AFRICA: ONE CONTINENT. MANY WORLDS. | TONY GLEATON

Tony Gleaton

Tengo Casi 500 Años: Africa's Legacy in Mexico, Central and South America

"The most important aspect of my portraits," says Los Angeles- based artist Tony Gleaton, "is the giving of a narrative voice by visual means to people deemed invisible by the greater part of society and, in so doing, crafting an 'alternative iconography' of beauty, family, love, goodness... one that is parallel to but outside the bounds of European-based art, one that is inclusive, not exclusive.

"The photographs which I create are as much an effort to define my own life, with its heritage encompassing Africa and Europe, as it is an endeavor to throw open the discourse on the broader aspects of 'mestizaje'... the 'assimilation' of Asians, Africans and Europeans with indigenous Americans."

Mr. Gleaton's photographs are in the collections of the National Museum of American Art, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, and many other institutions, and his work has been exhibited throughout the U.S. and Mexico. The images shown here are from his project entitled Tengo Casi 500 Anos: Africa's Legacy in Mexico, Central and South America.

The African Presence in Mexican National Identity

"When I arrived in Mexico about two decades ago to begin research on the early history of Africans and their descendants there, a young student politely told me that I was embarking on a wild goose chase. Mexico had never imported slaves from Africa, he said, fully certain that the nation's peoples of African descent were relatively recent arrivals."
COLIN A. PALMER

A Young Mexican-American's Search for her Identity

"Growing up under the canon of U.S. stereotypes I didn't fit the 'model' of a 'Mexican' or a 'Chicana.' Sure I've always been la morena to some, but who had ever seen a dark-skinned, kinky-haired Chicana? No one and so my constant longing and searching for a clue, an answer, and an identity. Was I Black, Mexican, a combination of both, or none of the above?"
JANEIN CHAVEZ

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