This poster was the official poster for Chicano Park Day on Saturday, April 25th, 1992. This year’s poster was centered around the theme of “Let Us Grow”. The creators of this poster are unknown, likely because there was a lack of professional artists available at this time to create a poster. Instead, organizers of the festival created this poster themselves with elements of Chicano culture that they knew personally.

This poster is a simple yet effective compilation of various elements of Chicano culture. It builds upon a plain parchment, containing picturesque scenes of Chicano culture drawn in the respective colors of the Mexican flag. In this poster, we see a Mariachi band, the Mexican flag waving in the wind, lowriders showing off their prized possessions, the Virgin of Guadalupe, the overpass of I-5, and other scenes that belong to Chicano Park Day every year. At the top of the scenes of the poster, the overpass of I-5 hangs over the rest of the poster. This portrays the real location of Chicano Park and augments the comprehension of the poster by relating it to the real place with these elements, rather than an artistic portrayal of the day and celebration. All these elements and scenes, they are compiled to convey the actuality of the park day and to create the beautiful and community-based vision for what Chicano Park Day means. The pictures and drawings that are included are of real people and things that intersect with the celebration every year. It shows how organizing in celebration of diversity of the community supports the entire community holistically.

The poster shows the sounds of Chicano Park Day through traditions and qualities that belong to the community. Through the music, dancing, vendors, the overpass, the low riders, and visitors on this day, the celebration would be loud and jolly. As we would walk through the park, we would constantly be surrounded by these boisterous qualities that make the community beautiful. In each section of the park, there would be different sounds. You could listen to the Mariachi band playing in one part and hear the footsteps and joyful yells of the dancers near the music, or listen to the vendors and buyers speaking in Spanish and sharing jokes and laughter in another, or hear the hydraulics and gasps in awe at the low-riders somewhere else. All of these sounds can be heard above the others, yet every sound in the park is able to be heard simultaneously in any area. Despite the overpowering sounds that are in the park at this time though, they all would blend together and create a dominant sound: the sound of community, solidarity, and joy. Mariachi Arcoíris, the first all-male LGBTQ+ mariachi band, is a prime example of a mariachi band that would ‘educate, engage and agitate through the power of art’. Here is a link to one of their performances:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1wPzg9H0G8&feature=youtu.be

This poster was created to advertise Chicano Park Day, but in a very unique way. The scenes and pictures that are included in this poster convey a powerful message that the Chicano community has this space to celebrate in a variety of different ways and bring everyone together through expression and art. Even though the poster is simple, it depicts a vast variety of parts of Chicano culture that are meant to be celebrated and shared. It creates a call to action for those who visit the park to remember that this space belongs to the Latinx community and offers a place of free and safe expression to those who had a previous space stripped from them. The theme was “Let Us Grow”, and this was timely because of the increases of border patrol at this time in 1992. The phrase “Let Us Grow” makes a statement to those who live along the border and have been disenfranchised by the US for generations to assemble in celebration in a shared space; it was finally time to move forward after tirelessly defending the claim over this space for years to a mindset of growth and safety in this space for the community from there on out in time.

Written by Samuel Stringer