Rooted in Nahuatl
Aztec Stories in Modern Mexico
Inocencio Jiménez Chino
Retrospective
Bedford Gallery
Walnut Creek
Ongoing – June 28
Aztec Stories in Modern Mexico: An Inocencio Jiménez Chino Retrospective explores over five decades of the artist’s practice through 35 paintings, video interviews, audio recordings and artist tools. Jiménez Chino’s first-ever retrospective, this exhibition traces the artist’s evolution from early works on board to protest line drawings from the 1990s and newly completed narrative acrylic paintings on handmade amate that capture, with remarkable intimacy and detail, daily life in the Balsas River basin of Guerrero, Mexico.
Rooted in Nahuatl storytelling and cultural preservation, Jiménez Chino’s work bridges ancient and contemporary traditions, offering profound insight into Indigenous culture, community and craft. The exhibition invites visitors to explore connections between art and ancestry, labor and landscape, and storytelling and cultural survival.
About the Artist
Born in 1950, Inocencio Jiménez Chino is a Nahuatl-speaking corn farmer and renowned self-taught artist from San Agustín Oapan, Guerrero, Mexico. He began producing art in the 1960s during the boom of commercial amate painting for tourists but quickly developed a unique, more intricate style.
Jiménez Chino is specifically recognized for these detailed, narrative amate (bark paper) paintings. Bridging ancient tradition with modern life, his work features intimate scenes of rural life and landscapes, as well as themes of cultural preservation and activism. His work often documents local traditions and labor, including scenes of farming, washing clothes and children playing. He uses his art for activism, such as protesting the 1990s San Juan Tetelcingo Dam project in Guerrero, Mexico.
