SAN ANTONIO — Latino Art (sometimes called Latinx or Latine for inclusivity) has gained broader recognition in recent years. But visibility isn’t the same as equity, and entire regions remain left out of the national conversation. Texas, home to the country’s second-largest Latino population, is one of them.

Rigoberto Luna, an independent curator based in San Antonio, is working to change that.

As a teen in the mid-1990s, Luna found his creative footing at San Anto Cultural Arts, a nonprofit born out of a DIY punk mentality. Founded in 1993 by artists Manny Castillo, Juan Miguel Ramos, and Cruz Ortiz, the organization still provides opportunities for Westside teens. Through mural painting and contributions to the community newspaper, San Anto is a creative outlet, a lifeline. Luna recalls how Castillo empowered the kids, valuing their ideas and supporting their creativity at every stage.

San Anto also introduced Luna to key players in the local art scene, helping him envision a future in the arts. After dropping out of community college, he studied Graphic Design at Pratt Institute in New York.

Luna returned to San Antonio in 2007 and worked as a graphic designer and preparator for area art institutions, including Museo Alameda (then the largest Latino museum in the U.S. and first Smithsonian affiliate), Blue Star Contemporary, and the San Antonio Museum of Art. While at the Alameda, Luna curated his first major exhibition: Manuel Castillo: The Painting of A Community, a tribute to his mentor, who died at age 40 in 2009.

That show planted the seed for something bigger.

Presa House Gallery

In 2016, Luna and Jenelle Esparza, his partner and an accomplished cultural worker and artist in her own right, founded Presa House Gallery. It started small in 2012 —curating a hallway in a friend’s hair salon— and grew to the duo taking over the home-turned-commercial venue and transforming it into a gallery. 

“We wanted to create an alternative to traditional white-centered exhibition spaces,” Luna explained. “Once we saw the impact within San Antonio, we started supporting other underserved art communities like Corpus Christi and Brownsville. Soon we were working with artists from across Texas.”

In 2022, Luna partnered with Albuquerque-based artists Vicente Telles and Brandon Maldonado and San Diego-based artist Ricardo Islas to present Crossing Borders: Tres de Oeste, an exhibition at Presa House that marked the first in a series of creative exchanges, launching an interstate dialogue.

Son de Allá y Son de Acá debuted across four Albuquerque galleries in 2022, and the following year traveled to the Chicano Park Museum and Cultural Center in San Diego. These shows brought Texas artists into new venues, introduced them to broader audiences, and expanded their networks.

The momentum continued in 2023, with Luna’s curation of Soy de Tejas: A Statewide Survey of Latinx Art. Featuring over 100 works by 40 artists born or based in Texas, the show broke attendance records at Centro de Artes and captured the attention of art patrons, curators, and collectors. It also brought artists, who felt isolated in their smaller communities, together. A second iteration of Soy de Tejas was presented in North Texas in 2024, and this fall, the show will reach a national audience when it opens at The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture in Riverside, California.

Locally Rooted

As Luna’s profile and reach grow, his approach remains locally rooted. At Presa House, he and Esparza continue to provide a platform for emerging creatives. The gallery serves as an incubator for artists, many of whom have gone on to show in museums and venues across the U.S.

Esparza, too, has gained national recognition. She recently received a $50,000 grant from the U.S. Latinx Art Forum and participated on a panel discussion at the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Meanwhile, Luna’s curatorial calendar is full. In June, he wraps up his residency at the prestigious NXTHVN in New Haven, where he curated All at Once: Reflected Through Glass. His culminating exhibition, The Things Left Unsaid, features NXTHVN Cohort 06 fellows and debuts at James Cohan gallery in New York City on May 8. This summer, he brings Ya Hecho: Readymade in the Borderlands to the Tucson Museum of Art. Once again broadening the conversation of Latino Art, the exhibition will showcase artists living and working on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border.

About the Author

Jessica Fuentes is an author, artist, and educator in Fort Worth, Texas. She is the news editor for Glasstire, an online magazine covering Texas art, and her writing has appeared in Hyperallergic, The Brooklyn Rail, and Southwest Contemporary. In 2023, she received the Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant.

We want to keep The Latino Newsletter accessible without paywalls. To help, you can donate here. Any amount (one-time or monthly) will keep us going.

The Latino Content Hub

Click on the image below or here for the latest from the Latino Content Hub.

What We’re Reading

Questionnaire Help: Journalist and columnist Joseph Paul Wright, a frequent contributor to Latino Rebels, is seeking help for a story about birthright citizenship and due process. The following is a link to his survey for more details.

Dalmau at UChicago: Boricuas en la Diáspora, a group that advocates for the independence of Puerto Rico, shared clips of Juan Dalmau’s appearance Thursday at the University of Chicago Law School. As the featured speaker at an event titled “The Ongoing Struggle for Puerto Rican Independence,” Dalmau, the 2024 pro-independence gubernatorial candidate, finished in second place behind current governor Jenniffer González-Colón.

Do you believe in creating new journalism lanes for Latinos and Latinas? Do you believe that U.S. mainstream outlets will never understand our community? Consider donating to The Latino Newsletter. Any little bit helps to keep this newsletter free and accessible to all. ¡Gracias mil!