Sandy Rodriguez maps ongoing cycles of violence on communities of color by blending historical and recent events. This exhibition chronicles two hundred years of uprisings in Central California, including the 1824 Chumash Revolt, and maps sites of resistance to the present through painted and inlaid works created with hand processed mineral and organic pigments of the Americas. Recovering the medicinal and esthetic uses of local plants and pigments enables her work to provide a space of healing and visual possibilities for current and historical traumas.

Raised in San Diego, Tijuana, and Los Angeles, Rodriguez is a first-generation Chicana and a third-generation artist. Her work investigates the methods and materials of painting across cultures and histories. This presentation is her fourth solo museum exhibition.  

Sandy Rodriguez — Unfolding Histories: 200 Years of Resistance is organized by the AD&A Museum. The exhibition is curated in collaboration with the artist by guest curator Sophia Quach McCabe, PhD. 

The exhibition is made possible through generous support from the Terra Foundation for American Art.

Image: Sandy Rodriguez, Mapa de Califas—Atrocities, Isolation and Uprisings 2020-2021 from the Codex Rodriguez-Mondragón, 2020-2021. Hand-processed watercolor on amate paper. Detail. Courtesy of the artist. © Sandy Rodriguez