Self Help Graphics and Art

Self Help Graphics and Art

Hansen Dam, 7th Council District

Public Program's Website

About the Programmer

Self Help Graphics & Art (SHG) inspires the creation and promotion of new works by Chicano and Latino artists through experimental and innovative printmaking techniques and other visual art forms/media.

Since 1973, SHG has been the intersection where arts and community meet, providing a forum for local and international artists. The Barrio Mobile Art Studio (BMAS) serves our mission to nurture emerging artists and present Latino art to a broad audience. The BMAS does this by taking art creation to the streets with arts programming that features both youth and multi­generational workshops. The creative team facilitates workshops in the community that include: printmaking (silkscreening, linocut, drypoint, monotype), digital art using mobile devices and tablets, aerosol art (including temporary murals), and stenciling, among other workshops that are customized to fit various scenarios. The BMAS was founded as a program that works towards equity and social justice through art.

About the Program

At Hansen Dam in Pacoima, the Barrio Mobile Arts Studio will offer an artmaking program to learn about the indigenous Cucapá peoples currently living in the settlement of Ejido Cucapá Mayor, located along the Colorado River Delta, 40 miles south of the border at Calexico, offering the opportunity to learn about this region and draw similarities between Pacoima and El Mayor to encourage taking ownership of water conservation and stewardship of bodies of water.

At Norman O. Houston Park in Baldwin Hills/Crenshaw, Barrio Mobile Arts Studio participants will be invited to create work about the Baldwin Hills Reservoir (now Kenneth Hahn State Recreation Area) that flooded parts of the community due to oil drilling near fault lines under the reservoir. A similar man­made flood in the Imperial Valley destroyed the area where the Cucapá had lived for over 10,000 years, displacing the community.