The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture facts for kids

The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture of the Riverside Art Museum

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Former name	Riverside Public Library
Established	June 18, 2022
Location	3581 Mission Inn Ave Riverside, California United States
Type	Art museum
Architect	Ficks & Ficks, 1964

The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture, often called The Cheech, is a special art museum in Riverside, California. It is part of the bigger Riverside Art Museum. This center focuses on showing and studying Chicano art from all over the United States.

The museum is a team effort. It was created by Cheech Marin, the City of Riverside, and the Riverside Art Museum. Cheech Marin is a famous comedian, actor, writer, and art collector. He has given or promised his amazing collection of over 700 Chicano artworks to the museum. The City of Riverside provided the old public library building to hold this collection. The Riverside Art Museum helps manage the center. The Cheech aims to be a top place for learning about Chicano art. It is the first museum in North America built just for Mexican-American and Chicano art.

How The Cheech Started

In 2017, some of Cheech Marin's art was shown at the Riverside Art Museum. It was a big success! After that, the city and museum asked Marin if he would like to have a permanent home for his art in Riverside. Marin liked the idea of keeping his whole collection together.

Riverside was a good choice for many reasons. The city cares a lot about history, art, and culture. It also has a large Latino population. Plus, five universities are nearby. Two of these universities, the University of California, Riverside and California State University, San Bernardino, already teach about Chicano studies. All these things helped convince Marin that Riverside was the perfect spot.

Funding the Museum

To make the museum happen, a fundraising campaign called "Reach for the Cheech" began in 2017. Many people and organizations helped. The State of California even gave $9.7 million to help with the building's changes. This money covered more than two-thirds of what was needed! In total, almost $14 million was raised to create The Cheech.

The Building's Design

The Cheech museum is located in what used to be Riverside's main library. This building is very large, about 61,420 square feet. It's also close to the historic The Mission Inn Hotel & Spa. The original building was designed in 1964. It has a modern style, but also some classic touches.

The building has two main floors and a basement. Before the museum opened, the books were moved to a new library nearby. Then, the old library building was completely updated to become an art museum. The outside of the building has eight huge concrete screens. Each screen weighs 17 tons and has diamond patterns. Inside each diamond is a dove. These doves were put there to show hope for peace during the time of the Cold War.

Inside, a special open space called an atrium was created near the entrance. This area is for visitors to gather. Two glass artists, Einar and Jamex de la Torre, made a huge art piece for this space. It's called Gaiatlicue and changes shape as you walk by it. The artwork mixes ideas from the Greek goddess Gaia and the Aztec goddess Coatlicue. It uses images of plants, animals, and parts of lowrider cars. Gaiatlicue also makes you think about climate change and its challenges.

What You Can See and Do

The Cheech has different areas for art. Some galleries show a changing selection of art from the museum's permanent collection. Near the entrance, there's a community gallery that features art by local artists. The second floor is used for big art shows that travel from other places.

The museum also helps people learn more about art. They offer tours for groups, including school children. Students from local colleges can even get internships there. This helps them learn how to work in museums. Cheech Marin and local leaders hope The Cheech will bring new life and culture to Riverside.

The Museum's Art Collection

The main collection at The Cheech comes from Cheech Marin himself. He has given or promised over 700 pieces of art. These include paintings, drawings, prints, sculptures, and photos. He collected them over 30 years! His collection shows many different types of Chicano art. Some art even shows a style called rasquachismo, which means using everyday things in a creative way.

Cheech Marin became famous in the 1970s as part of the comedy group Cheech & Chong. He is known for having one of the biggest and most important private collections of Chicano art in the world. The museum is also adding new art beyond Marin's collection. For example, they bought two artworks by Judithe Hernández for the first exhibition.

Special Art Shows

The Cheech often has exciting temporary art shows.

Collidoscope de la Torre Brothers Retro-Perspective

The first big temporary show at The Cheech was Collidoscope. It featured the amazing glass art of Einar and Jamex de la Torre. These brothers were born in Guadalajara, Mexico, and now live on both sides of the border. This show was at The Cheech from June 2022 to January 2023.

Their art often mixes different images and ideas. For example, one piece called Colonial Atmosphere shows a lunar landing craft shaped like a huge Olmec head. Another work, La Belle Epoch, is a moving sculpture of the Aztec Stone of the Sun (also known as the Mexican Calendar Stone) that looks like a Ferris wheel. The show also included ¡2020!, a glass sculpture that looked like the COVID virus as a baby.

Xican–a.o.x. Body

This exhibition, held from June 2023 to January 2024, was a major show. It explored how artists use the "Brown body" to show different ideas about Mexican, Mexican American, and Chicanx experiences. The show featured about 70 artists and included many types of art, like paintings, sculptures, films, and even lowriders!

Indigenous Futurism

From October 2023 to February 2024, The Cheech presented Indigenous Futurism. This show featured sculptures, paintings, and videos by 18 women artists from California. The artists use their ancient traditions in their art. The idea of "indigenous futurism" is like Afrofuturism. It explores how people deal with colonization and rediscover their old traditions.

Judithe Hernández | Beyond Myself, Somewhere, I Wait for My Arrival

A big show about the artist Judithe Hernández will open in February 2024. It will be her first major show looking back at 40 years of her art. Her work often explores the lives of Mexican migrant women. It also looks at the effects of colonization and the US-Mexico border on women and children.

Judithe Hernández was one of the first Chicana artists to have a solo show outside the Western United States in 1983. She has had a very important career around the world. In 2019, her huge mural La Nueva Reina de Los Ángeles was put up in downtown Los Angeles.

Artists in The Cheech's Collection

More than 70 artists have their work in The Cheech's collection. Some of these artists include:

The Cheech Film

In 2019, a short movie called The Cheech: An American Icon's Crusade for the Chicano Art Movement was released. It's a documentary about Cheech Marin. The film shows how he has supported Chicano art his whole life. It also covers his efforts to create The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture.

See also

• Archives of American Art
• Chicano
• Chicana art
• Category:Chicano art