Courtesy photos

WHO: Vincent Valdez, 30

MEDIA: Primarily oils; also pastels, charcoal and mixed media

BEST KNOWN FOR: Portraying people and experiences in the South Side of San Antonio, where Valdez was born and raised. “To me the South Side is the collision of the old school and the new school,” he said. “It's such a traditional place in terms of the families and church, culture and customs, and the deeper in the South Side you get, things become sort of archaic. But at the same time the times change, and gentrification is coming fast. But it's a place that adapts rather than becoming extinct.”

Valdez often explores issues of identity and has used his younger brother as a model to depict a street thug, a boxer, a soldier and other “tragic masculine icons,” he said. His drawing “Yo Soy-ee Blaxican!” refers to the melding of African American and Latino cultures; it deals with “the loss of identity but a creation of a new identity,” Valdez said. “This young male in the streets identifies more with Tupac Shakur and the black culture, but he's still from the barrio and brown-skinned. That's the new world we're all living in.”

Recently, Valdez transferred his images of boxers to a different canvas — a limited-edition Nike boxing shoe.

BACKGROUND: Valdez began painting community murals when he was 10 with mentor Alex Rubio. After graduating from Burbank High School, Valdez studied illustration at Rhode Island School of Design. He moved to Los Angeles in 2005 when he was commissioned by musician Ry Cooder to create a narrative mural of the Chavez Ravine, a poor Mexican-American barrio demolished in 1959 to make way for Dodger Stadium, on a vintage Good Humor ice cream truck. He now splits his time between Los Angeles and San Antonio.

CHECK HIM OUT: Valdez and Rubio's two-man homage to their hometown, “San Anto: Pride of the Southside/En El Mero Hueso,” runs through March 23 at Museo Alameda. If you're in L.A., go catch a performance by Valdez's world music/rock band, Ollin, in which Valdez plays trumpet.

Jessica Belasco | 210SA Contributor