Hot pink and acid green? Perfect – especially when paired with the vibrant turquoise of the market building beyond.
Yes, the Museo Alameda, also clad in pierced metal screening fashioned after Mexican luminarias and papel picado, fits right in to the colorful, clangorous atmosphere of Market Square, a place where the sounds of Peruvian flutes meld with the aromas of roasting corn, where legendary restaurant Mi Tierra serves up Mexican pastries and mariachis in equal measure, where a baptismal boutique plies its lacy wares around the corner from shops selling sequined velvet skirts. If the Museo’s goal is to illustrate San Antonio’s diverse heritage with “an emphasis on Latino arts and culture,” it couldn’t have landed in a better place.
A Little Background
Museo Alameda is just one part of a larger whole, the Alameda National Center for Latino Arts & Culture, which takes its 
name from the atmospheric Alameda Theater, a mid-1940’s gem of scenographic design that served the city’s Mexican-American community with Spanish-language films until the late 1900s. The restoration of the theater is a work in progress, but its glow-in-the-dark painted interior design has already been recognized as “an international treasure.” The center has also recently announced a new program, the Henry Ford Academy of the Alameda School for Art+Design, created to guide high school students into careers in disciplines such as fashion designer, filmmaker, museum curator and computer animator.
A Distinguished Pedigree
The Museo, the nation’s largest Latino museum, is also the first formal affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution and, as such, will have access to and help generate travelling shows illustrating the Latino experience. Recent shows have included “Phantom Sightings: Art After the Chicano Movement” whose works ranged from un-spun serapes to aluminum panels sprayed with chromatic urethane in a nod to low-rider automobile culture. The summer of 2009 will see “American Sabor: Latinos in U.S. Popular Music,” an investigation of Latin musical influence after WWII. To follow are exhibits exploring Frida Kahlo and teenagers in the immigration phenomenon.
Showcase for Local Artists
Local artists also played an early role in the museum with a two-man show, “San Anto: Pride of the Soutshside en el Mero Hueso” among the first. Favorite-son painter and muralist Jesse Treviño will also be featured in a one-man show. Treviño, who had to retrain himself to paint with his left hand as a result of the Vietnam War, is widely known for his depictions of daily life of San Antonio’s barrios, but his work is most visible in a 93-foot-tall tile mural at Santa Rosa Children’s Hospital (near the Alameda) and in his super-scale tile votive candle, depicting la Virgen de Guadalupe, at the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center.
“Jesse Treviño: Mi Vida" is being curated by Ruben Cordova and will run from October 21, 2009, through February 28, 2010.
Unique Latino Gifts
The Museo’s gift shop, put together by local artist Franco Mondini-Ruiz, is a snapshot of Latino culture in its own right. A corner of the shop, complete with drawers labeled with herbal remedies, is dedicated to the now-shuttered Casa Mireles, a botanica that flourished just off Market Square’s Produce Row until the late 1900s. Nostalgic purchases of votive candles and incense by the scoop can still be made here, but so can more ironic reminders of the Hispanic experience. MexiCans by Alejandro Diaz, for example, consist of silk flowers “planted” in tins of jalapeños; Mondini-Ruiz has created several mordantly witty works combining traditional yet unrelated objects in unexpected ways; and slogans such as “Make Tacos, Not War” abound.
Fast Facts: Museo Alameda
- Museo Alameda is located at 101 S. Santa Rosa and is open from noon to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday.
- General admission is $4, with lower prices for seniors, children and military. Admission is free on Sunday.
- Gallery tours can be booked in advance.
- For more information, call 210-299-4300 or visit the website.
