1979 Cuellar Pictorial Map of Northern California, Farm Workers / Chicano Movement

This is a c. 1979 Rodolfo Cuellar stylized representation of Northern California, produced for a Cinco de Mayo celebration at California State University, Sacramento (Cal State Sacramento or CSUS for short). In the 1970s, the campus became a center of Chicano activism, closely connected with the United Farm Workers (UFW) movement, led by Caesar Chavez.

A Closer Look

This sheet presents an abstract view of Northern California, more specifically the Sacramento Valley, looking westwards towards the Golden Gate Bridge. It advertises a series of Cinco de Mayo events organized by the CSUS chapter of MEChA, the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán, an activist movement to advocate for Chicano identity among young Mexican-Americans. The weekend featured a series of events, entertainers, and speakers, the most prominent being Caesar Chavez, leader of the UFW, who was originally slated to speak on Friday (his name crossed out in black) but was moved to the previous day.

Historical Context

This was a tumultuous time for UFW, which lost much of its membership and influence over the preceding decade and was embroiled in a vegetable worker's strike for much of 1979 that resulted in violence, including one death. Meanwhile, Caesar Chavez himself became a symbol in wider American culture of the struggles of farmworkers and of the Mexican-American community. The tireless Chavez became a frequent speaker on campuses, working closely with MEChA. But his increasing forays into 'new age' fads like vegetarianism and communal living, along with an increased emphasis on solidarity with other causes, endeared him a wider group of university students and left-wing activists beyond the Chicano movement.

The '10 Years of Struggle' noted at bottom refers to MEChA, which had earlier origins but was formalized at a conference of university students held in Santa Barbara in 1969. Towards right in the bottom margin is the acronym 'RCAF,' referring to the Royal Chicano Air Force, an artist collective formed at CSUS in 1970, of which Cuellar was a leading member.

Publication History and Census

This work, a screen print, is unsigned but universally attributed to Rodolfo 'Rudy' Cuellar, and was surely produced soon before the 1979 Cinco de Mayo weekend in question. Two other examples of this work are known to exist in institutional collections, one at CSUS as part of the Royal Chicano Air Force Poster Collection and one at the University of California Santa Barbara's Royal Chicano Air Force Archive (digitized by the Online Archive of California, showing Chavez's original speaking slot on Friday).