The Sun Valley Center for the Arts is opening "Retablos: Reinterpreting a Tradition" at The Center in Hailey on Wednesday, Dec. 19. The show will feature Boise artist Alma Gomez who will be present for an opening celebration and talk on Friday, Jan. 11, from 5:30 to 7 p.m. at The Center in Hailey.
Retablos are traditional iconic images of saints and virgins, which were created by folk artists or novice painters for home altar displays for spirituality and dedication to one's Catholic faith.
"My family is Catholic. I would see the images of the saints all the time, and everyone had them including my grandmother and mother," Gomez said. "You would see these images everywhere."
In the last six years Gomez has been painting retablos to express her own ideas about her culture and religion. The process opened the door to fascinating stories and rejuvenating a traditional folk art in contemporary society.
"They were people who were not artists," Gomez said. "They are very folksy and charming. I changed the art to include an image of a saint, and I've added text about that particular saint and why you would invoke that saint."
The paintings are small 7-by-5-inch mixed media pieces or 8-by-10-inch paintings on canvas. Gomez said she was never interested in painting things that were Mexican until she moved to Idaho. Being uprooted from her home in Texas on the border of Mexico, she realized she was not like anyone else and wanted to reconnect to her roots.
Gomez is an adjunct professor in the art department at Boise State University and has had exhibitions across the U.S. and abroad. They feature her insight into modern Chicano art and reflecting her own beliefs as a Chicano.
"I do big murals, but it's the little tiny images, which are me," Gomez said. "These little images were meant to be in a home."
The exhibition will also feature historic retablos paintings that date from the 18th century to the 1930s.
"I think around the 18th century and toward the end at its height in the 1860s these were paintings, which common people bought because they were cheap and created by untrained painters," she said. "Rich people had paintings done by trained artists for their homes."
Gomez said that retablos are engrained in her work and who she is as a person. She said she won't be able to leave them.
