Vincent Valdez: Just A Dream…, 2024

224-page, Hardcover
Text by Denise Markonish, Kristy Edmunds, Hesse McGraw, Evan Garza, Joyce Carol Oates, Patricia Restrepo
Published by X Artists Books, MASS MoCA and Contemporary Arts Museum Houston

Through his work across many media, Houston and Los Angeles-based artist Vincent Valdez bears witness to the world around him, chronicling an America at the margins. Vincent Valdez: Just a Dream… features work from over twenty years and writings addressing Valdez’s work through the lens of politics, history and humanity. Valdez’s approach to imaging his country, its people, politics, pride, and foibles includes boxing, lynchings of Mexican Americans, border walls, politics, greed, the Ku Klux Klan, and the failings and triumphs of American society. Vincent Valdez: Just a Dream… accompanies survey exhibitions of his work by the same name at the Contemporary Art Museum of Houston (CAMH) in 2024-5 and MASS MoCA in 2025-6. The bilingual (English/Spanish) publication features both full-color works and a gatefold for The Strangest Fruit as well as a sewn-in, slice-open, booklet of behind-the-scenes studio images that makes the volume absolutely your own.