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The Gallery at the Paramount
STG is creating a space to spotlight artists and galleries making positive change in the community.
Nepantla Cultural Art Gallery
Founded in October 2018 by Jake Prendez & Judy Avitia-Gonzalez, The Nepantla Cultural Arts Gallery is a multi-use multi-cultural accessible arts gallery grounded in the Chicana/o Latinx arts traditions. We are located on the border of West Seattle and the White Center neighborhood. We host monthly art exhibitions focused on marginalized communities and communities of color. We offer an ever growing gift shop with unique collection of apparel, jewelry, handmade gifts, and amazing works of art by local and national artists. The Nepantla Cultural Arts Gallery also serves as a community space for events including arts related lectures and workshops, open mics, and community forums. The Nepantla Cultural Arts Gallery serves as the Latinx/Chicanx arts hub of Seattle. We strive to provide a welcoming space for the community to celebrate cultura.
Nepantla is a Nahuatl (Aztec language) term which describes being in the middle or the space in-between. The term was popularized by Chicana writer/scholar Gloria Anzaldua. Most often the term references endangered communities, cultures, or gender who due to colonialism/marginalization or historical trauma, engage in resistance strategies of survival. Nepantla becomes the alternative space in which to live, heal, function, and create.
Our goal is to make art an accessible experience. The Nepantla Cultural Arts Gallery brings voice to our community and allows us to share our story with the larger Seattle community. Your support is greatly appreciated.
2023-24 Artist Spotlight
Cecilia Alvarez
Cecilia Concepcion Alvarez was born in National City, California. Her mother is Mexicana and her father is Cubano. Cecilia was raised between Sand Diego, California, USA and Ensenada, Baja California del Norte, Mexico. This cultural and political mix inspires much of her work.
Cecilia studied Sociology at San Diego State University. In 2001, she was honored as an Illustrious Alumna by SDSU’s Chicano/a Education and Woman Studies. She has work in Higher Education and in K-12 education for 25 years, as well as being a full-time artist and lecturer.
Ms. Alvarez is a self-taught artist. Her work reflects her perspective on being a Chicana/Latina. She is primarily a painter who has also created large-scale public art. Ms. Alvarez has worked extensively with youth in creating murals and cultural awareness. Cecilia has been invited to lecture on the symbology of her artwork throughout the United States and is featured in many private collections. Her work has been shown regionally, nationally as well as internationally.
Ms Alvarez is committed to create discourse through her art, on issues of entitlement, poverty and who is expendable in our collective. She hopes this discourse will create a new and healthier perspective on what is beauty, power and important to our societies.
Ms. Alvarez currently lives in Seattle with her husband. She has two lovely young adult children attending universities.
To purchase artwork or for information:
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www.ceciliaalvarez.com
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Jake Prendez
Jake Prendez is a renowned Chicano artist and Owner/Co-Director of the Nepantla Cultural Arts Gallery in Seattle. He creates art with a specific focus on themes relating to Chicanx culture, activism, social justice, and satire. His artistic style ranges from indigenous iconography, social realism, portraiture,to pop art.
His work is an amalgamation of his life experiences. It represents his Chicano background, it's part Seattle and part LA, its love, heart break, oppression, resilience, laughter and tears. You take your life experiences, put them in a blender and poured out on canvas.
To purchase artwork or for information:
www.jakeprendez.com
IG @nepantlaculturalarts
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Jose Rodriguez III
Jose Rodriguez III is a Mexican-American born and raised in Washington State. From farm family roots in Eastern Washington, his blended family then moved to Seattle when he was eight years old. Having always been given access to art supplies, his art foundations were solid enough to land him a job tattooing in Seattle in 1999, which he has been doing professionally ever since. During the late 90s and early 2000s he became fluent in the street mediums of spray can, airbrush, rhyming and skateboarding. This led to his first job as a professional artist and graphic designer in 2001 for Ride Snowboards, designing 3 different boards: Yukon, Lowride and Serum.
In 2005 Rodriguez moved to San Francisco to attend the Academy of Arts, where he began working with oil and sculpture, and majoring in illustration. A move back to the Pacific Northwest in 2012 secured him his first Seattle gallery shows at BHerd Studio, Flatcolor Gallery with Joe Nolan (2015), and Statix Gallery (2017-2018).
In recent years he’s reignited his passion for urban environments, spray can and large-scale work. Assisting on a 2018 mural in the Starbucks headquarters featuring a coffee plantation landscape with live vegetation accents growing in planters surrounding the mural provided inspiration for how both environment and vegetation interacts with art and can be enhanced by and in turn accentuate composition, perspective and color.
Rodriguez’s heritage as a Chicano American is a theme that runs fluidly and effortlessly throughout his body of work. His work accentuates dynamic interplay of light, shadow and form through color theory and application reminiscent of Impressionist strokes of paint; always with a consciousness and efficiency to how the brushstrokes are organized on the canvas. Favorite subjects are diverse and constantly in flux, but include: the human figure, especially Native Americans, BIPOC and our cultural heritage, lowriders, hot rods, American car culture, working artists, shifting urban environments, street art, weathered rural and farmland vignettes.
To purchase artwork or for information:
www.joserodriguez3rd.com
IG @joserodriguez3rd
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Gerardo Peña
Gerardo Peña, better known as Periko the Artist, was born in Queretaro, Mexico, but his family moved when he was a young child to the state of Washington. Periko was raised up and down King County and eventually settled in Tacoma, WA. With a background in business management, and with the current political climate, as a DACA recipient, he felt that it was now or never the time to focus his energy as an artist. Typically a surreal painter, Periko, has expanded into the public arts and multimedia world.
His art is an introspection of his journey into self identity and an emotional response of the world around him.
To purchase artwork or for information:
www.perikotheartist.com
IG @perikotheartist
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Raquel García Martínez
Raquel García Martínez was born and raised in the border town of Tijuana Baja California, Mexico. From a young age, Raquel found great joy in art, influenced primarily by her creative and resourceful mother and a father who loved long family road trips throughout Mexico. Early exposure to the beautiful indigenous and regional art styles from all over the country, was an important factor in her love for painting. Jalisco, Oaxaca and Guanajuato are among the places that left a great impression on her young mind because of the colorful pottery, paintings, handcrafted sculptures and figurines, making her an admirer of her country’s folk art.
Raquel is a self-taught painter who enjoys portraying her culture through bright and folkloric decorative shadow boxes also known as “Nichos.” She has a special interest in utilizing recycled materials as well as rescued or repurposed wooden items and furniture. Her main medium is acrylic paint however Raquel is also an avid sketch artist with pencil.
With her work, she hopes to connect with her people to convey one message; We are powerful, and we are beautiful! She wishes to do this by producing art with which people can feel represented and identified. Many of Raquel’s pieces feature women of color in a range of different skin tones, most with brow skin, brown eyes, and dark hair. Some include her favorite quotes.
Raquel has lived in Seattle for the past 28 years. She is the proud Mother of 4 amazing sons. Raquel has worked at El Centro de la Raza’s Senior Center for 19 years, serving and empowering the elderly in her community through education, nutrition, physical activity and of course, making art.
To purchase artwork or for information:
www.etsy.com/shop/ArteColoridoDeRaquel
IG @Raquelitagm
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Rolando Avila
Rolando Avila is an illustrator and graphic designer in South Park Seattle. With a background in community and union organizing, Rolando’s work is focused on collective action, leftist politics, punk and hip-hop culture, and pop culture and his Mexican roots.
To purchase artwork or for information:
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www.rolandoavila.com
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Teresa Martinez
Teresa Martinez is a Seattle based artist that creates art & jewelry inspired by her Mexican American culture and often incorporates and re interprets iconic and traditional Latin American images. What started out as a need to wear and see things that represented her culture turned into a passion and sparked the creativity that she wants to share.
To purchase artwork or for information:
www.amanoseattle.com
IG @amanoseattle
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Víctor Meléndez
Víctor Meléndez is an Art Director, designer and illustrator based in Seattle, originally from Mexico. His work is a combination of bold lines, vivid colors, organic forms and mysterious, spellbinding characters. Melendez’s multicultural upbringing gives him a unique approach to craft and style. This distinctive quality has given him the opportunity to create award-winning work for a wide variety of clients that include REI, Pepsi, Target, Starbucks, Crayola, SubPop, USPS, Hallmark, and Honda, amongst others.
To purchase artwork or for information:
www.victormelendez.com
IG: @hellomelendez
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