ASARO:
Revolutionary Mexican
Prints for the 21st Century
Original woodblock prints by the ASARO collective
(Asamblea de Artistas Revolucionarios de Oaxaca)
ASARO, the Assembly of Revolutionary Artists of Oaxaca, is a collective of young Mexican artists responding to Oaxaca’s current political turmoil. ASARO’s remarkable woodblock prints are part of Mexico’s long tradition of popular revolutionary art. The artists sell woodblock prints for 100 pesos, roughly $10, in Oaxaca’s public square. ASARO’s real passion, however, is the work they give away.
Overnight they cut paper stencils of an arrested comrade, the next morning her portrait is sprayed all over the walls of the historic city center. They print 3ft. tall woodblock prints of goose-stepping police monsters on tissue paper. By dawn a chorus line of these mutant police is pasted on the cathedral’s wall.
Seldom seen in the United States, a selection of ASARO’s best artwork will be displayed at Kutztown University's Rohrbach Library this fall.
Celebrate
with us at an opening reception on Thursday, October 25,
2007 at 4:30 PM. Prof. Kevin McCloskey will talk about his visit with ASARO in Oaxaca this past summer. Reprints of Amnesty International's Human Right's Report: "Oaxaco: Clamour for Justice" will be available free of charge.
