Chicano Park Museum exhibit spotlights lowrider bikes and culture

Chrome gleamed, candy-colored paint shined and classic Spanish songs filled the Chicano Park Museum and Cultural Center on Saturday, Sept. 12.

The museum opened “Chrome and Candy Dreams: A Rite of Passage,” an exhibition celebrating lowrider bikes as an art form and a source of mentorship for generations of young people.

Bikes filled the museum’s main gallery alongside artwork, posters and archival photographs documenting more than 40 years of lowrider culture. DJs performed during the reception, while a mariachi band welcomed visitors.

Curators Norman Paraiso, Juan “Wicho” Flores and Ariana Arroyo said the bikes represent more than transportation or polished showpieces.

“Some people might just see a bike that’s prettied out, but reality is that it’s a lot of sweat, tears, hard work, dedication, determination and, most importantly, community behind it,” Flores said.

Flores said young builders rarely complete the process alone. Family members, artists, mechanics and mentors contribute ideas and teach the skills needed to turn an ordinary bicycle into a personalized work of art.

“It’s a true community build when you build a lowrider bike,” he said.

One featured bike belongs to Flores’ daughter, Maya Itzel Flores, a senior at Logan Memorial Educational Campus and a member of Viejitos Bike Club San Diego.

Her red-and-gold bicycle, decorated with roses, was inspired by “Can I Call You Rose?” by San Diego soul group Thee Sacred Souls.

The exhibition includes bikes from clubs across the San Diego-Tijuana region, including Oldies Car Club, United Lowrider Coalition, Groupe, Majestics, Amigos San Diego, Members Only Car Club, Aztlan, Viejitos and the Black Lowriders Association.

Paraiso said the curators contacted longtime clubs because they wanted the exhibition to trace the culture’s roots and recognize those who helped establish it. Some bikes were built by young people and later passed down to their children.

That progression is central to the exhibition’s subtitle, “A Rite of Passage.”

He described a path that begins with getting and building a bicycle before potentially moving into the world of lowrider cars.

“A rite of passage is kind of like when you’re crossing a bridge, going from an adolescent to a teenager, or a teenager to an adult,” he said.

Paraiso was about 12 when a car with a metal-flake paint job introduced him to lowrider culture. Seeing it made him want to build something similar one day.

Now, he hopes the exhibition will give young visitors the same inspiration.

“We’re hoping that they get inspired, that they see that there are some outlets,” Paraiso said. “We are hoping that it creates some unity and that they see that there is hope, that there is a different path that they can take.”

He said a shared interest in lowrider bikes can connect young people from different neighborhoods.

“You no longer look at that kid as like, ‘Oh, that kid’s from the other side of town,’” Paraiso said. “You look at it as like, ‘Oh, that guy does the same thing I do. He has the same goals. He has the same ideas.’”

The exhibition features work by Chata, Irene Shion, Jacqueline Valenzuela, Kito, Low N Slow Trading Cards, The Perez Bros, Valerie Vargas and William Aldana.

Dyse One contributed an installation recreating a San Diego sidewalk scene with a street sign, phone booth, graffiti-covered bench and lowrider bikes. Archival photography came from the Black Lowrider Association, David Aguilar, Impact Images and Rene Acevedo Jr.

Arroyo said bringing the bikes into a museum does not elevate them above outdoor shows or the neighborhood spaces where the culture thrives. Instead, it places a community art form alongside other work typically shown in galleries.

“We’re just bringing what we consider high-level, high-skilled art — and this is from our neighborhoods, from our communities — into museum spaces, into gallery spaces,” Arroyo said.

She said the museum also has a responsibility to preserve local history while allowing community members to tell their own stories.

The opening reception included raffles for a bicycle and shirts, along with posters featuring lowrider artwork and San Diego’s 619 area code.

Although each finished bike reflects an individual vision, Flores said it also carries the contributions of the people who helped create it.

“When people say it takes a village,” he said, “I like to say it takes a barrio.”

Chrome and Candy Dreams: A Rite of Passage will remain on display through December at the Chicano Park Museum and Cultural Center, 1960 National Ave. Admission is free. More information is available at chicanoparkmuseum.org.