"Lab."

I've made some time to "experiment."

Roses.

I'm a sucker for a good horoscope.

CANCER (June 21-July 22): First the negatives: Don’t be a martyr to what you’ve won. Don’t let your success oppress you. Don’t become a slave to the useful role you’ve earned. Don’t neglect your own needs as you serve the needs of those who admire you for what you give. Now let’s try a more positive way to frame the challenges ahead of you: Keep questioning whether the fruits of your victories are still enjoyable and fulfilling to you. Make sure the triumphs of the past don’t get in the way of the potential triumphs of the future. Find out how your success may need to evolve. Push beyond what’s good and head in the direction of what’s great.

My goodness am I a sucker for a good horoscope, what an eery feeling to have something or someone outside of you communicate and put into words things that you have been grasping for and feeling, but may have set aside as illegitimate sensations. Not that I would have ever referred to myself in terms of being a "martyr," or admired, or possibly a servant to others (pride and vanity are worlds apart). I must admit that the sudden influx of activity and attention that the collective, and I, have been receiving, makes me feel a little outside of myself. Basically, I'm not use to it, it's new, and I feel like it's some what of a social role that I don't know if I properly fit. I've always been the type to question everything, I'm a bit of a pessimist, and prefer a realistic route (due to the fact that I have already tried living a fantastical, assumptive life, and it was a lesson learned). I think I can say that I never intended to be classified as an "artist," without the statement being detrimental. So, that's it. This is all very new to me, and more than anything, it's surreal. It's almost as if I'm on the outside looking in.

To have been covered by The Current on multiple occasions, by WOAI and San Antonio Living, The SouthSide Reporter (three times), The Prensa, The Express News (comes out in tomorrow's paper), BackBeat Magazine, 2 Cammy awards, a residency in LA, a gallery show that has been intentionally prolonged....in a month, at times makes me want to run for cover and hide (because I don't know what to say) but at the same time I am ecstatic, because this is all much bigger than me. There is no grasping for notoriety on my end because I have not lost my purpose, which is to give back to the community that has supported and given me so much, and to make my family proud.

Everything has happened so fast that I have had little time to sit, soak it up, analyze, and put it into perspective.

I've been given good advice, bad advice, and questionable advice. My favorite conversation to recall is "It's a business, that's how you have to see it." Really? Interesting, because that's what I wanted to stay away from. But, I think I can navigate appropriately, and I'm sure an argument can be built against that statement.

I don't mean to sound ungrateful, because it's actually quite the opposite. I am so grateful that I am more determined than ever to stay true to myself, to the community I love, and to direct my energy towards a constructive, positive life.

Thank you.

p.s. I recently got asked to be a part of a show at the Museo Alameda. I'm gonna be showing at a museum. What???

(the Museo space, and my wall)

THE PRENSA!

I love it that we are in The Prensa!

"Dogs Mark Territory in Mexican Art."

Sweet!!

Southside Reporter!

Noi Mahoney, Editor of the Southside Reporter came out to the "Meet The Artists" event at the Guadalupe Gallery where Más Rudas gave a tour of the instillation and talked about our inspiration and goals for the show, and he wrote a great article about it. There was great conversation and interaction from all that came. In attendance were family, and friends, reps from local animal care facilities (who promised to alert city officials and get them to view our show), and the room was buzzing with the impact we all want to make in regards to the stray animal issue. We made lots of connections, shared our resources, and I walked away with a feeling of momentum that I hope lasts. What a great evening!

Check out our Southside Reporter article here:

Art show chronicles plight of San Antonio's ‘dogs'

Backbeat Magazine, April issue.

Hey, thats me:

Thank you, Frank!

San Anto Cultural Arts Wheat Paste Project

The students and I have completed our first wheatpaste project, and we are all ready for our next, BIGGER paste up (which will happen this summer). The images went up on the soon to be home of San Anto Cultural Arts, on the corner of El Paso and Chupaderas. If you have a minute swing by and check out the photos of the future residents of 2120 El Paso.

Más Rudas on the San Antonio Living show!

("hey Shelly," hahaha)

San Antonio Current - ARTS: Biting back

Thank you to Natalia for reviewing our show. Read our review in The Current, here:

San Antonio Current - ARTS: Biting back

(p.s We hardly ever drink Starbucks [but hey, who's perfect?]......we have some strong points to make in the idea of re-defining what Chicana means to us, and if you have any questions in regards to what we were quoted saying we would be happy to explain in detail)

Biting back
San Antonio's Chicana collective takes in Westside strays

COURTESY PHOTO

Transforming Galeria Tonantzin into SA's west side

By Natalia Ciolko
The women of Chicana art collective Más Rudas sprawl on the floor of the Galería Tonantzin as a tray of Starbucks arrives. Ruth Buentello, whom the others call “the artist,” eyes her venti cup with alarm. “You said get the big one!” insists Mari Hernandez, the photographer, and pushes it toward her. Kristen Gamez, a filmmaker, turns up a mix of freestyle on the boombox and everyone gets back to painting the walls. It’s another long night in anticipation of the group’s first full exhibit, timed perfectly for San Antonio’s Contemporary Art Month.

Despite the strong stirrings of girl power in the gallery tonight, the subject matter of operation Canis Familiaris is San Antonio’s stray-animal problem, itself complicated by human notions of machismo.

“For me the machno-ness is just seeing the stray mothers,” Gamez said. “It’s this lot they have no choice in. They’re in heat, the male dog dominates them, and they’re left with these babies that they have to nurse and find food for. It’s something I’m definitely going to identify with my piece, connecting to these females.”

CAM

Mas Rudas Collective:
Operation Canis Familiaris
Through Apr 16
Galeria Tonantzin
Guadalupe Cultural Arts
Center
guadalupeculturalarts.org

By opening night, the gallery’s formerly blank walls had transformed into street scenes of San Antonio’s West Side, direct reflections of the neighborhood surrounding the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center. As visitors entered the streetscape, miniature televisions glowed with images of strays in the urban wild. Buentello’s cardboard paintings of dogs and men stand away from the minimal black-and-white walls, leading into the orange living room of a family home. Hernandez’s black-and-white portraits of beloved animals and the details of recreated domesticity induced visitors and family members to relax on couches and add beer cans to the already-realistic scene.

But opening night was just the beginning: Más Rudas will participate in a gallery walkthrough April 1, at Meet the Artists, followed a week later by a spoken-word poetry event in the space, in collaboration with San Anto Cultural Arts. The show will culminate in a Westside dog show and closing reception in the parking lot of the Guadalupe. By far the most unusual aspect of the exhibit is a free spay-and-neuter clinic scheduled for March 31.

SpaySA, a nonprofit that provides subsidized services in Bexar County, says it’s able to work anywhere — a gym, a hall, anyplace will do. Because the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center is located in Council District 5, the organization has funds available to offer free spay or neutering services for 100 animals, plus $10 rabies shots.

“Because we come from this issue and we’re faced with it, and even some of our families are a part of the issue, we wanted to provide something to service the community,” Gamez said. “It’s not about looking down. It’s just something that we need to provide some kind of recourse for.”

The stakes and scale of this show are vastly bigger than the group’s first effort, a barely publicized art-show-cum-house-party titled Our Debut: Quince at 30, in which the then-nameless collective explored the rite of womanly passage they each skipped in adolescence, and in doing so touched on topics ranging from teen pregnancy to consumerism. [See “A quinceañera, 15 years late,” December 22, 2009.]

Scarcely two months later, opportunity presented itself. Cruz Ortiz, orchestrating the second installment of the Guadalupe’s Artists Curating Artists, chose Más Rudas to take over Galería Tonantzin at the Guadalupe.

“We didn’t have much time, but we knew we couldn’t pass this up,” Buentello said, a hint of amazement registering on her face even now. Things are moving quickly, but not to anyone’s dismay.

Gamez described meeting her fellow collective chicas as a watershed moment that came at a time when she felt adrift. “I could do this 24 hours a day,” she said. “I could get off work, come here, and paint these black lines on the walls until 2 or 3 in the morning or whenever it gets done because I like what we’re doing and I feel good when I’m around them.”

Más Rudas’ origin story should make other aspiring artists feel good, too; to date, the women estimate that — aside from prints of Hernandez’s photos — the show has cost them less than $20 to put together. Found materials and old paint make up most of it, and the spay-neuter services were donated. Creativity and group action made it happen, and the audience the women say they hope to influence most are the Westside youths in whom they see themselves.

“I want them to know their passions can be nurtured,” said Más Rudas’ Sarah Castillo, who is currently pursuing her B.A. in art at UTSA. “My parents did not really support me and my creative side growing up. It was just something that I did, and I placed value on it but the adults in my life didn’t. I know firsthand how that could cause confusion or setbacks.”

Buentello, a painter, says kids should know that Chicano art doesn’t have to look a certain way. “When I was growing up, I thought Chicano artists could only exhibit in a certain part of town, or could only do work that’s made on canvas and in a frame, but when you think about what we’re doing, we’re really stepping out of that,” she said. “You can redefine what Chicano means.” •

Natalia Ciolko is a San Antonio native and UT-Austin graduate living and writing in SA.

The making of Canis Familiaris

With the help of friends and family we installed our exhibit in the late hours of 7 days. Big THANK YOU to all that came to help us: Ricardo, Joe, Chad, Natalia, Audrya, Taj, and to our families who allowed us to borrow the certain home adornments to complete the interior.

Our first gallery show consisted of almost 4 times more space than we had to work with before.

In between our work schedules, our homes, our families, and the time we needed to work on our individual pieces, we constructed an instillation that makes me proud. There's something that happens when I come together with these ladies, a dynamic thats difficult to put into works. A lot of hard work went into making our first gallery show a success, we new we had to. A few times along the way I was pessimistic, and now, I realize that I had no reason to be.

Flores Tire Shop adorns a wall.

Cristina and Ruth evaluating the images to be painted on the walls.

A fence made by Ruth and Taj from found home siding.

We appreciate her feedback.

Painting the wall.

A rare show of stress.

Kristin and Mari working hard.

Ruth and her hammer.

Before and After.

Before and after shots of two spaces in the instillation.