Press & institutions
William Marquez Bejarano
Biography, statement, exhibition history and approved images for journalists, galleries and museums.
Short biography
For more than five decades William Marquez Bejarano has painted between Los Angeles and México — and kept the posters, letters, magazines and photographs that the Chicano art movement left behind.
Long biography
William Marquez Bejarano — who has signed his work Guillermo Bejarano since the movement years — was born in San Diego, California. He took his degrees at California State University, Northridge in 1975 — one in painting, one in Chicano Studies — and spent a term studying muralism in Mexico City. He came back an advocate for public art in Los Angeles, and has worked on both sides of the border ever since.
Between 1970 and 1975 he worked out of the Méchicano Art Center in East Los Angeles and El Jardín de Flor y Canto in Pacoima. In 1972 he won an open competition through Méchicano to paint a forty-foot mural, Micro / Macro Medical Science, inside East Los Angeles Doctors Hospital. He assisted Carlos Almaraz on a fifty-foot City Scape on Floral Drive in 1980.
From 1976 to 1980 he was part of Centro de Arte Público in Highland Park and El Concilio de Arte Popular, a state-wide coalition of artists and community art centres. He co-published and art-directed ChismeArte, the movement’s art and literary magazine, and 201, a publication for the Los Angeles Bicentennial. In 1979 he was a founding member of the Los Angeles Latino Writers Workshop.
He ran Image Bureau, a graphic arts and pre-press studio, from 1986 to 1995. In 1998 he built one of the first online social networks for Latino artists — Network Aztlán, on Yahoo! Groups — which earned a Mención Honorífica in the Premio Comunidades Transnacionales from CNCA in Mexico City. He was Artist-in-Residence at the California Museum of Photography in 2000.
His work is held in the collection of the Latino Art Museum in Pomona and in the Méchicano Arts collection at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. He paints between Laguna Woods, California and Ajijic, Jalisco.
Artist statement
Read more →I understand the philosophy of a single reality, seeing it with an energy, a spirit, an essence that gives it existence.
My art is about abstraction and figurative expression: in the medium of painting and digital photography.
An art review described my paintings as an archetype in Jungian psychology — a primitive mental image inherited from the earliest human ancestors and supposed to be present in the collective unconscious, invoking the conception of deep emotions.
Approved images
65
These are the works scanned at high resolution. For editorial use, write and we will send the original files together with the correct credit line.
Exhibition history
10
2024
The art collection of Frank Garcia
Claremont Lewis Museum of Art · Claremont, CA
2018
Transformation — solo exhibition
Latino Art Museum · Pomona, CA
2014
Méchicano Arts collection
Smithsonian American Art Museum · Washington, DC
2012
From Equinox to Solstice: Reflections on a Mayan Calendar
La Galería Gitana · San Fernando, CA · Group show
2006
Two-person exhibition
Gallery 33 · Long Beach, CA
2005
Just Another Poster?
UCLA Fowler Museum · Oakland Museum · Merced Multicultural Arts Center · Jersey City Museum · Crocker Art Museum · La Raza Galería Posada · Travelling exhibition
2005
Returning to Aztlán
The dA Center for the Arts · Pomona, CA
2000
The Millennium Exhibition
Gallery 57 · Pomona, CA · Group show
1999
California Blends: Tradition and Change
Millard Sheets Gallery · Pomona, CA · Mural commission, Youth Project
1995
Sol de Verano
Galería Las Américas (Linda Vallejo Gallery) · Los Angeles, CA · Group show
Awards
4
2024
First Place — Print / Altered Reality
Camera Club of Laguna Woods · Laguna Woods, CA
1998
Special Mention
San José Tech Museum · Submitted by the California Museum of Photography, UC Riverside — Artist-in-Residency, CMP Students at Risk Program
1998
Mención Honorífica — Premio Comunidades Transnacionales
CNCA · Mexico City, México
1995
Special Mention — I Bienal de Pintura Mexicana y Chicana
El Instituto Mexicano, Consulate of Los Angeles · Los Angeles, CA
Murals
7
1999
Spider Woman — 4 × 8 ft, acrylic on plywood
Downtown Pomona Mural Program, Third and Thomas Street · Pomona, CA
1999
Mayan Time — 4 × 20 ft
Fairplex at Millard Sheets Gallery, Los Angeles County Fair · Pomona, CA
1980
City Scape — 14 × 50 ft
Argil Building Material Co., 4754 Floral Drive · East Los Angeles, CA · Assistant artist to Carlos D. Almaraz
1976
Tree of Life — 15 × 20 ft
El Monte Community Center · El Monte, CA · Funded by the Los Angeles County CETA Project
1973
La Raza Cósmica — 9 × 90 ft
CSU Northridge, Chicano Studies Department, Sierra North · Northridge, CA
1972
Medical Science — 4 × 40 ft
East Los Angeles Doctors Hospital · East Los Angeles, CA · Open competition, Méchicano Art Center
1970
Quinto Sol — 8 × 16 ft (destroyed)
CSU Northridge, Old Student Union · Northridge, CA
Organisations
6
2000
Artist-in-Residence
California Museum of Photography · Riverside, CA
1998
Webmaster — Network Aztlán, artist social network
Yahoo! Groups
1986–1995
Owner — Image Bureau
Graphic arts and pre-press services
1979–1980
Founding member
Los Angeles Latino Writers Workshop
1976–1980
Centro de Arte Público and El Concilio de Arte Popular
Highland Park, Los Angeles · A state-wide coalition of artists and community art centres. Project: ChismeArte, an art and literary magazine.
1970–1975
Méchicano Art Center and El Jardín de Flor y Canto
East Los Angeles and Pacoima, CA
Publications
2
1977–1980
ChismeArte revista
Co-publisher and art direction
1977–1980
201
Publication for the Los Angeles Bicentennial Celebration
Contact
Write to bejarano@losartes.com