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In recent exhibits, renowned Colorado artists Tony Ortega and Daniel Salazar explore themes of Chicano experience, historical erasure, memory, mythology and the bonds of family

Tony Ortega and Daniel Salazar did not know each other growing up in Denver. They did not cross paths at the �Ǹ�Թ�, even though many steps on those paths were similar.

They finally met through Denver’s , when the organization invited famed Mexican sculptor Francisco Zúñiga to Denver and Salazar and his wife, Maruca, a CU �Ǹ�Թ� MFA alumna, hosted a reception.��

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Maruca Salazar (left) and Daniel Salazar (right) in a Museo de las Americas gallery with their recently ended exhibit “Accidentally on Purpose – Pasó lo que tenía que pasar” celebrating 50 years of their activism and art. Maruca is a former director of Museo de las Americas. (Photo: Tony Ortega)��

“That was really an era that brought artists together,” Salazar says. “And that was really also part of what we were experiencing and practicing at that time, because we were very much directed toward organizing and creating work and creating community, something that continued from our experiences at CU of organizing, working together, creating opportunities to create work and exhibit work and just making that part of our lifestyle.”

So, Ortega and Salazar met, and in that meeting there was recognition—of the inspiration to create, of activism and organizing, of El Movimiento, of art informed and inspired by history and heritage, culture and identity and, perhaps most especially, family.

Always family—in the making of art, in its display, in bonds of both birth and choice that have woven a creative tapestry across decades and been given form in the recently completed exhibit ��at Museo de las Americas in Denver, celebrating 50 years of and ’s activism and art; and in currently showing at the �Ǹ�Թ� Museum of Contemporary Art.

“Tres Voces, Un Corazón” highlights the , his wife, , and their son, . The exhibit, guest curated by Maruca Salazar, in part explores what is passed between generations and how even in families, identity does not have to mean identical.

And in both exhibits, themes of Chicano experience, Indigenous identity, historical erasure, memory, mythology, community and creating home—themes that in many ways began to find form for Salazar and Ortega as young activists and artists at CU �Ǹ�Թ�.

The path to CU �Ǹ�Թ�

Before they began to flourish as artists and activists in the Chicano cultural renaissance that grew in the 1970s, however, Salazar and Ortega were two kids growing up in Denver—six years apart in age but experiencing similar trajectories.

Salazar was born in Denver in 1952 and Ortega moved to the city as a young child from Pecos, New Mexico, and both were Baby Boomers who navigated their Mexican heritage as American boys who loved to run around and play sports and get up to things in neighborhoods where many of the adults acted as auxiliary parents.

Salazar was in one of the first graduating classes from John F. Kennedy High School and studied at Pamona College in California before losing his financial aid and dropping out to pursue work as a real estate photographer. However, “my brother five years older than I was had attended CU, and I used to go and visit him and marvel at what college life was like there. I was very intrigued by the �Ǹ�Թ� scene in those days.”

Ortega, coming up six years later, remembers touring the CU �Ǹ�Թ� campus as a senior at East High School—inspired, in part, by a fascination with the football team’s lauded running back Bobby Anderson.

Even though Salazar and Ortega studied at CU �Ǹ�Թ� several years apart, they were there in the heady 1970s, when Chicano activism was gaining momentum and intensity on campuses across the United States. Both were involved with United Mexican American Students (UMAS) and the El Diario de la Gente student newspaper, and Salazar was an undergraduate student during the time of —when, over the course of 48 hours in May 1974, two car bombs killed six people, five of whom were CU �Ǹ�Թ� students or alumni, who were involved in El Movimiento Chicano social justice movement.

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Cipriano Ortega (left), Tony Ortega (center) and Sylvia Montero (right) at their “Tres Voces, Un Corazón” exhibit showing through Sunday at the �Ǹ�Թ� Museum of Contemporary Art. (Photo: �Ǹ�Թ� Museum of Contemporary Art)

Not long after the tragedies of those days, Salazar traveled to Xalapa, the capital of Mexico’s Veracruz state, to study. It was a strange time to be away from �Ǹ�Թ�, Salazar recalls.

“The aftermath of Los Seis and other events made things kind of tense, kind of heightened,” he says. “It was a period of a lot of political protest and activity, a lot of activism and organizing, so it was an interesting time to step away from what was happening in �Ǹ�Թ�.”

Several years later, Ortega also studied in Xalapa, a natural progression of his Latin American studies and, in a way, to “see how Mexican I was,” Ortega recalls. “I think both Daniel and I ended up finding out how American we were.”

While studying Spanish, anthropology, history and other subjects, both lived with local families and “really integrated into Mexican society,” Ortega says, experiences that have informed his and Salazar’s artwork in various ways—from occasional experiences of feeling very Mexican in the United States to not feeling Mexican enough in Mexico, to navigating and claiming their Mexican heritage while exploring their Chicano identities. And in Salazar’s case, the time in Xalapa included meeting Maruca, the woman who became his wife.

‘Let the muse move you’

After graduating CU �Ǹ�Թ�—Salazar in communications and Ortega in business Spanish and Latin American studies—both Salazar and Ortega pursued creative careers. Salazar worked in photography, journalism and filmmaking and Ortega, who earned an associate degree in fine art from the Rocky Mountain College of Art and Design in 1982 and his MFA from CU �Ǹ�Թ� in 1995, became a .

And they both married artists and grew their artistic reputations in Denver’s vibrant arts community, so it’s only natural that art has been a language and lineage of family.��

As organizers and activists, their art explores themes including immigration, gender roles, historical erasure and identity. And it has never shied away from topics that aren’t easy to face. “Accidentally on Purpose – Pasó lo que tenía que pasar”��featured Salazar’s work Grand Poobah and Office Fairy Cut Through Red Tape, a digital photograph mural featuring a 1941 photograph of federal office workers to whom Salazar added a crown and fairy wings.

The piece was controversial enough when it was hung in Denver’s Wellington E. Webb Municipal Office Building that even The Denver Post editorialized against it on behalf of aggrieved government employees.

“Government employees didn’t like it very much,” Salazar recalls, “but I think most people’s experiences are with the red tape and feeling like they can’t do anything about it.”��

“It’s meant as satire,” Maruca Salazar says.

And “Tres Voces, Un Corazón” includes Ortega’s work El Grito de Guadalupe, which portrays Our Lady of Guadalupe in a pose reminiscent of Edvard Munch’s The Scream. Beneath her on the floor is a sculpture of baby Jesus in a cage.

“To be meaningful, art should represent and reflect the time we’re in,” Ortega explains, adding that art also is a medium for exploring and understanding identity.

“Tres Voces, Un Corazón” also includes Montero’s series “Gaan”—collages showing different aspects of southwest Native dance and reflecting both her Apache heritage and her training with the Martha Graham Dance Company.��

Tony Ortega notes that while each of the three artists in the family work on different levels of their Denver home, and while each has a strong individual artistic identity, the threads of family are woven throughout “Tres Voces, Un Corazón.”

In Cipriano Ortega’s installation Lo Lo House, in which he and his band Los Lo Los will perform at 6 p.m. Saturday, one of his poems scrolls down a wall: “To build a house, to build a home. To build a house. To build a home. Let the muse move you.”

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