Monthly Archives: March 2024

Guadalupe Pop Shop

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Wheelz Studio and Dreamonoid’s HiFi hosted Guadalupe Pop Shop to celebrate the opening of Wheelz Studio, a barber shop located in co-owner of Dreamonoid’s Christian Rios’ 1711 Guadalupe building in San Antonio, TX.

Background

Over the last year at Dreamonoid’s HiFi, I (joey) have transitioned to running a Dreamonoid’s in Bryan, TX and Christian Rios has been running the shop in San Antonio. After a couple months, Christian found his groove of how he wanted the space in Dreamonoid’s SA to function and reached out to his barber Wheelz, who is a long time friend of his and offered him half the space to setup his own studio. The results have been amazing.

Wheelz, aka Andrew Gonzales, has been a barber for decades and is a polymath who is also interested in audio, photography, video and much more. The barber shop reflects this with an amazing aesthetic offering a cozy feel with a lounge area and video game consoles. With four chairs and multiple barbers ready to give cuts, their clientele has been growing smoothly.

Guadalupe Pop Shop

Wheelz and Christian did a great shop curating the event adding string lights outside, having a good mix of venders, offering drinks (provided by Wheelz Studio) and live music. Here is a highlight of just a few of the many awesome venders (go to the gallery at the end of the article to see all the venders).

Emmanuel Valtierra had his art on display and it was amazing to see all the decks he has been creating along with his prints. He also spoke about his latest venture of working with DC comics on visuals for an upcoming movie.

La Calavera Garbancera restaurant located next to Dreamonoid’s was one of the food venders and provided patrons with some good eats and when they didn’t have it right there, they would direct them to the restaurant. Performer Zayno Rayne was one of those patrons who went over to the resturant and got some Barria tacos and loved them so much, he told us he went back there the next day for lunch before heading back to College Station, TX.

Danielsan & Zayno Rayne

Danielsan & Zayno and company delivered a great show. Dizzy an audio engineer based out of College Station set them up. They opened with DJ MOTTA who played a two hour set and then Zayno opened and Danielsan headlined. The performed Duo’s at the end. Rooted out of the Bryan, College Station, TX area, it was great having them perform at the Guadalupe Pop Shop event, the crowd and the venders were all vibing and they definitely provided some great energy.

Summary

Overall it was just crazy for me, joey, to experience the Guadalupe Pop Shop as it was a mix of so many different generations of students I have taught and am teaching, friends, family, hifi customers and community members. It was a trip to get to show Zayno and the performers the space (see video below) as I have always talked about it, but it’s another thing for them to get to see and experience it.

While I finished the event exhausted, with a subwoofer blown, PA cords doused in drinks, I finished the weekend cleaning it all up and reflecting on the unique temporary autonomous zone (TAZ) created by this event where cultures collided in a harmonious way.

Photo Gallery

LATINX POP BOPIC 2024

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BIPOC Pop 2024 was definitely a new perspective for me.  Both times I came in the past I was highly involved with panels or workshops and definitely working on producing photos and video as primary content to document the event.  This time I attended as a co workshop leader and then just as an attendee.  It was much more of my “anthropologist hat on,” kinda attendance where I get to just sit and absorb what’s going on around me.  I spoke with a lot of different attendees, artists, academics, students, people from the community in general.  I went to some dinners and in general just took it all in.  This year’s blog post is definitely a reflective one.

I carpooled with Dr. Ramirez from Bryan, TX.  Dr. Ramirez is an assistant professor at the University of Houston Downtown and helps run the Center for Latino Studies.   We would have good discussions on the drives to and from the conference, getting to discuss theory, our jobs and on the way back, deep reflections on the conference.  It was amazing.  We also hosted a workshop together about multimodal academic works and pedagogical approaches.  Dr. Ramirez did an amazing job leading the workshop and the interactions were great.

At the conference itself I just kinda sat around and would “graze” the panels, workshops and artist market.  I attended some great workshops, my personal favorites that I attended were Mary Cantu’s and Ernesto Cuevas’.  Both approached their workshops in a very inclusive community oriented way that encouraged everyone to participate and interact, yet also time for self reflection and growth.  

Anel Flores

I was able to capture some video of Anel Flores’ Zine workshop, it was amazing. Anel is a poet, visual artist and in general a public figure in San Antonio who represents the “other,” in so many spaces. While I was not able to attend the full workshop, I was so inspired by her reading of her zine and the imagery used. I was personally touched by her use of Jovita Idar, my great great Aunt.

Mary’s Workshop

Mary’s workshop focused on comics and the panels themselves, she had us choose comics that we would then color the panels and create a “basic” meaning of shapes and colors that give meaning to the panels. I created my own using a comic and when finished took a side by side of a similar page and my work, it was definitely a good process for both the mind and creativity.

Ernesto’s Workshop

Ernesto led a workshop where he had people pair up and develop what I am calling “miniature murals” based on text, art and thinking about stories.  I worked with Dukes comic’s co-creator Dr. E.C. Dukes, along with my son jojo on creating a mini mural.  What is so awesome to me about this kinds of workshops is that it is so much more than learning to create a mini mural, it is the journey, the conversations and intermodal art approach to creating, creating bonds, memories and lessons.

Dr. González’s Workshop

I also attended Dr. Christopher González’s  workshop, Latinx Life Tales: Writing Workshop From Memory to Memoir.  His talk explored his journey to creating Big Scary Brown Guy – A memoir.  My personal reason for going to this was very open ended.  I just had a feeling to go and that I would figure out why when I was there. Dr. González was a great presenter and fielded questions of all types. 

My Reflection On Dr. González’s Workshop

What I took away personally was that I should create a memoir at some point and if I were to do one soon I think a title might be “A academic degenerates life – part one.”  It made me think about a list of articles I have already written that might culminate into something.  Here are a few:

Artist & Book Market

The artist and book market is one of my favorite parts of BIPOC. It is where I get to meet so many creative people, learn about publishing opportunities and purchase from and support artists directly. This year did not disappoint. I got the pleasure of meeting the Dukes after many years of hearing about their amazing work. It was definitely a para-social relationship moment where I have followed their work for so long on social media that I felt like I knew them. The cool part was that I got to know them very quickly. They are definitely people I want to stay in touch with.

I also met Sarah Rafael García of the LibroMobile Arts Cooperative and learned about their efforts in Santa Ana, California to celebrate Latinx heritage through community oriented art works and shows. I am hoping we are able to collaborate on some sort of project soon.

In general I got lots of good art work, here are some of my “finds”

Summary

Overall BIPOC 2024 was great. I will say it exhausted me. Ultimately I am an anthropologist and I take in a lot of the energy of people around me and it was overwhelming. The overarching feeling was one of optimism. That said, I do want to recognized the feeling of internal and external struggle by the artists and academics who presented. Many stories and pieces and presentations are based around painful experiences, past and present. This overtone definitely kept things “real.” I saw many academics who are currently struggling to find themselves and representations of themselves in academia. Yearning to learn how to navigate Academia at all levels. I did publish an article on my personal website about it:

I encourage anyone who has the smallest amount of interest to attend BIPOC 2025, it is free and something that Fredrick Luis Aldama and Samantha Ceballos produce at a level of sincerity that shows and attendees like me appreciate and value.

Music & Movie Making in Texas Conference Spring 2024

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Music and Movie Making In Texas Conference Write Up

The 2nd annual Music and Movie Making in Texas Conference was a success this year.  With around 60 people in attendance on Saturday and over (get amount from Zayno) at the School of Performance Visualization and Fine Arts Friday concert at the Grand Stafford Theatre.

Organized by the Texas A&M Media & Gaming Lab, the three main organizers were student Zayno Rayne, Professor Jonathan Guajardo and joey lopez phd.  We would like to thank them for all their hard work.

Sponsors of the conference

  • Texas A&M Race Ethnicity Studies Institute ($500 grant)
  • Texas A&M English department (facilities)
  • Texas A&M Performance Visualization and Fine Arts (equipment)
  • Texas A&M Communication & Journalism Media & Gaming Lab. ($1000 for food (special thanks for Professor Jonathan Guajardo)

We would like to thank them for the support given.  The conference went smoothly and offered a well rounded set of panels with good interactions and questions.  Lunch was provided by Blue Baker, a special thank you to Rubi Ruiz, the department of Communication & Journalism administrator for all her help, she makes our lives so much easier.  

PANELS

Media Studies Panel

The media studies panel consisted of four professors, Dr. Campbell, Dr. Ramirez, Dr. Connor & Dr. Sullivan. Each presented about their research. Dr. Campbell presented about AI and the premise of AI’s from outterspace and music knowledge, it was highly engaging. Dr. Connor presented about licensing and we quickly learned he should give a full workshop with local musicians sooner than later. Dr. Ramirez presented about comics and media studies and his journey studying borderland culture in the media, such as comics. Dr. Sullivan discussed his research into television. They then answered questions moderated by joey lopez. Check out the video stream:

Student Media Panel

The student media panel consisted of Diego Valle & David Kang of CSTAT Collage, Kyle Heise of SZNS, Claire Thessen of A Line Magazine and Sophie Villarreal Battalion. Each student media publication previewed their work and spoke about the opportunities and challanges of creating student media. It was great to have two organizations who are officially part of Texas A&M and two orgs that are independent of Texas A&M but started and run by A&M students.

Max Nied Key Note

Max Nied of Monstercat Records delivered a “boots on the ground” presentation where he worked through what it is like to develop a music career and how his career has evolved working with Mostercat Records.

2am Productions Key Note

2am Productions gave a keynote, which consists of Alazar Asrat & Marco Mireles, both graduates of Texas A&M and former participants of the Media & Gaming Lab. Their presentation featured their journey to becoming media makers and how they decided to create 2am Productions, highlighting their successes and lessons learned.

BCS Music Scene Development Panel

The BCS Music Scene Development Panel consisted of local music producers and two music making student org presidents. Their presentation revolved around their approaches to impacting the music scene in the BCS area as well as discussing the challanges of creating an overall community.

Regional Bands & Creators Panel

The regional band and creators panel featured local performers Dylan Zientek, 4kace and Daniel San. Moderator Zayno asked questions about their approach to music making, performing and then had the performers show off their work.

Media Making Panel

The Media Making Panel consisted of students and local media makers. Each media maker spoke about their approaches and then showed their works. It was great to see such creative work being done.

Summary

Plans for the 3rd Annual Music and Movie Making in Texas conference are already in the works. One of the major take aways was the need to have more workshops for the practitioners of music and video production pertaining to revenue streams, business structures and licensing. We have also noticed a desire for a full on film screening, so we may add that into the mix with a film festival. Another take away was the need to have our live music event after the conference, not before. We also are planning to have a new media production track where panelist show their works in VR/AR and other new media fields.

We would like to thank all those who participated in the conference and we hope to see you all again at the 3rd annual Music and Movie Making in Texas Conference in the Spring 2025!