1823 1861.

The Alamo is used as a military fort by five different countries in that 41 year period.

That amount of change in such a short period of time, it is really difficult to historically empathize and wrap your mind around what that would have felt like and how much change that is in a really short period of time.

In 1820, native peoples vastly outnumbered Spanish and Mexican people.

If we had no Anglos in Texas, when their citizens proved unwilling to relocate to secure its northern regions, Spain then Mexico encouraged and incentivized Anglo settlement.

By the 1830s, the population of Texas was predominantly Anglo with Texas independence, political alliances shifted, but familial and cultural ties with Mexico have remained strong.

San Antonio's Latino population continues to grow and hovers at over 60%.

Welcome to Misty psyche.

In the blended culture.

Of.

San Antonio's origins lie and its historic missions, all of which we treasure, and one of which we remember as the Alamo.

It was in that of Mexico that the Spanish missionaries were taught the languages and the customs, and the indigenous populations they would encounter here.

It was in get it that they learned the survival skills they would need to travel north to the outer boundaries of New Spain to establish these missions.

It was there where the San Antonio of today to grew and grew.

And it is there that the San Antonio's blended culture was born.

Simply put, if it weren't for Katrina, there would be no missions, no Alamo, and no San Antonio.

Now, after more than 300 years, we rediscover and celebrate San Antonio's deep connection with Kitaro through artistic and cultural expression.

A reunion three centuries.

In the making.

For.

As people of these lands of South Texas, we are reminders of the other great American origin story.

We know we all knew about Plymouth Rock in 16 2015, 2100 years before Plymouth Rock.

America has this other origin story.

The Spanish influence has been in the United States from before the Anglos settled.

Remember that Spanish was the first language, aside from the native languages.

Was the first language spoken in the United States, not English.

We know the closeness of the bonds between Mexico and the United States, but most importantly between San Antonio and Mexico.

So many of our community are proud of their Mexican-American descent and heritage.

We often refer to this city as the northernmost city in Mexico, so we view it as a responsibility in San Antonio to uplift the relationship and the importance of the relationship.

Our dinner tables throughout this community are filled with the binational culture that we've shared for centuries, and it's something to be proud of.

It's what makes San Antonio one of the most unique cities in America, if not the world.

And we have our friends and our family in Mexico to to thank for that.

San Antonio is a very important part of our Mexican connection.

But that's not without their being in reality, an unbroken tie to our to our culture.

So, it's it's it's not, you know, merely enough, I think, to say that that that we're connected because we're of the same people, but that we're of the same history.

United States is a country formed by immigration.

You have people from all over the world here.

Migration is an act of resistance.

Maybe the most important one, because it's either that or die.

It's not clearly a choice that I am very happy.

And all of a sudden I'm going to decide to migrate.

No.

Most part of the time are very strong reasons that you have to leave your your comfort zone to the unknown, to the violent, to the difficulty.

The population of Texas grows a lot in the 1820s.

At the beginning of the 1820s, indigenous people in Texas still outnumber Spanish and Mexican people.

So come Moses Austin in 1820.

He dies shortly after he gets permission from Spain to bring families here.

In the months after that, Mexico achieves independence from Spain, and his son Stephen F Austin takes over his father's charge, gets permission from the nascent country Mexico and their new government to bring 300 families into Texas as well.

They're basically no Anglo people living in what is now Texas jump forward ten years later, 1830, and they outnumber their Tejano counterparts by more than 10 to 1.

And you have these three different groups.

You have Mexican government officials who want people to come live in this area, where Mexican citizens have really not shown a lot of interest in living.

You have the local Tejano population who has never felt meaningful support from the government in Mexico City.

And then you have people like Stephen F Austin who represent people coming in from the southern United States.

Originally, most of the people who came to Texas had land grants from Mexico and from Spain.

So they came with particular agreements.

They agreed to be Catholic.

They agreed to certain kinds of fees and taxes.

They were giving very specific tracts of land.

But in taking those land, they they recognize Mexican rule.

And as Mexico became more distracted and failed to exercise its influence over Texas.

They use that benign neglect to carve out their own path.

When Mexico tried to reassert its its authority and its control over its settlers in Texas, Texans realized they didn't need Mexico.

They didn't want to pay Mexican taxes.

They wanted to own slaves, which Mexico did not allow.

They wanted to be able to decide their own rules.

They wanted to be able to use the language that they wanted and they they realized that they didn't need Mexico's help and they didn't want Mexico to interfere with their affairs.

And when Mexico tried to come in and reclaim them or claim their territory, and they were trying to claim what was theirs, and, the early Texans simply wanted to claim it for themselves.

Soon after the battle of the Alamo, the fact that, all the defenders will be killed and that they're fighting for Texas independence, and they chose to remain.

You know, you're they're really setting the stage for an important act.

And it's that self-sacrifice they saw.

Sacrificed their lives.

In order for Texas independence.

Where do other stories come from?

From the victors.

And we'll hear the Mexican army is the victor, and they send the word back.

And they have reports that give us a details of the battle.

But six weeks later, they're defeated.

And so now there's a breaking communication.

So when the story starts coming out, the first telling is from Joe, who is enslaved by Travis.

And he tells us what how Travis died at the end.

And that becomes the foundation for what will become the Alamo narrative that we tell today.

The story of Texas independence is a complex one, and there are lots of different sides of it because different parties see their own, their own view, their own history, their own motivations and different points of the story.

And then they identify with that one and tend to ignore the other ones.

And I think we still have a lot of work to do to to tell that story better.

The Alamo place in Texas history, I think, I think is better looked at through that broad, holistic, over 300 year lens where rather than the Alamo being important because it's a battlefield, it's a place that different groups of people come to have interpreted and reinterpreted as a way of exploring their own community, their own freedom stories, and their own identity.

And that's a lot more powerful than focusing on a single historic event.

Because of these political figures, Santana sold this part of Texas to the United States.

People, those not even migrate to United States.

They just wake up one day and they were Americans.

What?

No.

And now all of a sudden, you have to change your identity, your culture, your values, your desires, your truths, your enemies.

We could also think of our relationship in terms of an interrupted story by the appearance of the border, the US-Mexico border, that partition across a homeland.

And for people who live in borderlands, there are no lines of demarcation.

People's lives expand across the border in terms of family connections, in terms of economic connections, religious connections with the missions are, you know, the Catholic religion or other religions as well.

People and good at that.

On people in San Antonio have been creating connection.

We've been creating connection through culture and heritage.

So those linkages between people on both sides of the border have been strong.

And this friendship city, this sister city, will help the whole world recognize it.

The borderlands are also part of their expression, because the music is borrowed.

For example, the any what?

Mongo or Angel is Spanish at bass, but, the instruments come from different sources.

You know, the we.

Well, the guitar is from Spain.

Sometimes they use a trombone.

So the trombone is from the United States.

So they're in their in their musical ensemble.

They're uniting musical instrume The connection between Jesse's culture is history.

His father, Monterrey, the United States, the tension as a Mexican-American living between these two worlds.

Because for many of us, we're Mexican-Americans.

Jesse had to become a naturalized citizen.

That that connection, that that denial or effort to continue the relationship between these two worlds, that for us, it's one world.

So Jesse was able to to use all aspects of our culture and to present them in a universal way that that not only reminds us but embodies our our culture as Mexicans and our culture as Americans, which in one level is a national relationship.

But on the level of the cultural relationship that we remember, that we have an obligation to make sure that that story is not a story of the past, but that it's a living presence.

So in the codex codices, we have women and men wearing gowns such as I'm wearing, made from cotton and woven.

So when I found that out, it was like this huge acknowledgment because I had never heard that or studied that in my history classes or any class.

To find out that this gown has found thousands of years of history, and it was made by the first people in this world.

And that was a huge eye opener.

Since then, I have been wearing pillars because they reflect who I am.

And so I am in your face wherever I go.

Not just at fiesta, but wherever I go.

I'm in your face because I wear who I am.

We are exemplars in the in the Mexican story and the American story of this power to adapt.

And we're part of this ever evolving sense of human identity.

So for me, it's ever been a project of trying to return to something true that we once were.

It's really about knowing more about the history from which we've emerged to have a sense of what it is we're becoming, who it is that we are becoming and presenting to the world.

When you live in San Antonio, you live in a blended culture.

And that isn't Mexico, isn't the United States.

It's something completely different and unique.

What we see around us is a wonderful, unique blend of cultures.

By that I mean we speak our own language.

Here in San Antonio is Spanglish.

This is what we speak.

It's not all Spanish.

It's not all English.

It's a combination of code switch words that everybody in this culture understand.

And you've got what's happening in Mexico with Mexicans, with Mexican artists, with Mexican writers, with Mexican people.

And you've also got those people in the United States who are having similar experiences with language, with politics, families earning a living and providing for your families.

And the way you present it in your art or your music may have similarities.

There may be slight differences because of the milieu you're in, but it tells your story and it tells the story across borders, not something that's contained by a political line.

I have a friend that I would go and work with, and I still go and work with in Michoacan, in Morelia, and she was always surprised that me as an American, wanted to focus on Mexican iconography.

And she's like, why are you focusing on Mexican iconography?

I said, Because I'm Mexican and I want to know that side.

And here I am going to be 65 years old and that curiosity has not ceased, thank God, because I just think it's a magnificent history.

Culture is the thing that, really connects us.

As humans, right?

And it's the one thing that we're able to produce.

Without really thinking about it.

And so even within families, a union, a family can have their own culture.

Our neighborhood could have its culture.

A larger community can have a culture.

There can be several cultures.

All intertwining.

And interacting with each other.

Art is an expression of cultural identity.

And by having this, exhibit, it's only going to allow that growth within ourselves, within the artist, within the students.

And I think it's also important for.

Students overall throughout our five colleges in our system.

To.

Understand the global impact.

We live in a global economy.

San Antonio is unique because it is by cultural, by nature, because of a shared history.

But there are other countries and other communities that have had an impact also on San Antonio.

And students are.

Going to live in a global society.

So to understand their lived.

Experience in what.

Where they come from is really critical.

But to also appreciate other cultures is even more significant.

The first people made food, they made the is thousands and thousands of years ago.

So what's going to be continue to happen is that this culinary, cultural, culinary aspect, fusion is is continually happening in the United States.

My mom is from Fort Stockton, from West Texas.

Her first language was Spanish, and, was very much raised in the whole food culture.

And my dad is from Louisiana, from close to New Orleans.

And so he comes from a very different but also equally strong food culture.

And I was born and raised and spent.

I have spent my life in San Antonio.

I love San Antonio so much, and it's such a specific food culture.

The birth of Tex-Mex.

What I gain from my culture is a fully rounded picture of who I am, because even though I grew up with rock and roll, even though I discovered rock and roll American rock n roll when I was five years old from my cousin who listened constantly.

I am not just a rock n roll child.

My mother listened to Augustin Lara.

My father left conjunto music, and so I'm also a product of Mexican art, Mexican music.

I know that my art is made more complex by knowing my own roots, because my roots are diverse, my Mexican roots are not simple roots.

My Mexican roots connect to Europe.

My Mexican roots connect to Spain.

So it's never simple to say I'm Mexican American because Mexico is so many cultures, America is so many cultures and none of them are simple.

I've got my grandfather.

Edinger was Jewish, and then I have my he married a food Washington Baptist in North Carolina, and my mother's family were all, Episcopalians and, and Methodist, you know.

So what am I?

Well, I am kind of what I want to be, but we're all mixed.

I know my father was born in Laredo, and my mother was born in blue Town in the RGV.

And if you follow that line, it just follows the river.

And like where my two parents were born, who are my, you know, where my, My center is.

Right.

So Mexico is part of me because it was right there.

It was always right there.

We've always been quarreling about these names.

My parents hated the name Chicano.

Chicano.

You know, the fact is, though, that this litany of names that we've taken on ourselves are testimonials to the shapeshifting nature of of who we are, that we are a protean force of of human becoming.

So we are manifesting new ways of being humans.

And we can call ourselves Mexican-American or Chicano or Indigenous people.

The reality is we're all human.

So it doesn't matter what they call themselves or what we call them, they all still experience the same thing.

Our governments and our political scenes are trying to say, no, you're completely different.

You have to consider yourself separated by frontiers, by walls, by.

And it's absolutely ridiculous.

And you're going to have to fight.

Well, they're going to have to fight very strongly because this is completely unnatural.

And I have to tell you, it give me a lot of hope in these new generations that can just catch the best, the best of the two countries without, without stop being who they are or who they were.

So yes, we are trying to find this very own identity and especially in United States.

I am absolutely an American, and I keep making that point to folks, that especially with places like the Smithsonian, my artifacts, my records, my papers are in the archives of American Art.

I don't know if there's a Latino section or a people of color section.

I don't know if that's where they are.

All I know is that my records are in the Archives of American Art.

You don't tell me where you have to be born to be a Chicano.

It's the community.

It's what you choose.

This is my history.

This is my culture.

This is my.

These are my languages, not Basque.

Spanish.

Castellano.

Miles.

Jockey.

Whatever.

It's what you.

Choose.

I am.

Not Mexican or Chicano or Latinx or.

She connects.

By DNA.

I am, an immigrant to this part of the country who has adopted the culture wholeheartedly, and who is an observer and a participant in the ongoing this blending of races into a new race, blending of cultures into a new culture.

So I paint in Texas and I paint in Mexico.

I'm a citizen of the U.S., a temporary resident of Mexico, and the bringing of all of those influence together is what influences me and compels me to be an artist.

My wife always says that America is unique because we don't have an enemy on the North, and we don't have an enemy on the south.

That's a rarity around the world.

In Russia and Ukraine, you have enemies right next to each other.

If you live in Israel, you have enemies next to your border.

Here we don't.

I hope that it will always remain that way, that the US and Mexico will continue to have the friendship that we've had through the years, and that we don't make artificial enemies out of our cells, because that's not what we are.

We are familia.

I love to paint familia.

I love to paint magenta because I love who we are.

We're a mixture of everything, you know?

We're all mestizos.

You know, we're in a moment now where we've got all these silos, and that's because nobody has invited people in to be a part of American certain areas.

And so these groups of people are really making a lot of noise, and they're doing so that their voice can be heard.

Now, the ideal result of that is that we go from these different silos having to do with gender, with race, with background, with religion.

And we have one silo, which includes all of us.

I mean, that's where we've got to go.

For.