Join SVMoA for a conversation with internationally recognized artist Enrique Chagoya and master printmaker Paul Mullowney. Represented in the Jordan Schnitzer Collection, Chagoya draws on his experiences living on both sides of the U.S.–Mexico border and in Europe to create work that juxtaposes secular, popular, and religious imagery. Using familiar pop culture icons as accessible points of entry, he explores complex issues including colonialism, cultural conflict, and political power. Recently, Chagoya completed a residency with Mullowney, and the two will discuss Chagoya’s artistic practice, their collaborative printmaking process, and the ideas that emerged from the residency.
Enrique Chagoya is a Mexican-American artist whose paintings, prints, drawings, and multiples examine the intersections of history, politics, religion, and popular culture. Drawing on influences ranging from Aztec codices and European colonial imagery to comic books, advertising, and contemporary media, Chagoya creates layered visual narratives that challenge conventional understandings of cultural identity, power, and historical memory. His work often employs satire and humor to critique colonialism, globalization, and the circulation of images across cultures. Chagoya has exhibited extensively in museums throughout the United States and internationally, and his work is held in major public collections including the Museum of Modern Art, the Whitney Museum of American Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum. He is Full Professor at Stanford University’s Department of Art and Art History.
Paul Mullowney is a master printmaker and the founder and co-director of Mullowney Printing Company in Portland, Oregon. Over a career spanning more than three decades, he has collaborated with leading contemporary artists to produce innovative editions in intaglio, relief, photogravure, lithography, and screenprinting. After becoming a master printer at Crown Point Press in San Francisco, Mullowney went on to direct print studios in Japan and Hawaii before founding his own workshop in 2011, relocating it to Portland in 2019. In addition to publishing editions with internationally recognized artists, he is deeply committed to printmaking education through residencies, apprenticeships, and community partnerships.
This lecture is presented as part of SVMoA's Circa 1971: From the Collections of Jordan D. Schnitzer and His Family Foundation exhibition.