as the legal and social conditions that shaped their experiences. Particularly, the availability of divorce even though it created a greater burden in terms of financial contribution and judgment by peers worried of their full “Americanization” allowed for more independence (Ramirez, 2021, p. 3). Participants in consumer culture, Mexican women were also active in labor struggles (such as those in the 1930s) with their labor involvement predominantly in garment industries and in informal economics like cleaning houses, sewing work, landry, childcare, etc; however, they also had involvement, as their male counterparts, in agriculture and industry (meatpacking houses, steel factories, etc) (Arrendondo, 2003).

 Before 1930, Mexican migrants were predominantly urban and middle-class from central Mexico, border states and northwestern Mexico; but after unskilled, blue collar laborer Mexican migrants from predominantly of the Bajío region increased (Flores, 2018, p 130). As emphasized by Flores, braceros were not “cheap, docile, workers” but, rather, would stand up for their better treatment through filing complaints and by skipping on their contracts in search of fairer, safer and higher paid work if their needs were not met; migrant workers often faced underpay, hazardous conditions, substandard housing/rations and physical assaults. However, if they took the route of opposition it placed them in danger if they transitioned from bracero to “illegals” or “wetbacks.” (Flores, 2018, p. 130) This would be particularly concerning given the growing anti-immigrant rhetoric that fueled initiatives that targeted them.  

“Operation Wetback” in 1954 is considered one of the largest mass deportation of undocumented workers in the U.S which sent about a million or more Mexican immigrants, some that came here legally through labor programs tied to labor work, back to Mexico. At this point, to appease the the agribusinesses, many migrant workers had to participate in the “drying out the wetback” process in re-crossing the border as new braceros; this problematic procedure in addition to the increased militarization of the INS (Immigration and Naturalization Service) expanding transportation opportunities for deportation (bus, train and planes) made for a strong border patrol presence felt from the border states and beyond (to the Midwest regions) (Flores, 2018, p. 132). Police would work alongside the INS to carry out multiple raids in predominantly Mexican neighborhoods on the basis of eliminating the threats to national security. 

This presence would put all Latines at risk since particularly many Puerto Ricans migrant workers were concurrently recruited for labor (fieldwork, foundries, domestic work) just as labor pograms for Mexicans like the bracero program started; thus, many Puerto Ricans would often be targeted as wetbacks and stopped by police although majority avoided deportation (Fernández, 2012). This would become one of the strong factors that contributed to Mexicans living in predominantly Puerto Rican neighborhoods to decrease deportation risk, as highlighted by Fernández. 

Overall, both Puerto Ricans and Mexicans tended to avoid being in public to prevent risk of deportation and/or harassment. Amezcua (2022) notes that Operation Wetback’s campaign in Chicago was not replication of their operations in the Southwest, rather, it was an opportunity to “dislodge the communities that Mexicans built in the industrial North” (p. 36). Chicago’s Operation Wetback purposely started on Mexican Independence Day (September 16th, 1954) taking advantage of the fact that many Mexican residents would be outside celebrating with floats, performers, marching bands, etc. A more densely populated city, Chicago served as the perfect site for not only more ease in their search but a place to spread and utilize their military expanse of manpower, vehicles, detention powers that had been “rehearsed” in the U.S Southwest (Amezcua, 2022).

Mexicans and Puerto Ricans were continuously unrecognized as equals, being exploited for their inconsistent status and labor; Velázquez (2022) notes in her book that though Puerto Ricans had perceived citizenship, it did not stop city officials from viewing them as deportable and therefore led to constant profiling. U.S Immigration policy was fairly open before World War II and the end of the 19th century; underpopulation was, in fact, the main concern. However, with the rise of the Mexican population and the increased migration of other Latine migrants in the U.S, drew concerns based on eugenics that fueled the “Latino Threat” narrative (Chavez, 2008). “This narrative asserts that contemporary Latino immigrants are not like earlier (European) immigrants and pose a serious danger to the nation. This narrative is constructed based on “taken-for-granted truths'' that get propagated via radio and television news and talk shows, newspaper editorials, Internet blogs, and other media”(Fernández, 2010). The “Latino threat” narrative was coined by scholar Leo Chavez and describes the racialization of Latino immigrants faced, especially heightened by the media. The Eugenics movement was influential in pushing this narrative in order to conserve the “superior race” against the “unift”, “feeble-minded” people that bring violence, diseases, and overpopulation (Romero, 2009). 

As Fernández notes, there has been a great lack of acknowledgement of Latinos as a prevalent minority group since Americans tend to conceptualize race and racial prejudice within a strict black and white terms, recognizing primarily Black Americans; this lack would persist even when Latinos or Spanish-speaking descent people surpassed African Americans as the largest minority group in the US as of 2001 (Fernández, 2021).

“In some ways, they are an indecipherable people—conquered or colonized in parts of the continental United States and the Caribbean, but simultaneously voluntary immigrants from other places in Latin America. Because of their diversity and ambiguous status, for decades researchers have struggled with how to study and classify Latinos. Are they a racial “minority” group or are they “immigrants”? (Fernández, 2012).

In the Chicagoland area this ambiguity is particularly apparent given the large migrations of both Mexicans and Puerto Ricans historically. White-ethnic blue collar neighborhoods would become incubators of anti-immigration and anti-Latino sensibilities which grew from these drastic demographic changes that residents were witnessing right outside their front doors. (Amezcua, 2022). Puerto Ricans and Mexicans contributed a “brown” experience that disturbed the already existent “Black and white” dichotomy established in the neighborhoods they would start residing in. “Brown '' as Fernández (2012) details, is not a universal color assignment of Mexicans and Puerto Ricans but, rather, a placeholder (within the racial taxonomy of the U.S) to capture the malleability of meaning to the social difference they are believed to embody. (Fernández, 2012, p. 17). It is this social difference and situation between white and African Americans that connects these groups to embrace a shared Latino identity although there are still distinct histories and relationships to the U.S that impacts their perceived legitimacy as immigrants and citizens. 

At the beginning of the 20th century the major areas of Mexican migration would be to the Near West Side, Packingtown/Back of the Yards (where the meatpacking and slaughterhouses are located) and the South; although urban renewal would push them further out to major locations such as more South/Southwest particularly. These areas or “colonias” as described by Amezcua (2022) in “Making Mexican Chicago” didn’t have Mexicans as the majority at the time but were also occupied by European migrants, Blacks and Puerto Ricans. Influenced by both the limited employment and encouragement by city officials, Puerto Rican migrants tended to settle predominantly in or near the center of the city in neighborhoods such as Lincoln Park, Lake View and the Near Northside (Velázquez, 2022, p. 44). Puerto Ricans specifically, since they were lower in population compared to Blacks and Mexicans, made up barrios that would be scattered throughout the city, as described by scholar Felix Padilla in “Puerto Rican Chicago.” Their presence is most notable in the West— Westtown/Humboldt Park— area housing the largest concentration of Puerto Ricans in the city as reported in 1960. (Padilla, 1987). Though Puerto Ricans were also present in the Near Northside (named “The Gold Coast and the Slum” by Harvey Zorbaugh) living next to Chicago’s wealthiest families, it was due to urban renewal renovations and increase in rental pricing that they were soon forced to relocate to other parts of the city.  

The neighborhoods relevant (but not limited to) in this project are the following: 1. Pilsen (Lower west side) 2. Little Village (Southwest side) 3. Gage Park  (Southwest side) 4. Back of the Yards  (Southwest side) 5. Humboldt Park (West side) 6. Logan Square (Northwest side) 7. Uptown (Near North side) 8. Boystown (Northside). These areas are points of interest due to its proximity to not just the location of murals but locations of where these Latine muralists are either based or grew up in. 

The Pilsen neighborhood (popularly known as “Eighteenth Street” and “Heart of Chicago”) was the site of mostly Eastern and Central European immigrants (Polish, Czehoslovokian predominantly) up until the 1950s after which many Mexican immigrants would settle due to its proximity to downtown industrial jobs and inexpensive housing (Sternberg and Anderson, 2012). Around the 1960s, at the same time Mexicans began moving in due to displacement from expressway construction, urban renewal and the construction of the new University of Illinois campus (UIC), the area’s white population began declining (previous decades of children and grandchildren of European migrants) (Fernández, 2012). This would result in Pilsen becoming a new port of entry for incoming Mexican immigrants and Tejano migrants (Mexican Americans from Texas) arriving through the 60s and 70s. According to Fernandez (2012), several hundred Puerto Ricans as well would contribute to this Spanish-speaking population; in 1960 they made up only 14 percent of the Pilsen population but by 1970 it had risen to 55 percent. As indicated by Sternberg and Anderson (2014) in their study on Bronzeville and Pilsen, unlike the African Americans it was white-led gentrification that historically displaced the Latino population; this would be seen in areas like Wicker Park, Bucktown, Lincoln Park, and University Village which led to the displacement of low-income Latinos by affluent Whites since as early as the 1970s. Pilsen, specifically, due its proximity to downtown and depressed property and land was a particular interest to developers. However, activism in the Pilsen community such as groups like the Pilsen Alliance would be successful to prevent the fates seen in the other neighborhoods described earlier (Wicker Park, Bucktown, etc) forcing the retreat of developers; but it is still an ongoing battle (Sternberg and Anderson, 2012). 

Little Village (popularly known as “26th street” and “La Villita”) of the Southwest/South Lawndale side got its name as part of a rebranding campaign to encourage a neighborhood fix-up of sorts encouraged to residents by real estate agent Richard A. Dolejs. Amezcua (2022) details that Dolejs aimed to promote a local heritage to evoke the small Czech and Slavic villages “from which his forebears came”; this promoted a white, even if immigrant, identity to “sever association” with the neighboring Black community (“North Lawndale/Black Lawndale”) (Amezcua, 2022). The official establishment of “Little Village” became more solidified after North Lawndale was designated as the “worst ghetto in the country” by Life magazine. South Lawndale community members quickly voted for the name “Little Village” after much worry to be associated with a black neighborhood with such negative connotations and, instead, be associated with Old World rural/small thrown origins of its early European immigrants. (Fernández, 2012). A Landmark Designation report done by the Commissions on Chicago Landmarks (2021) states that Mexicans began arriving in the South Lawndale area since the 1940s and that despite the name change to “stem white flight” European descent families increasingly moved out to suburban areas (Cicero, Berwyn, Riverside) by the 1960s. For Mexican families, Little Village offered them affordable housing and a walk-able self contained community. They migrated for similar reasons as to those who migrated to Pilsen: displacement from urban renewal projects and the building of the UIC campus. The report states that as of 2012, the population of Little Village is 84 percent Latino (of which 77 percent is Mexican/Mexican-American), 12 percent African-American and 3.9 percent foreign born. Together, Pilsen and Little Village contained over one third of the city’s Mexican population and represented the largest concentration of Mexican people in the entire Midwest, officially becoming Mexican barrios by 1980 (Fernandez, 2012).

The Gage Park neighborhood was settled by predominantly German immigrants in the 1840s and was known as Lake Town until it was annexed to Chicago by 1889. The area was named “Gage Park” in honor of George W. Gage, a Chicago Commissioner who laid out a plan to build a park there. In the 1920s, many Bohemian and Polish people would migrate there, and were workers of the neighboring Union Stockyards (an area now known as the Back of the Yards).  As stated in the encyclopedia of Chicago (2005), Gage Park is known, historically, for being a testing ground in the 1960s for integration of African-Americans in affordable housing complexes and schools, however much resisted by white residents at the time. Currently, Gage Park is occupied by a predominantly Latino working  class.

Back of the Yards was annexed by Chicago in 1889 since, like Gage Park, it was part of the Town of Lake and experienced great expansion due to the stockyards and due to it being a concentration of railroads. Back of the Yards is located at the former Union Stock Yard and packing plants which was considered the largest livestock yards and meatpacking center in the country until the 1950s (University of Chicago-Chicago studies, 2022). The job prospects from the meatpacking industry attracted many European immigrants (Irish, German, Polish, Lithuanian, Slovakian, etc) and then later Mexican immigrants. The Union Stock Yard officially closed in 1971 which resulted in a serious economic decline and physical deterioration. By this time, the population was becoming majority Latine; 62 percent Latine and 22 percent African American as reported by the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning in 2023. In the article “The Story of the Back of the Yards” by WTTW Chicago’s Monique Wingard, states that by the 1990s that area has since been turned into a busy industry.

Humboldt Park (popularly known as “Paseo Boricua”) was annexed by Chicago the same year it was given its name in honor of naturalist and geographer Alexander Von Humboldt in 1869. The first wave of migration saw Germans, Scandinavians (mostly Danish and Norwegian), Poles, Ukrainians, Italians, and European Jews; it was given a status as a “cultural hub” which is reflected by the statues erected of Humboldt for the Germans, Leif Erickson for the Scandonavians and Thaddeus Kosciuszko for the Poles. (University of Chicago-Chicago studies, 2022) Around the 50s and 60s is when larger migrations of Puerto Ricans settled in the area, which —similarly to the Mexican migrations to Pilsen and Little Village— was a result of the construction of the Congress Expressway, residential redevelopment and urban renewal that pushed them out of the downtown and Near Northside areas in which they previously occupied. Humboldt Park and also the neighboring West Town area (though also occupied by African Americans and Mexicans) became known as Puerto Rican barrios as a result of the departure of European Americans. By 1980 the white population declined to less than 24 percent. African Americans made up 36 percent, and the Spanish-speaking were nearly 41 percent; which, even though Puerto Ricans did not make the majority, Humboldt Park would still be designated as a Puerto Rican Barrio (Fernández, 2012, p. 154). As of 2024, Humboldt Park has been given the designation of Puerto Rico Town (the first in the city) by the Illinois Assembly which works to revitalize the area in promoting economic development and preserving historic traditions (Crain’s Chicago Business, 2024). This is particularly significant since the area is made up of mostly mom-and-pop shops that were hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, and since the community has been facing higher rents and taxes as a result of gentrification. This designation also paves the way for other neighborhoods in Chicago like Little Village and Chinatown to get these protections as well. 

Logan Square used to be an open prairie occupied by farmers until it became annexed by Chicago in 1889. Railroad tracks incorporated in the area opened it up for development; at this time many German and Scandinavian immigrants resided there due to its affordable housing. With the “L” rapid transit station established that connects them to neighborhoods across the city, housing construction increased— particularly after World War I wherein in many Poles Russian Jews became a part of the demographic (University of Chicago-Chicago studies, 2022). After 1930, the population declined as properties deteriorated; the Kennedy Expressway construction and the (Blue Line) station were considered a disruption to residential and commercial life. However complete abandonment of the area was averted thanks to the Logan Square Neighborhood Association which worked to revive and improve living conditions. By the 1960s, Spanish-speaking immigrants became the majority, as reported in the Encyclopedia of Chicago they made up almost 2/3rds of the population (Mexicans, Puerto Ricans, Cubans, Central Americans). Puerto Ricans, particularly, who were pushed out of areas in the Near North and inner city would make Logan Square their new home (although to a lesser extent than Humboldt Park and West Town)  in the 60s and 70s (Fernandez, 2012, p 149).

Originally part of Lake View Township, Uptown became incorporated into the city in 1857 and was occupied by middle income and wealthy residents— early settlers were predominantly German and Swedish immigrants. The establishment of the railroad system which connected them to downtown and other parts made Uptown accessible and sparked construction of new spaces (stores, offices, apartments, etc.) (Maly, 2005). However, after the Great Depression the area experienced an increase in unemployment, overcrowding and a decline in businesses. Suburban out-migration increased as a result which put a financial strain on landlords with the excess vacancies that they could not maintain. The neglected properties provided accessibility for migrants to live there and by the 50s appeared: Appalachian whites, Japanese, Puerto Ricans, Native Americans from other U.S states (encouraged by Bureau of Indian Affairs to integrate into cities) and mental health patients who were sent to apartments and halfway houses. Uptown was given negative associations such as “Hillbilly Ghetto”, “the New Skid Row’, “Uptown the Psychiatric Ghetto.” By the 60s and 70s other groups more largely  integrated into the demographic including refugees (from Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, Haiti, and Ethiopia) and then Blacks and Latino from other parts of the city who were looking for a diverse community, escaping run-down homogenous communities on the south and west sides. (Maly, 2005).  Felix Padilla (1987) in “Puerto Rican Chicago” writes that for Puerto Ricans specifically, Uptown was one of their earlier settlements into the city (alongside Lakeview, Near Northside and Lincoln Park).

Not far from Uptown resides Boystown within the Lakeview area of Chicago. Widely known as the “gay enclave” of Chicago, it provides a safe space and services to the LGBTQ community and was given the official “gay district” designation by the city in 1997. This area has hosted the Pride Parades since the Stonewall uprising in 1969. The community was formulated as a result of persecution and discrimination against homosexuality. Beginning in the 70s, medical clinics, gay community centers, and gay bars gradually opened up which only attracted more gay businesses and residents to develop into what is now an undeniable LGBTQ identity.

As stated previously, the neighborhoods discussed here is an overview, a condensed version of a richer, deeper history. Additionally, these are not all the neighborhoods in which Latine groups have historically resided/reside in but are the most relevant locations to discuss as it relates to the project. Lastly, given that Chicago’s density makes for a larger concentration of Mexicans and Puerto Ricans does not mean that Latines did not migrate to other parts of Illinois. Opportunities for fieldwork would result in migrants in other more rural areas in Illinois as well as the impacts of gentrification would push them further out of the city. 

Mexicans that arrived in Chicago during the early 20th century were in the midst of the revolution whereas in the Southwest, Spanish-speaking communities would develop during the colonial period. It is for this reason that Flores (2018) argues that in many ways, Chicago was closer to Mexico than many of the ethnic Mexican communities in the Southwest. By the 1940s is when Mexican-American leadership became forming, as Flores defines, between the liberal, the radical and the traditional: 1. The radical revolutionary politics would empower Mexican workers whose hard labor was used for the production of goods and services for Mexico, the U.S and the global capitalist market. They dreamed of creating a Mexico that would allow them the choice to stay there in a high standard of living. 2. The liberals utilized nationalist foundations of Mexican Chicago in the 1920s and aimed to create a community and reform movement that celebrated anticlerical and a liberal Mexico as well as the indigenous and “mestizaje” heritage of Mexican peoples. They criticized U.S racial discrimination, devalorized whiteness and denounced U.S imperialism and intervention of Latin America. 3. Traditionalists were faithful Catholics aiming to contain the anticlericalism and radicalism sparked by the revolution. They believed in a sense of morality that does not forsake the Catholic and empathetic ethic that they see as the defining aspect of Mexicanidad. (Flores, 2018, p 135)

From these ideologies formed organizations in Chicago such as LULAC aiming to increase U.S citizenship for Mexicans and secure their rights (via proximity to whiteness) or the GI Forum that defended Mexican veterans of World War II after they were being denied benefits. In the 1960s, particularly sparked newer generations to reimagine their position in society especially after witnessing monumental historical moments like the farmworkers movement and the assassination of both Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and Fred Hamptonin.  They worked in collaboration with their Black and Puerto Rican counterparts to create community after struggling to get local institutions to serve their needs. Therefore, Mexican residents in Chicago saw themselves a part of the growing Chicano Movement which aligned with their objectives to combat institutional racism to instead promote equal labor and political rights.  The Southwest narrative of the movement capitalized on the critique of the U.S empire on former Mexican northern lands; and though Mexicans in Chicago could not claim “the border crossed them” it did not deter from their mission and efforts to establish themselves especially since there is a great connection of migration spanning decades between Mexico and the Midwest area. As documented in “Chicanas of 18th Street,” Chicana activist María Gamboa (2011) writes how the Chicano movement spread a consciousness in Chicago that recognized a history of struggle in both the U.S and Mexico. However, Gamboa firmly emphasizes that the struggle that existed in Chicago, in the U.S, was most imperative to address. 

“I don’t agree when people say we’re all Mexicans transplanted here. No! We’re not Mexicanos all transplanted. I’ve never lived in Mexico! I’ve never struggled in Mexico! I’ve never felt the oppression that people in Mexico have.” (Ramirez, 2011, p. 91)

Gamboa says that the movement brought unity between young, old, working class, those undocumented and among those first to second to later generation Mexican-Americans. From Gamboa’s account, it was the “campañeros” who came from Mexico and struggled there that brought lessons to their fight in Chicago. 

  A notable “hub” (founded, 1970) for this movement was at Casa Aztlan located in Pilsen, which was designated for community organizing, running a free clinic, supporting the arts, providing immigration services among other functions aligned with their self-determination. The Brown Berets, which was modeled after the Black Panther Party, for instance, considered it “home” (Gómez-Quiñones, 2014). The Brown Berets were considered the muscle of the movement made up of mostly former gang members and Vietnam vets. Although the Chicago Berets saw themselves as militant but nonviolent in their efforts to protect and maintain the free clinic in Casa Aztlan, they were still criticized as just being a new gang. (Montejano, 2012, p. 50) 

Compared to their counterparts in the Southwest, Mexican and Mexican Americans in Chicago found it difficult to gain visibility as a racial minority in need of federal entitlement programs that aim to remedy social inequities (Fernández, 2012, p. 231). El Centro de la Causa, is an organization (founded 1971) that aimed to empower local Mexican residents and provide opportunities for youth; it also worked to supplement Casa Aztlan which was constantly in demand. As Fernandez writes, since they were largely unrecognized and had minimal political representation, El Centro provided an alternative to bypass traditional  patronage political systems to, instead, establish community controlled projects. 

The Chicano movement, praised for promoting unity and a new sense of pride for Mexican descent peoples to strive for self determination, still had a shaky foundation. The formulation of the mythologic “Aztlan” land (the American Southwest) brought forth claims to Native American and Azetc heritage for Chicanos— and claims to recuperate a lost homeland whether physically or spiritually. However, as stated by Alicia Gaspar de Alba (2003) in “Chicano Art,” the idea of Aztlan was largely influenced by patriarchal cultural nationalism that embraces indigenismo and focuses predominantly on race and class struggles without considering gender and sexuality issues; this wouldn’t come to the forefront until closer to the 80s-90s when discussions of the intersectionality between the Chicano identity and feminist politics became more apparent. 

The Puerto Rican experience in Chicago is what island officials and local press popularly labeled “The Chicago Experiment” since New York was considered the more “traditional” center of the mainland population (Staudenmaier, 2017, p. 690). As the farthest from New York, the area was presented to migrants as a fresh start that would have been otherwise contested elsewhere on the mainland. However, as emphasized in Rúa’s “Grounded Latinidad” (2012), their experience has been largely absent in popular accounts, especially the role they played in intervening between white and Black. Sonio Song-Ha Lee (2014) posits that the Puerto Rican racial and ethnic identity is an interplay between their sensibilities as people of color with African Americans, Hispanic with other Spanish speaking groups and as members of a distinct Puerto Rican nation. Furthermore, she argues that both African Americans and Puerto Ricans were pivotal actors of blackness and Puerto Rican-ness that makes permeable the boundaries between these categories. 

The Young Lords organization (YLO) was one with origins in Chicago in the late 1960s that worked to address this permeability that led to their experiences as overpoliced and displaced. Originally a street gang comprised of Puerto Rican youth (women known as “Lordettes”), soon became a grassroots political collective led by activist Jose “Cha Cha” Ramirez. In addition to their stance against displacement, they demanded low-income housing and, though short-lived, ran a day-care program. They were based in a Puerto Rican community located on the northside of Chicago, Lincoln Park, which was experiencing threats of urban renewal. Although women were involved and YLO supported gender equity, it was still primarily masculinist and androcentric in its posture, politics and leadership (Fernández, 2012, p. 195).  Unfortunately, the YLO was not able to halt the high-end housing that pushed out low-income Puerto Rican residents out of the neighborhood. This sparked migration that would lead them further west to areas like Humboldt Park.

As noted by Duaney (2002), ideologies amongst Puerto Ricans existed at a juncture between a national identity or a sovereignty. Similarly to the use of “Chicano” and the Mexican ideology of “mestizaje,” the Commonwealth government officially adopting cultural nationalism presents a dominant image of a Puerto Rican nation with a harmonious integration of three cultures and races (Spanish, Taino and Africans) However, this conflation glosses over inner-conflicts and promotes the myth of racial democracy. On the positive end, though, it allowed for the adoption of cultural institutions reviving the study and embracement of the Island’s rich diversity and culture including that of the original inhabitants, the Tainos. This has led to the creation of the identity “boricua”, “borinqueno” for Puerto Ricans as an emotional way to recognize this history. This is particularly adopted in the diaspora in the U.S, as a form of yearning or endearment and as a way to keep ties with Island despite being generations separate from it. DiaspoRican is another term used to represent the varying experiences amongst the Puerto Rican diaspora in the U.S, this was originally coined by poet Mariposa to embody the complexity of the Puerto Rican identity.

  Puerto Ricans in the city faced displacement, housing discrimination, high unemployment rates and police brutality. A prominent instance of the brutality occurred in the summer of  1966 during the first Puerto Rican parade in Chicago, known as the Division Street riots which was sparked after a Puerto Rican youth was shot by a police officer. This is credited as the turning point for the politicization of Puerto Rican Chicagoans which brought to light the harsh conditions they were experiencing in deteriorating  and neglected neighborhoods. Other than the efforts from the Migration Division regional office, organizations like the Los Caballeros de San Juan denounced the “human slums” conditions of public housing (Fernandez, 2012, p145). A key religious institution, the Caballeros supported the integration of Puerto Ricans in Chicago mainstream life while also maintaining cultural pride (Perez, Encyclopedia of Chicago, 2004).

Latino Urbanism or Latino New Urbanism came about as a response to unsustainable development patterns and the insensitivity of New Urbanism towards multiculturalism. Tracing the genealogy of this term, Clara Irazábal (2012) indicates in “Beyond Latino New Urbanism,” that it was proposed as a way to acknowledge and respond to the ethnic needs and lifestyles of US Latina/os in the built environment. One pressing issue is the threat of gentrification to these areas in which Latino Urbanism has been sought to describe how current community members are impacted as a result of the “beautification” to “tropicalization” of the city. According to L.A city planning it is a “broad term used to categorize the multiple practices by which Latinos have created and contributed to the forms, functions, and cultural landscapes of American cities.” There is no one all-encompassing image or concept of Latino Urbanism since settlements  and historical developments can be traced back to pre-colonial periods (pre-Hispanic Mission, Native tribal lands, etc). 

One of the subjects of this project, Puerto Rican muralist Cristian Roldan (2023), sees mural art in the urban sphere as alternative spaces for education since  galleries and museums have been notorious for “othering” and “romanticizing” the marginalized. However, when it comes to conversations about the role of muralists in the process of promoting gentrification and development it becomes more difficult to untangle. In the literature “Heart of a Mission” by Cary Cardova (2017), writes how this tropicalizing of cold urban space exists in the San Francisco Mission District (filled with murals by Latine artists) making “desirable urban bohemia part of the mainstream.” Often this tropicalization smooths over any conflict in news (NYT), “quant area for tourism and gentrification.” Consumption of Latino cultures historically depoliticizes and others the cultures, a “tropicalized borderland, physically and culturally indicative of Latino identity” The mission is thus described as an “alternative lifestyle” living, an expression of nonconformity. Cardova (2017) writes that white anti gentrification activist Kevin Keating (2017) says people like him who want to get as far away from the mainstream without leaving the US end up in neighborhoods like the mission, wherein whole process of gentrification initiated”—at times, though, the tropicalization gives a platform for resistance.

“The difference between graffiti and public art is generally in the eye of the beholder – and for some, they are one in the same. But discerning between the two will get a little easier for city crews in Chicago, thanks to the launch of a mural registry” (Thometz, 2019).

As announced by the public media outlet, WTTW Chicago, the 2019 established mural registry is a promise of protection to Chicago-based artists and their work. More than that, this registry is the city's initiative to solve the age-old issue of what is legal, “public art” (i.e murals) and what is illegal art (i.e graffiti) given that the lines between these two genres are blurred more each year. The shift in acceptance between what is deemed “street art” versus “public art” is dependent on the viewpoint community and the surrounding establishment. Scholar Paola Mezzedri’s (2021) article details this condition as dependent on whether a piece is socially recognized as art and/or as beloved artifacts and testimonies “which spread the values of civilization.” Therefore, the question is less about whether or not to preserve an art piece but “what to preserve and who can decide it?” Mezzedri argues that art becomes “public art” (therefore, accepted art) when administrations and institutions deem it as their moral duty to conserve the artwork. 

Now with the mural registry enacted by the city of Chicago, the decision opens up to artists and the community on what is deemed an artifact to be protected. However, the title “mural registry” insinuates a clear association between mural art and its legality as opposed to graffiti; however Chicago graffiti style work can still be registered (and is) under this umbrella. Though this is a step forward in protecting such— initially criminalized —art forms as the heavily influential and monumental graffiti style, this registry still reinforces those negative connotations and disregards history tied to this genre. Bruce’s work (2019) argues that conflating graffiti with illegal uncritically adopts social problem narratives when, in actuality, its approach is varied between official, unofficial, commercial and vernacular spheres. Graffiti (a social practice and aesthetic) is more than simple resistance but is a spotlight for urban communication, a “caption for the urbanity” that has transnational possibilities additionally to how it has been typically regarded as a counter-hegemonic space for representation. (Bruce, 2019) 

Looking back to the first movements that made art more accessible to the public whether as audiences or participants can reveal the varying interpretations of these art styles (graffiti, murals, public, street). Before the Chicago mural registry, many public art pieces were unfortunately not afforded these protections having been lost to whitewashing/removal, which is one of the main reasons this initiative exists.

As discussed earlier, graffiti has been typically defined as a counter-hegemonic social practice that functions as a stand-in for rupture and cultural transformation (Bruce, 2019, p. 11). Whereas a mural is defined, by Heather Becker’s book (2002), as a painting on a wall that has a particular function in society whether it’s a cave, place of worship, home, factory, school, library, courthouse or business; in whichever space, the target audience is usually firmly public that is away from personal vision and, rather, to a broader form of communication that is rooted in shared social beliefs. This form is considered to be typically tied with restrictions such as the purpose of architectural structure, fixed spatial requirements and appropriateness of subject matter for its audience (Becker, 2002, p 47).

In the United States murals date back to the 17th and 18th century, which within these times were primarily regarded as provincial, seen mostly within the interior decoration of private homes. Opportunities to produce more public murals was thanks to the Academic (aka the American Renaissance) mural movement described by Becker as the “first major American mural movement.” Lasting from the 19th up to the early 20th century, this period resulted in murals in more public spaces such as the Trinity Church in Boston and the State Capital at Albany New York. These murals tended to be of the academic style, meaning that it was produced with heavy influence by European academies of art. This interest in European Style mural making especially sprouted around Philadelphia’s Centennial celebration (1876) when Americans particularly felt the need to compete with Europe not just with technological innovation and trade but with the arts and humanities as well (Knight and Senie, 2016, p. 108). This led to public, official buildings like museums, libraries and universities to be built with emphasis on Greek and Roman classicism with murals and sculptures seen as complementing the architectural fabric.

Around this time as well, academic style paintings grew in Mexico as well with the history genre particularly attempting to portray a national identity depicting pre and post Conquest scenes. Mexican women, specifically, although not academically trained and their position in society relatively sheltered (in-access to public and professional spheres) their work can actually be found in the 1876 Centennial celebration in Philadelphia; featured women included for example Josefina Mata y Ocampo and Soledad Juárez (Estevez, 2018). Although, due to the women being strapped to domestic spaces, their paintings in this period tended to be not of the history genre but of still lifes, portraits, and of domestic interiors. The history paintings, as previously mentioned, would appear in later exhibitions such as the Chicago’s 1893 World’s Fair: The Torture of Cuauhtémoc by Mexican acadmic painter Leando Izaquirre (1893); and, although not featured in this exposition, but it is interesting to note, that another Mexican academic painter Juan Córdero created a work in the history genre as well but of Columbus introducing New World natives to Spanish Royalty (shown in an exhibition in Mexico) So, there has existed an intertwined history and art exchange between Chicago (and U.S generally) with Mexico since well before the mid to late 20th century when it was considered the initial point of exchange/exposure via the growth of Mexican migration to the city that formulated barrios like Pilsen and Little Village.

Around the Chicago exposition (1893) as well existed a shift of increased public interest in murals and therefore, of public commissions which led to national mural groups formulating such as the National Society of Mural Painters founded in New York in 1895. Despite this unprecedented exposure of mural and art in general to the public, mural making would not fully develop until the 20th century (Becker, 2002, p. 48). By the early 20th century, around World War I and after, Knight and Sanie in “A Companion to Public Art” describe that just as the academic mural painting movement was said to have begun, its decline would soon follow. Away from the academic style (with the emphasis on American history and nationalism) the style being called for now is more lyrical expression of our “contemporaneity” since the idealism, optimism and nationalism of the academic style translated into excessive motifs and allegories (Knight and Sanie, 2016, p. 111).

This is a time where Mexican muralists' presence in the US, along with the American realist painters engaged with Regionalism and American Scene painting, would begin the encouragement to artists and patrons to embrace contemporary subject matter and styles in public murals. The art world has since been wowed by the revolutionary images produced a decade after the Mexican Revolution (1910) which then led to the emergence of the famously titled “Los Tres Grandes”— Diego Rivera (1886), Jose Clemente Orozco (1883-1949) and David Alfaro Siqueiros (1898-1949)— who had commissioned works in both Mexico and the US. (Becker, 2002, p. 50). They were known for using their Italian renaissance inspired fresco-style art as a tool of political expression by painting images about the revolution sweeping the country, though at least in the US, its production relied on commissions from private individuals and institutions. The common subjects portrayed through their artworks largely focused on the indigenous and labor and in regards to their work in the US, did not necessarily portray the presence of Mexican-Americans. The Mexican mural movement played a critical role in the inception of Depression-era art, when the federal arts program of the WPA (Workers Progress Administration) began sponsoring murals to support artists struggling from the nationwide economic crisis.  Chicago muralists such as Edward Millman, Lucile Ward and Mitchell Siporin traveled to Mexico and studied techniques used there— as Beaker emphasizes, the New Deal policies in supporting mural production on a massive scale was following Mexico’s example since they were known for their art patronage. The Mexican mural movement exposed to the U.S the potential of mural art to be utilized as a public forum and as a medium to spread social consciousness and public concern (Becker, 2002, p 51).

 In the landscape of Chicago specifically, this newfound support allowed for the creation of the Illinois Art Project (1935-1943) which bore an original school of muralists and other art forms that established a “Chicago style which made the project the cynosure of artistic eyes throughout the country” (McDonald, 1969, p.407). It was from this need-based program (providing work for unemployed artists and making collections more available to the public) that sprouted the South Side Community Art Center (1941) and aimed to stimulate cultural development from all races as well as diversify the Illinois project. Eleanro Roosevelt visited Chicago for its dedication, and to this day it still stands as an official Chicago Cultural Landmark, recognized for being the oldest African American arts center in the United States. The Illinois Art Project from 1935-1943 allocated 316 murals (233 commissioned through the state) with 150 still existing to this day in Illinois (Becker, 2002, p 95). .Following an economic surge at the end of World War II, federal sponsorship and government funding of murals was no longer deemed necessary, and also at this time abstract became popularized (Knight and Sanie, 2016, p 116). Artists began experimenting on how to make larger scale murals began nationwide and were severing ties with European art traditions opposing the idiosyncratic individualism and European art associations of the 1920s. (Becker, 2002, p. 95). One of the defining characteristics of Chicago murals—highlighted  by Becker— were their large heroic figures, massive planar shapes, bold compositional elements and hard-lined contours: symbolic actions and earnest facial expressions were rendered in blocks of light colors and earth tones using dry, visible brushstrokes in sweeping motions.” Additionally, Becker mentions how many of these characteristics were influenced by Mexican muralists. Heroic aspects, specifically, would be something seen in both the community mural movement and within graffiti styles as well. At least for Chicago Public School murals, they tended to coincide with the history painting genre showing themes of the New World, American history/leaders and Chicago; all of which were considered complementary to the curriculum. For example, at least for the Chicago history portrayal, it would feature the Midwest as the “breadbasket and industrial center of America” of manufactured and agricultural goods. (Becker, 2002, p. 99).

Within and after the Civil Rights movement created an unprecedented visibility of murals in particularly neglected neighborhoods. The 1998 edition of Eve Cockcroft’s “Toward a People’s Art,” is a seminal study of the emerging community-based mural movement in the United States and stresses how people wanted to shift away from integrationism to instead move towards radicalism and empowerment: 

“People wanted to control their own media, their own schools, their own lives. This mass quality of the cultural quest for identity necessarily brought great pressure to bear on nonwhite artists and intellectuals…As the myth of the melting-pot America was laid to rest not just blacks but others— Chicanos, Puerto Ricans, Asians, women, Native Americans, white-ethnics—joined in rediscovering their cultural heritage and with it new pride and dignity in themselves” (Cockcroft, 1998, p.17).

Cockcroft credits Chicago as having the largest concentration of community-based murals, where the movement toward people’s art has progressed furthest in theory, practice and durability overtime. A prominent and famous first out of this movement in Chicago was the “Wall of Respect” mural done in 1967 which was created in reaction to the “high tide of black resistance” (Lloyd, 1996). The mural celebrated achievements by African Americans (public figures, athletes, musicians, writers)  and was done through collaborative and activist processes, with Black muralist William Walker leading a group from the Organization of Black American Culture (a collective founded in the same year). Breaking from the melting pot ideology, activist groups such as the Black Panthers (founded in California 1966, with Chicago following in 1968) the Puerto Rican Young Lords organization (founded in Chicago in 1968), and the Brown Berets (founded in California 1966, with Chicago following in 1971) began formulating with the outward facing art a reflection of their struggles. 

Mario Castillo’s following “Metafísica”(1968) is credited as the first Chicano, Mexican and one of the first anti-Vietnam murals in Chicago. Castillo, following the lead of Walker, worked on the mural collaborating with neighborhood teenagers (described as “Chicano youth" by Cockcroft) and envisioned it as a “Wall of Peace” as stated in the “Healing Walls” collection (Lloyd, 1996). This was created in the backdrop of the Chicano movement (1960s-1970s), aligned with the objectives of civil rights for Mexican-Americans, greatly contributing to community-based mural movement as its own sort of sub-genre of Chicano styles.

Gaspar de Alba argues that Chicano culture is an “alter-native” within the U.S, both alien and indigenous to the landbase known as the West. This culture, a byproduct of domination, is a form of resistance and a form of survival via the power of reproduction. Guisela Latorre (2008) similarly writes how indigenismo elements, particularly in murals, work as political in the way Chicano/a artists articulate a cultural and gendered identity. This means resisting postcolonialism and capitalism with a strong sense of indigenism; so therefore a de-colonial act or consciousness that pushes for a clear autonomous indigenous voice.

Many activist groups have already existed by this point— the term itself “Chicano” existing even longer before that. A pejorative term, Chicano was originally used predominantly by the Mexican American working class as a way of denouncing land grabs and white privilege. A large part of Mexico was annexed after the US war with Mexico, and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo in 1848 was supposed to ensure the existing Mexicans would gain rights of citizenship (aka rights to own land, property, vote, etc). However, this was an empty promise that led to years of mistreatment that pushed an “other” or “alien” rhetoric towards them, citizens or not. The “Chicano” identification allowed for reclamation of their roots in the US, to not be seen as foreigners but as long time contributors to the country that deserves recognition. The 1950s “Cold War mentality” as Rosales (1997) calls it in his book “Chicano!,” was an anti-establishment mindset that grew within the “hippie” counterculture. Free expression was promoted against American conformity in which Latinx youth became increasingly involved in.  It eventually led to their idealization of “Chicano” as grounds to start a movement

One significant form of protest— and just a year after Castillo’s first anti-Vietnam mural in Chicago— attached to this movement was the “National Chicano Moratorium” in East LA 1969. It was anti-Vietnam due to the many Mexican-Americans who were expected to be on the frontlines but were horribly discriminated against when they got home; this further ensued an already existing unrest (Rosales, 1997).  However, as often happens to racialized groups that protest peacefully, it was considered threatening and was met with beatings and bloodshed despite the fact that families and children were participating. Sprouted from their frustrations, the Chicano mural movement began around this time to push back against the dominant ant-Mexican rhetoric and promote autonomy/self-determination for themselves through art.

Not too long after Castillo’s mural, came the “History of the Mexican-American Worker” mural by Ray Patlán, Vincente Mendoza and José Nario created in the mid-70s. During its creation the city was not happy with the United Farm Workers emblem depicted in the mural, criticizing it as an advertisement, not art; the city council filed a lawsuit in 1974 to stop the muralists however the Judge at the time ruled in favor of the artists. This delayed/slowed the mural production and it did not help that vandals who opposed the mural would deface it with paint. Despite all of this pushback, they were able to successfully complete the mural and it is celebrated and repainted to this day: it features a railroad worker, machinist, a scene of the steel mills, a butcher man, both U.S and Mexican flag along with the likeness of Benito Juárez, José Vasconcelos and Abraham Lincoln.

John Pitman Weber, Chicago muralist and co-founder of the Chicago Public Art Group in “Healing Walls” (1996) said that the influence of Mexican muralism has been strong there since the 30s and in no way was limited to artists of Mexican descent. “Los Tres Grandes” inspired movements throughout Latin America and the U.S. utilizing the medium to raise awareness on political and social situations. Puerto Rico, particularly,  is characterized by Jarieth Merced as a   “mecca of local and international muralism” that reclaims spaces and articulates identity; from this sprouted festivals such as “Los Muros Hablan” and “Santurce es Ley.” Puerto Rican murals would address issues regarding ecological responsibility, heritage/history and their colonial status. On a transnational level as well, would exist murals by the diasporic Puerto Ricans across the U.S in places like Chicago, Philadelphia to New York (Roberts, 2021).

The first Puerto Rican mural in Chicago is the “Cruxificion de Don Pedro Albizu Campos” by community artists Mario Galan, Hector Rosario and Jose Bermudez (1971). It depicts a Puerto Rican flag divided in sections with a white cross and shows Campos being crucified between Lolita Lebron and Rafael Miranda. Commissioned by the Puerto Rican Arts Association it reflects the struggles of Puerto Rican nationalists. Since U.S rule overtook Puerto Rico various parties formed, which Margaret Power describes in her book “Solidarity Across the Americas”; 1. The Republican Party (1899) supported statehood for economic and ideological reasons 2. The Socialist Party (1915) advocated for statehood for Puerto Rico and for better worker conditions. 3. The Union Party (1904) advocated for self-government, autonomy or independence. 4. Nationalist Party (1919) conflicts in the previously named party led to this one to be formed from the pro-independence wing of the Union Party. Campos was the vice president of the Nationalist Party in 1924, including members Lebron and Miranda. Against the U.S presence in Puerto Rico, Lebron is known for her political activism and for leading an assault on Congress an “armed propaganda” not meant to kill but to bring awareness of Puerto Rico’s status as a U.S colony (Power, 2023).

The mural is an homage to the Puerto Rican independence movement depicting members like Campos as martyrs (alike to Jesus) of its mission. Although still standing today over a community garden, it faced various threats of removal by development in the early 2000s. Due to activism and protests that stalled construction—Alderman Billy Ocasio threatening to chain himself to the structure—  successfully prevented the mural’s destruction. “Símbolos” (1974) another mural in Chicago by Galan was created a few years later and had specific pre-Columbian references to the Tainos of Puerto Rican culture similar to the references seen in Castillo’s “Metafísica.” 

Walking down Paseo Boricua in the Humboldt Park neighborhood would reveal numerous murals with clear connections with the area’s historical Puerto Rican presence. You would find a similar presence in Pilsen and Little Village in regards to the Mexican presence. These enclaves, a safe place for migrants previously and those to come, show examples in real time of cultural placemaking and the capability of this process to attempt to preserve. Cultural placemaking as defined by Feng and Owen (2019) is the creation and expansion of arts and cultural infrastructure to prevent the place from disappearing culturally. This process celebrates the identity and history of the people highlighting themes of diversity, democracy and struggle for social justice.

 The efforts of place making tends to be more context-specific and works against an homogenous aesthetic of modern-day housing and commercial development (Rodriguez-Roberts, 2021). In addition to the archival sites, local businesses (many named after Mexican or Puerto Rican states/towns), art centers, cultural centers, museums (The Humboldt Park National Puerto Rican Museum or the Pilsen National Museum of Mexican Art) what is most immediate to the eye are the murals decorating these buildings interiors/exteriors (including residential buildings). 

This project intends to look behind a sample of these murals as it relates to the Latine artists behind them and to understand if cultural place-making was at the forefront (why, if not). With the city as a canvas, muralists take on a more scrutinized role in what approach they take, what message they intend to convey and how that is received by the community. Whether the identity of the artist complicates or enriches this process is what is to be investigated amongst the eleven Puerto Rican and Mexican descent Chicago-based muralists in how they are able to navigate space to become part of the legacy of artists of color attempting to secure a foundation for them. The following section will address more specifically what is to be uncovered at the conclusion of this project.