The University of Houston’s Center for Mexican American and Latino/a Studies [CMALS] has just unveiled Latino cARTographies, the country’s first portable, bilingual, and interactive digital board that maps Houston’s Latino visual art.

With just a touch of the finger, this innovative digital board allows the visitor to access 180 of Houston’s Latino artists, explore neighborhoods, meet the artists, and experience the Latino cultures of Houston. In addition to images and text, the board features audio, video, animation, avatars, special effects and even music.

Latino cARTographies is the creative vision of Pamela Anne Quiroz, Executive Director of the Inter University Program on Latino Research, Director of the Center for Mexican American and Latino/a Studies and Professor of Sociology, and Juana Guzman, former Vice President of the National Museum of Mexican Art, and current National Arts Strategist.

Professor Pamela A. Quiroz and Juana Guzman worked with the CMALS Research Team and the Gibson Group’s award-winning TouchCity Platform for nearly three years to create what Homi Bhabha called, a ‘third space’, a place where cultures collide and interact, and where new realities are made. The ‘Third Space’ is about active engagement and interaction, agency, and empowerment.’ This vision seeks to engage and educate the public about Latino cultures and artistic contributions to the city and the nation, democratize access to the arts, particularly for underserved communities, and shift the mode of visitor participation from passive consumer to one that assists the visitor to find or create her/his ‘third space.’ 

The idea for Latino cARTographies began when Dr. Quiroz organized the city of Houston to host the country’s premier Latino art event, Latino Art Now! Dr. Quiroz conceived the idea for the digital Artscape and viewed it as a way to create a dynamic but permanent tribute to the Latino artists of Houston. The result is a twenty-first-century mode to access the arts and experience culture – Latino cARTographies that maps the past, present, and future of Houston’s Latino art. By utilizing technology that preserves, represents, and promotes Houston’s Latino visual arts and communities in an equitable and inclusive manner, the Center for Mexican American and Latino/a Studies is transforming how we experience art in the twenty-first century.

Latino cARTographies is a permanent yet dynamic visual archive, a digital Artscape designed to educate and engage the public. It merges art with technology to address the historic inequities of Houston’s underserved, underrepresented Latino artists, arts centers, and communities and presents an alternative to the traditional ways in which people have accessed art and culture.

Latino cARTographies plays a critical role in capturing the artistic and cultural contributions of Houston’s Latino artists and preserving public works of Latino art that have been lost. In the span of three years since the planning and implementation of the digital board, several public works have been destroyed.

This digital Artscape is a community-centered permanent tribute to the artistic and cultural contributions of Houston’s Latino artists, Latino arts organizations, and the Latino communities they serve.

In addition to images, Latino cARTographies draws on library archives, oral histories, and artists biographical notes and interpretations to understand how artists view their art and their vision for its future. Also included are brief descriptions and histories of the location, title of artwork, year of production, medium, and photographic credits. Latino cARTographies is predicated on user participation. The interactive digital Artscape invites visitors to touch, explore, and participate in the creative process. Everything on the board is meant to be touched and examined.

The priority audience for Latino cARTograhies is schools, libraries, community events and other opportunities to display the board to the public.  The portable, interactive digital board can be easily transported. In short, this project will bring the museum to the community and the community to the museum.

Latino cARTographies is CMALS’s gift to the Latino and greater Houston community, a resource that documents Latino cultural contributions in depth, while also serving as a tool to generate social discourse in the humanities. Eventually, the goal is to expand Latino cARTographies access through multiple installations throughout the city of Houston and virtual access through an App.