Background
Oscar Castillo – Artist Narrative: As a youth my parents
influenced me in that my mother kept a family photo album, which I keep
now, in which our family photos and memories were kept. These were not
just snapshots, but now I can see that they are well composed as well as
tell a story by the choice of locations as well as depicting different
people. My photography carries on my early memories of community, family
and a sense of place, although I have chosen to look at a much larger
extended family and community. Since I'm of Hispanic and Native American
heritage, my work is very influenced and reflects these backgrounds
while at the same time make a universal statement. As a multi discipline
artist I work in different media such as drawing, painting, stained
glass, ceramics, and mixed media, but with a main emphasis on
photography as art. While in Japan, during the mid 1960's, I was very
influenced by the cultural and environmental beauty of that country and
I began a serious study of photography to document my experiences while
there. This fascination with cultural, social and political
documentation has continued to this day with my personal and artist
photography reflecting my sense of community. In the late 1960's I
enrolled in college with a dual major of Sociology and Fine Art. In the
more than 30 years that I have been producing art images, there are
cycles of recurring themes and a metamorphism of images and ideas. Some
pieces are stand-alone images, while in others I combined photos into
juxtaposed or organically combined collages. While some of my photos are
also photo journalistic others are painterly. I work in traditional dark
room printing as well as digitally created and manipulated and printed
photography. Artist statement courtesy of Oscar Castillo
Restrictions
For students and faculty researchers of UCLA, all others by
permission only. Copyright has not been assigned to the Chicano Studies
Research Center. All requests for permission to publish or quote from
manuscripts must be submitted in writing to the Archivist and/or the
Librarian at the Chicano Studies Research Center Library. Permission for
publication is given on behalf of the UCLA Chicano Studies Research
Center as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include
or imply permission of the copyright holder, which must also be
obtained. [