Introducing MCASB Leadership – New Co-Executive Directors & New Trustees – Join us in celebrating The New Salon: Arte del Pueblo this Saturday!

Co-Executive Directors: Dalia Garcia and Fabián Leyva-Barragán 

Garcia is also a co-curator of the two forthcoming exhibitions Sangre de Nopal/Blood of the Nopal opening this summer at the Fowler Museum at UCLA (January 20th) and then in fall at MCASB (October 6th), as part of the Getty’s PST ART: Art & Science Collide initiative. In 2020, she became the manager of Mixteco Indigena Community Organizing Project (MICOP) Tequio Youth Program, where she developed several workshops and programs aimed at developing an understanding of indigeneity and its complexity, including the Na Vali Youth Leadership Program in collaboration with other Indigenous intellectuals. She has been involved with the Guelaguetza Popular in Santa Maria, which organizes the Guelaguetza Festival, and the Collectivo Educativo de Estudiantes de Naciones Indígenas (CE’ENI), a pioneering collective of indigenous immigrant youth that has created a safe space for youth to focus on maintaining Indigenous identity among immigrants and new generations born and raised in the U.S.

Fabián Leyva-Barragán, Co-Executive Director, Curatorial, joins MCASB from the Department of Photography & New Media at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art (SBMA). Leyva-Barragán, born in Tijuana, Mexico, has a B.A. with a double major in History of Art and Practice of Art from the University of California, Berkeley. He is the recipient of a National Association of Latino Arts and Cultures (NALAC) Leadership Institute Award.

Since 2019, Fabián has worked extensively on exhibitions for SBMA that feature 19th century photography, contemporary photography, and new media. In 2023, Fabián curated: Thinking and Seeing Beyond the Lens: Conceptual Photography from the Collection, focusing on conceptual photography from the SBMA’s permanent photography collection; additionally, he proposed the acquisition of artworks by Ana Mendieta, Liliana Porter and Ana Tiscornia, Ana González, and Janna Ireland into the Museum’s permanent art collection. Prior to the SBMA, Fabián worked in the Department of Photographs at the J. Paul Getty Museum, where he contributed to the exhibition: Photography in Argentina, 1850-2010: Contradiction and Continuity, for the Getty’s Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA initiative. Additionally, he has previously worked in different curatorial capacities at the Walker Art Center, the Dallas Museum of Art, Blanton Museum of Art at the University of Texas in Austin, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, among other art institutions.

Contact the Co-Executive Directors: 
Dalia Garcia, dgarcia@mcasantabarbara.org
Fabian Leyva-Barragan, fleyvabarragan@mcasantabarbara.org

New Trustees: Carolyn Merino Mulllin, Dr. Silvia Perea, Xaviera Simmons

Part of this work has demanded the ongoing development of a series of community agreements, a shared lexicon, and a deeper awareness of the pervasiveness of White Supremacy and wealth hoarding, Patriarchy, Anti-Blackness, and Anti-Indigeneity within the history of all art museums and within ourselves. The Board is implementing methodologies developed by the Readying The Museum initiative, a nationwide cohort working with ASU Art Museum with major support from the Ford and Mellon foundations. More of this work will be shared in the coming months.

Adriana Arriaga – Xicana designer, Oxnard, CA (Santa Barbara born)

Ingrid Bostrom – Lead photographer for Santa Barbara Independent, has a photo centered column called “Bosses by Bostrom” in Coastal View News, and contributes to Carpinteria Magazine and other publications, Carpinteria, CA

Porfirio Gutiérrez – Zapotec textile artist and natural dyer, Ventura, CA, and Teotitlán del Valle, Oaxaca, Mexico

Arturo Heredia Soto – Co-Founder and Art Designer Lum Art Magazine, and Lead Exhibition Designer, Art, Design & Architecture Museum, UC Santa Barbara, Goleta, CA

Debra Herrick, PhD – Co-Founder and Editor-in-Chief Lum Art Magazine, and Associate Editorial Director, UC Santa Barbara, Goleta, CA

Laura Hyatt, Secretary – Executive Director, LAND (Los Angeles Nomadic Division), Los Angeles, CA (Santa Barbara born)

Frederick Janka, President – Queer Latinx Arts Advocate and Cultural Producer, Santa Barbara, CA (Santa Barbara born)

Carolyn Merino Mulllin, Vice-President – Executive Director at the Oxnard Performing Arts Center Nonprofit Corporation (OPAC), Ventura, CA

Dr. Silvia Perea, Vice-President – Architect (M.Arch), Ph.D., and Curator of the Architecture and Design Collection at the Art, Design & Architecture Museum, UC Santa Barbara, Goleta, CA

Xaviera Simmons, Treasurer – Artist, and Co-Lead, Readying The Museum, Los Angeles, CA and New York, NY

Vanessa Wallace-Gonzales – Multiracial Black and Mexican interdisciplinary artist, New York, NY (Santa Barbara born)

Opening Reception for The New Salon: Arte del Pueblo – Saturday, June 29, 4:00 – 6:00pm