THE CYNTHIA (KIKI) WALLIS and RENÉ YAÑEZ
REAL MISSION SCHOOL ARCHIVE
Dates:
Inclusive:1970’s – 2010’s.
Collected by: René Yañez and Cynthia “Kiki” Wallis
Finding Aid Prepared by Richard J. Lee and Michael Pincus
Item Count:
14,205 items
Languages:
English and Spanish
Biographical Notes:
René Yañez, Chicano artist, curator and community activist, has worked as a champion of radical political art and
the Chicano experience in San Francisco, CA from the late 1960s to the present day. One of the most prominent
figures in the Mission School in the early 1970’s, Yañez cofounded the Galería de la Raza (GDLR) in 1970 – to this
day, GDLR is one of the principal showcases for Chicano and Latino politicized art. Yañez has frequently
collaborated with other art organizations advocating for people of color, including more than a decade of work with
the performance theatre group Culture Clash (founded at GDLR in 1984).
Cynthia “Kiki” Wallis’s career has spanned some of the most important cultural and artistic movements in the San
Francisco Bay Area for the past four decades. In 1974, she became the Assistant Director and Stage Manager of the
Asian American Theater Company (AATC), beginning a twenty-year creative partnership with Eric Hayashi that
secured the place of the AATC (and its predecessor, the Asian American Theater Workshop) in the burgeoning
Asian American arts milieu during the period. During the 1980s, the scope of her work expanded to include
Chicano theater as well. In 1991, she began a creative partnership with noted Mission District artist René Yañez,
producing readings, installations, and collaborative projects with the AATC. In addition to multimedia presentations
and exhibitions, Wallis’s work included photographic documentation of Yañez’s many exhibitions, as well as
collaborative projects between Yañez and other noted Chicano artists, such as Guillermo Gomez-Peña. Her
contribution to the Chicano arts movement was most recently acknowledge from the stage by Culture Clash during
the October 26, 2013 benefit for René Yañez and Yolanda Lopez held at the Brava Theater in San Francisco. Wallis’s
participatory and documentary contributions to the René Yañez Real Mission School Archive represent an essential
piece of the definitive history of San Francisco’s Chicano arts movement in the 1990s and 2000s.
Content Summary:
This particular collection is a rare treasure trove of materials relating to the Chicano and political arts movements,
from the late 1960s to the present. With the help of several volunteers, René Yañez (henceforth RY) organized the
material into 68 “portfolios,” many by specific subject. The portfolios contain a wealth of original art by RY and
others, as well as both photographic and print documentation of the many shows RY curated, community activism
centered in San Francisco’s Mission District, and, importantly, ample documentation of the historical origins and
contemporary practices of the California Chicano and Border Arts movements. Beyond that the Archive shows the
extent of RY’s cultural influence beyond the Mission community and into the Bay Area, the State of California, the
Americas, and the world.
To request item level detail of many of the portfolios in this archive (in .xls format) contact mweber@booklyn.org.
Selected Notable Galleries, Exhibitions:
Alliance Graphics, ASCO, Chicano Visions, Day of the Dead, Chicano Visions, City of Miracles, Frida Kahlo, Galería
de la Raza, Great Tortilla Conspiracy, Mexterminator, No on 187 Campaign, SOMARTS (South of Market Cultural
Center), Royal Chicano Air Force (RCAF), Teatro Campesino
Selected Notable Artists:
Wilfredo Castano, John Carrillo, Eugenio Castro, Rene Castro, R. Crumb, A. del Valle, Lou DeMatteis, Felipe
Ehrenberg, Ricardo Favela, Harry Gamboa, Rupert Garcia, Sal Garcia, Carmen Lomas Garza, Guillermo GomezPena, Louis ‘the Foot’ Gonzalez, Gronk, Nancy Hom, Eric Hayashi, Adan Hernandez, Esther Hernandez, Gonzalo
Hidalgo, D. O’Keefe, Yolanda Lopez, Ralph Maradiaga, Magu, Jose Montoya, Moscoso, Michael Rios, Jos Sances,
Herbert Sigenza, John Valadez, Patssi Valdez, Esteban Villa, Xavier Viramontes.
Series Description:
Media incorporates technology and information artifacts that are not paper based. This subseries includes
information storage mediums (CD's, DVD, hard drives, floppy disks, DVRs) that contain short films, photograph
scans, and business documents. Kiki Wallis has significant portfolios devoted to external hard drives containing
scans and photographic jpgs.
Printed Material and Press is a dominant series of the collection consisting of materials printed for specific and
large audiences. This subseries includes rare event flyers, independent magazines, artist books, postcards, and
runs of local and bilingual newspapers that document the social life of Chicano and Latino Americans in the
California and Bay Area.
Business and Personal Documents is a considerable series consisting of finance and gallery related documents.
This series includes all forms of correspondence, selection of personal journals that function like scrapbooks.
Included is administrative paperwork that relate to the making of exhibit such as Yañez ’s famed Day of the Dead
Exhibits and the seminal Frida Khalo show in the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art 1978. Document also
related to performances and public television programs such as scripts and drafts are found in this subseries.
Art is the dominant series in the archival collection corralling material including painted tortillas, experimental
collage art created on Xerox machine, pencil and pen sketches, photographs and related negatives, and 3-D
artworks.
René Yañez Series Listing
I. Printed Materials and Press
II. Visual Art
1. Photographs, Negatives, and Slides
2. Posters, Paintings, and Drawings
III. Business and Personal Documents
IV. Media and Audiovisual Material
Cynthia “Kiki” Wallis Series Listing
I. Visual Art
1. Photographs, Negatives, and Slides
2. Posters, Prints, and Drawings
II. Printed Materials and Press
III. Business and Personal Documents
IV. Media and Audiovisual Material
Estimated total item count: 14,205