Amalia Mesa-Bains

Abstract

Amalia Mesa-Bains is an artist and cultural activist whose work emerged from the Chicano movement of the 1960s and 1970s. Her evolution as an artist paralleled her work in education. With a degree in clinical psychology and her background in elementary and bilingual education, and as a scholar of the Chicano movement, Mesa-Bains perceives strong ties between art and social practice. Art is “a series of ethical reflections,” she says, “a relationship of private narratives and public dialogues.”