Smithsonian's Dolores Huerta exhibit comes to Brownsville amid deeply felt legacy
The Smithsonian Museum’s traveling Dolores Huerta exhibit has come to Brownsville for the fall.
Tracing Huerta’s life from teacher to labor organizer, the exhibit titled “Dolores Huerta: Revolution in the Fields” uses high-quality, towering, screen printed photos, text, and an app to tell Huerta’s story at the Brownsville Museum of Fine Art.
Its first photos show migrant farm workers picking vegetables as planes dust the crops and, subsequently, the workers, with chemicals. Another photo shows the living conditions the farm workers lived under, sleeping on mattresses strewn about the floor in small one-room homes. These photos depict some of the many injustices Huerta fought against, including higher wages, bathrooms in the fields and protection from crop dusting planes.
“My parents and my grandparents were farm workers. And I think (this exhibit) is equally important for the whole (Rio Grande) Valley, because we are an agricultural part of Texas. I mean we grow so much food for so many people,” Teodoro Estrada, a Brownsville Museum of Fine Art member and instructor, told TPR. “I encourage people and I ask people to come and see this exhibition because it will bring back a lot of memories, just like it has for me.”
Estrada helped install the exhibit, telling TPR of his memories as a young child in Houston, seeing the grape and lettuce boycotts that made their way from California to across the country.
Huerta co-founded the National Farm Workers Association (now the United Farm Workers Union, or UFW) with Cesar Chavez in 1962, in Delano, California. Huerta, an elementary school teacher, left her job to organize after seeing the poverty conditions of her students, whose parents were farm workers.
Produce boycotts and labor strikes were paramount to the UFW’s organizing. Huerta, Chavez and the UFW orchestrated a 25-day, 300-mile march protesting labor conditions in 1965. These marches continue today, as does Huerta’s legacy.
“She was this advocate for accomplishing (getting workers access to) water, bathrooms,” Dahlia Guerra, University of Texas at Rio Grande Valley’s Assistant Vice President of Public Art, told TPR. “You know, all of these things that happened over (in California), directly impacted the Valley.”
Guerra’s father-in-law was a civil rights attorney who marched in the Rio Grande Valley’s protests for improving farm workers’ labor conditions.
The exhibit has photos of Huerta at demonstrations, speaking at NFWA meetings and standing alongside Robert Kennedy, a longtime supporter of the United Farm Workers. Their companionship lasted until Kennedy’s end: she was with him just seconds before he was assassinated in a Los Angeles hotel.
While Huerta’s organizing had a profound effect on gaining labor rights for farm workers, so, too, did the protest art that came from the movement. Photos of Xavier Viramontes’ “Boycott Grapes” and Ester Hernandez’s “Sun Mad” are shown in a panel explaining the art’s significance in the movement.
“As people begin to see the different logos, the different signs, and what’s happening out in the field, it brings around a lot of awareness to what the people are suffering,” Estrada said.
The exhibit also explains Huerta’s behind-the-scenes actions in the movement. The famous phrase, “si, se puede,” synonymous with Chavez and the UFW’s movement, was coined by Huerta, the exhibit notes.
Guerra hopes Rio Grande Valley residents will visit the exhibit while they have the chance.
“What I think people will get from this exhibit is just to be inspired by this incredible woman who knew no boundaries, who was unstoppable, who was unafraid and who was unique,” she said.
“Dolores Huerta: Revolution in the Fields,” is open to the public until October. The exhibit will go to Gilroy, California after its run in Brownsville.
Editor's Note: This story has been corrected to note Dahlia Guerra's father-in-law was a civil rights attorney.
Maonyesho ya Dolores Huerta ya Smithsonian yanakuja Brownsville katikati ya urithi uliohisi sana Maonyesho ya kusafiri ya Dolores Huerta ya Jumba la Makumbusho la Smithsonian yamekuja Brownsville kwa vuli. Kufuatilia maisha ya Huerta kutoka mwalimu hadi mratibu wa kazi, maonyesho yaliyoitwa <unk>Dolores Huerta: Mapinduzi katika Mashamba<unk> hutumia picha za ubora wa juu, zenye urefu mkubwa, picha zilizochapishwa, maandishi, na programu ya kuelezea hadithi ya Huerta katika Jumba la Makumbusho la Sanaa la Brownsville. Picha zake za kwanza zinaonyesha wafanyakazi wa mashamba wakikusanya mboga huku ndege zikitupa vumbi kwenye mazao na baadaye wafanyakazi kwa kutumia kemikali. Picha nyingine inaonyesha hali ya maisha ya wafanyakazi wa shamba waliolala kwenye godoro lililotandazwa kwenye sakafu katika nyumba ndogo zenye chumba kimoja. Picha hizi zinaonyesha baadhi ya ukosefu wa haki ambao Huerta alipigana dhidi yake, ikiwa ni pamoja na mishahara ya juu, bafu katika mashamba na ulinzi kutoka kwa ndege za kupulizia mazao. <unk> Wazazi wangu na babu na nyanya yangu walikuwa wafanyakazi wa shamba. Na nadhani (maonyesho haya) ni muhimu sawa kwa Bonde lote la (Rio Grande), kwa sababu sisi ni sehemu ya kilimo ya Texas. """Tunazalisha chakula cha kutosha kwa watu wengi,"" Teodoro Estrada, mwanachama na mwalimu wa Jumba la Makumbusho la Sanaa la Brownsville, aliiambia TPR." "Ninawatia moyo watu na kuwaomba watu waje na kuona maonyesho haya kwa sababu yataleta kumbukumbu nyingi, kama vile ilivyokuwa kwangu. "" Estrada alisaidia kuanzisha maonyesho, akimwambia TPR kumbukumbu zake kama mtoto mdogo huko Houston, kuona vikombe vya zabibu na lettuce ambavyo vilifanya njia yao kutoka California hadi kote nchini." Huerta alianzisha Chama cha Wafanyakazi wa Shamba la Kitaifa (Sasa Umoja wa Wafanyakazi wa Shamba, au UFW) na Cesar Chavez mnamo 1962 huko Delano, California. Huerta, mwalimu wa shule ya msingi, aliacha kazi yake ili kuandaa baada ya kuona hali ya umaskini wa wanafunzi wake, ambao wazazi wao walikuwa wafanyakazi wa shamba. Uzalishaji boycotts na mgomo wa wafanyakazi walikuwa muhimu kwa UFW ya kuandaa. Huerta, Chavez na UFW waliandaa maandamano ya siku 25 ya kupinga hali ya kazi mnamo 1965. Maandamano hayo yanaendelea leo, kama vile urithi wa Huerta. "Mwanamke huyo alikuwa mtetezi wa kupata maji na vyoo,"" alisema Dahlia Guerra, Msaidizi wa Makamu wa Rais wa Sanaa ya Umma wa Chuo Kikuu cha Texas huko Rio Grande Valley, kwa TPR." "Wakati wa kampeni za kuondoa sheria za kijeshi, baba mkwe wa Guerra alikuwa mwanasheria wa haki za kiraia ambaye alishiriki katika maandamano ya Bonde la Rio Grande kwa ajili ya kuboresha hali ya kazi ya wafanyakazi wa shamba.""" Picha za Huerta katika maandamano, akizungumza katika mikutano ya NFWA na kusimama kando ya Robert Kennedy, msaidizi wa muda mrefu wa Wafanyakazi wa Shamba la Umoja. Uhusiano wao ulidumu hadi mwisho wa Kennedy: alikuwa naye sekunde chache tu kabla ya kuuawa katika hoteli moja ya Los Angeles. Wakati Huerta's kuandaa alikuwa na athari kubwa juu ya kupata haki za kazi kwa ajili ya wafanyakazi wa shamba, hivyo, pia, alifanya sanaa ya maandamano ambayo ilitoka harakati. Picha za Xavier Viramontes <unk> <unk>Boycott Grapes<unk> na Ester Hernandez <unk>Sun Mad<unk> zinaonyeshwa katika jopo linaloelezea umuhimu wa sanaa katika harakati. "Wakati watu wanaanza kuona nembo tofauti, ishara tofauti, na kile kinachofanyika nje ya uwanja, inaleta ufahamu mwingi kwa kile watu wanateseka", Estrada alisema. Maonyesho pia yanaelezea Huerta's nyuma ya pazia vitendo katika harakati. Maneno maarufu, "si, se puede", yanayofanana na Chávez na harakati ya UFW, yalichukuliwa na Huerta, maelezo ya maonyesho. Guerra anatumaini wakazi wa Bonde la Rio Grande watatembelea maonyesho hayo wanapoweza. "Nafikiri watu watapata kutoka kwa maonyesho haya ni kuchochewa na mwanamke huyu wa ajabu ambaye hakujua mipaka, ambaye hakuweza kukamatwa, ambaye hakuwa na hofu na ambaye alikuwa wa kipekee, ""alisema." <unk>Dolores Huerta: Mapinduzi katika Mashamba,<unk> ni wazi kwa umma hadi Oktoba. Maonyesho hayo yataenda Gilroy, California baada ya kuonyeshwa huko Brownsville. Kumbuka: Hadithi hii imerekebishwa ili kutambua baba mkwe wa Dahlia Guerra alikuwa mwanasheria wa haki za kiraia.