LACMA

18 such a transition—that is, of being seen as American citizens with inalienable rights, rather than as aliens. Hence, the second meaning of verge: "the extreme edge or margin." The dictionary gives this useful example: "on the verge of tears." In this way, Chicano Visions foregrounds cultural difference as an act of seeing the art object, and then draws attention to the artists as citizens who have been placed at the extreme margin, yet who stand ready to cross the border into the mainstream of their national culture. Ironically, it is Marin's international celebrity as well as his role as a major collector that makes all three things possible: the naming of Chicano art, the renaming of its artists as American painters, and the acceptance of both into main- stream venues. Indeed, it is no overstatement to say that Marin is more well known than the category of Chicano art, and his exhibition represents an effort to convert his social power (as celebrity) into cultural capital (for Chicano painting). I won't belabor this point, but a Google search using "Chicano art" generated a photo- graphic image of Marin. Hence, a third meaning for verge pertains as well, one that can be seen as playfully referencing the historical relationship between the artist and the art patron: "The rod held up by a feudal tenant while swearing fealty to a lord." 9 To be "on the verge" is a complicated thing for any artist, but for U.S. artists of Mexican descent it carries specific resonances and historical conditions. In this respect both exhibitions agree: within their own national culture, these artists are either phantoms or located on the extreme margin, and in one way or another such positioning informs the art itself. 10 In addition, both exhibitions are self-conscious about the difficulty, if not the paradox, of bringing something invisible into public view. Without a name and a context, how can this work be seen, let alone integrated into the art world and our national visual culture? Hence, both exhibitions name, rename, and unname their object (the art, the artists), all in an attempt to move the art from the margin to the museum, thereby introducing it to a mainstream public audience. Thus, while there are considerable differences between the two exhibitions, both share not only the same underlying project (to make visible) but also an appreciation of its inherent paradoxes and contradictions. In one sense, "Chicano art" has always been a project of making an experience, community, or culture visible within public culture. Since Chicano art first emerged as an integral part of a broad social protest movement, it often shared that move- ment's unique historical vision, one that articulates itself as the through-line and endpoint for four radically different contexts: pre-Columbian indigenous history, the Spanish conquest of the Americas, the Mexican nation-state, and the United States. Such a vision gives the Chicano movement a certain rhetorical inevitability and autonomy, since its origins can be traced to the pre-Columbian—that is, before the nation-state (Spain, Mexico, or the United States) but also before history itself. The main art forms within the Chicano art movement included painting, murals, and graphic art, and Chicano artists played a crucial role in this process through NAMING, RENAMING, UNNAMING One sees different manifestations of such care in the two "Chicano" exhibitions at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in spring 2008. The first exhibition, Phantom Sightings: Art after the Chicano Movement, places an emphasis on seeing what is not considered to be there (more on that later). It does not invoke "Chicano" until the subtitle, and then does so indirectly, not as a description of the artists or even the art, but rather of the sociohistorical context for artistic production. This (unnamed) art is produced after the Chicano movement, which is a tricky date to pin down with precision. Like "the sixties"—understood as a period in U.S. history marked by social protest, countercultural activities, and state intervention—the Chicano movement flowed into the 1970s. Phantom Sightings establishes this history as a context, an influence, a point of departure —but not as the basis for a proper name for the art or the artists.. Consider the other Chicano art exhibition that opens at lacma two months after Phantom Sightings, built around Cheech Marin's extensive collection of Chicano painting, here focusing on Los Angeles artists. From 2001 to 2007, a version of the exhibition including Chicano artists from across the nation traveled under the name Chicano Visions: American Painters on the Verge, appearing in municipal art museums and other mainstream venues. 5 Both exhibitions start with the visual: sightings and visions. But in contrast to the unnaming of Phantom Sightings, Marin's title boldly names this art as Chicano visions. Then an interesting thing happens in the subtitle: the artists who make this Chicano art are renamed as American. 6 They become American painters on the verge… but the verge of what? In fact, what is a "verge," anyway? The American Heritage Dictionary defines verge as border, a word more easily associated with Chicanos, no doubt due to the 1,951-mile-long U.S.–Mexico border. I am reminded of the end of the movie Born in East L.A. (1987), when a wrongly deported Rudy Robles (played by Marin) finally crosses the border back into the United States. 7 Marin was, at the time, a Chicano director on the verge of mainstream acceptance in his first film after the breakup of the comedy duo Cheech and Chong. 8 The film narrative itself humorously allegorized the difficulties of Chicanos making

• Cover