1970s

In 2014 the Chicana por mi Raza digital Memory Collective interviewed foundational Chicana film producer Nancy de los Santos.  Nancy had grown up in Mexican Chicago, far from the Southwest, and had participated in many key events related to the Midwestern arm of the Chicano Movement. During the interview, Nancy mentioned — as it turns out quite modestly — that she might have “a few photos” to share with us. When Nancy arrived with three bulging boxes of photographs, some of them large format photos, many of them repeated images that had clearly been modified, cropped, and artfully reconstructed, we began to understand that her creative life as an image maker did not begin with her filmmaking.