(mellow music) (mellow music continues) (light upbeat music) (rain pattering) (serene music) - This neighborhood, it's my heart.

(serene music) As a child and growing up on the west side of Kansas City, Missouri was just such a safe place, a safe environment.

I can't say really anything bad about it.

I mean, there may be little times when I can remember something here, there, but just really an amazing childhood, an amazing place to be in Kansas City and growing up here.

(serene music) The place where, you know, all my inspiration came from would be this neighborhood, you know, my grandmother's house, my grandmother for sure.

My grandmother, she was just special.

You know, there was a time when I couldn't even talk about her without crying, but she definitely was such a huge influence in my life.

(serene music) When she came to the United States, you know, it was during the Mexican Revolutionary War and her father had just passed away, and my great-grandmother felt unsafe, so she took my grandmother along with her siblings and brought them across to the United States from San Luis Potosi.

The story begins from there.

(serene music) - I know, yeah, yeah.

(people chattering) I talked to John for a while.

- (indistinct).

- Yeah.

Jenny helped me.

Jenny helped me, from high school.

- [Grandmother] Jen was very (indistinct).

Always very friendly.

Always... You know, when she was little, she just attract the children to come and play with her Not her age, younger kids, and all kinds of kids down the neighborhood.

They wanted to play with her.

So they would ask me, "Can Jenny come and play with us?"

Or, "Can we play with Jenny here?"

I said, "Yeah, let me call her."

And she play with them, and she'd organize a game, or school, or something but they were... she would always attract people to talk or do something, especially the children, and she's still doing it today.

So... (light upbeat music) - My grandmother was everything to me, you know, and... My grandfather, you know, he was out, you know... And I think that's where the art part comes from.

He was making films, you know, filming every birthday party, every baptism, whatever event it was.

My grandmother was telling the story so it's like, those two things and learning more... wanting to learn more and more and hearing, wanting to hear it, you know, It wasn't something that I took lightly at all.

It was something that I was aspiring to.

Being able to take all that in really made me just want it more.

And so that brought my persona of the person that I am today.

You know, I'm very proud to wear something that is from Mexico.

I'm very proud to be able to wear my Our Lady of Guadalupe around my neck every single day, those types of things, you know.

I'm really proud of my background and really proud to be able to share that with other people and make those connections.

Being Chicana is just... And I don't use that term too often, but at the same time, it's definitely something that really speaks to me, and it's important to be able to use that word along with all the other little words that we can come up with or we have come up with.

But Chicana specifically, is the idea of being Mexican and being American.

I am American.

I was born here in the United States, but you cannot take the Mexican part of me that is instilled, that will always be here.

(mellow music) The West Side Mural Project started in 1982 by Lee Ann Perez and her now husband, and a group of union men that really wanted to get this project rolling, and I saw a flyer when I was in high school and I knew it was something that I really wanted to be a part of and it was in my neighborhood.

And every summer, from 1982 on, we created murals for a good 10 years.

I graduated high school and I ended up attending the Kansas City Art Institute, and while I was there, Lee Ann had reached out to me and really just passed me the torch.

Being able to follow in her footsteps and get my own group of students together and we created a timeline of the history of Mexico.

And from, you know, Aztecs, to the Mayans, to the Mexican Revolutionary War.

You know, the best part of it all, was pretty much the last year that we were doing murals.

And I was able to work with Lee Ann specifically and we worked on a mural together.

And it really was a moment of just as artists, working together and creating something, you know, that was meaningful for the community and really could help to educate people on new things.

And we chose the topic of Jose Guadalupe Posada, and the Mexican Revolutionary War, and you know, the different prints that he would make that included many images from Mexico but also of Day of the Dead.

And I was able to hand draw all the flowers that went around the border of the mural.

And later kids came in and painted them and helped me to kinda recreate something that kinda came from my inspiration from Mexican pottery and some beautiful pieces that my grandmother actually had in her kitchen, so I wanted to, you know, replicate that and we made it happen and it was amazing.

I had some of the images that he's very well known for, for the Day of the Dead.

And you know, the skeleton images here on the west side and then the community maybe weren't as familiar to people, and for me, that's when the Day of the Dead started.

And it was something that really, I became so passionate about and being able to educate people, let them know what it was, let them know what it was about.

And I continue to do that today, working with kids and being able to be, hopefully an inspiration, but just being able to educate and, you know, the relevance and the importance of remembering our culture.

(light upbeat music) Well, I think what it mean for me to be Chicana, to be of Mexican descent third generation and as a person of color, you know, in order to (indistinct) is everything, you know.

It runs through my veins you know.

It's here in my heart.

That will never change.

(serene music) (light upbeat music) ♪ I got the power, I got the power ♪ ♪ Power, power ♪ I got the power, I got the power ♪ ♪ Power, power ♪ Power, power ♪ I'm going higher, higher ♪ I break my bones I lose control ♪ ♪ But I'll be shining bright (serene music) This is the Kansas City Museum, and here, I'm gonna have my first piece in a permanent collection.

This is a really great museum because it's part of the rich history of Kansas City.

But it's also nestled in a very immigrant area as well.

When my dad first came to the United States, he lived in the northeast neighborhood.

And so historically, I have that connection with the space too.

When I was growing up in Mexico, my abuelito's house, which is where I grew up, he had a big garden, so he was a plant lover.

And I remember waking up every morning and there was like a very fresh, like dewy look every morning.

There was like some gloss over everything.

So, including these plants in my art, or like the Agave even, is a way for me to reconnect with that story, and to be able to reconnect with the homes that I used to live in but no longer live in anymore.

And then I'm even placing an image of my Tia Rosie.

My Tia Rosie, I was very close to her and she actually passed away this year.

She is a huge inspiration to me.

She was a very empowering woman.

For me it's hard because, you know, as an immigrant and being part of the DACA program, I live here, but a lot of my memories are in Mexico and so oftentimes, it's very fragmented for me.

Like I remember a lot of things but I can't tell if those things are real memories because I remember them or if they're real memories because I saw them in a video, or I saw them in a picture, or I heard them told their story.

And that's actually why I use vellum in a lot of my artwork.

Vellum has like a haziness to it, and I think that a lot of my memories are kind of... have a little bit of a veil over them, you don't fully remember, they're not fully transparent.

My abuelito (speaking in foreign language), he was just a really hard worker, and he actually died here.

This is his rosal.

So he loved his roses and he would come out and plant them and look after them, and he actually passed away when I was in middle school.

My only (speaking in foreign language) is still alive and she lives in Mexico, and she is so, so sweet.

She's so nice and she's so...

I really love her and they're there out of fiesta.

The last time I saw my abuelito was when I came here.

So I would have been...

I think I would have been seven.

I was so excited to come to the United States.

For some reason (laughs) this new world was what stood out in my mind.

And you know, that's me being young, thinking like, it's like a vacation and we'll see each other like it was over the weekend, and you know, it was the last time I saw my abuelito and it's the last time I've seen a lot of my tios and a lot of my tias.

So yeah, like I said, some of those things you don't know, that may be the last time that you see them.

(singer singing in foreign language) (rain pattering) - So I think I would say like, it's been a long time since I've been there.

Like I remember being young, and the last time that I was there it was just hard.

Like I said bye but it's like I didn't know.

I wish I had like... had more intent and, you know, sometimes you don't know those things especially like, when your family is trying to make the best of things and do the best for you.

(singer singing in foreign language) ♪ I wish that you were with me (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ I wish that you were here (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ I wish that you were here (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ I wish that you were here (singer singing in foreign language) ♪ I wish that you were here (singer singing in foreign language) I thank too, my tia who passed away.

For me, when that happened, I was devastated.

You don't even know what to think.

I felt guilt even being here.

But she, I know her, and she would tell me it is worth it, yeah.

Like, (speaking in foreign language) worth it.

(speaking in foreign language) worth it And I know her and I know she would say that.

So maybe the answer isn't that simple.

But I think that maybe it's like a quiet reflection and it's something of like, maybe it's an intimate reflection, you know, even ask like, "Is it worth it?"

And then think about those things.

What are those things that are worth it?

Like, what makes it worth it for me?

♪ I wish that you're here (light upbeat music)