LACMA × Snapchat: Monumental Perspectives

¡Vendedores, Presente! responds to L.A.’s shared history with street vendors. Ruben Ochoa draws from his family history—his mother pioneered a mobile tortilla delivery system in San Diego County—to pay homage to the critical role of street vendors in L.A.’s culture and economy. Referencing familiar forms of street vending, ¡Vendedores, Presente! serves as a multilingual resource for on-the-ground entrepreneurs and a call for advocacy. After a decade-long fight to legalize street vending in L.A., the pandemic has impacted its progress and potential growth, with many street vendors left more vulnerable than ever. ¡Vendedores, Presente! invites participants to learn more about the plight of street vendors and provides options to assist through non-profit organizations Community Power Collective (CPC) and Inclusive Action for the City. In conjunction with ¡Vendedores, Presente!, Ruben Ochoa has a limited fundraising print series that directly supports street vendors and their families. To learn more, visit ochoa.lacma.org.

This initiative uses augmented reality to explore monuments and murals, representation, and history. Monumental Perspectives brings together artists and technologists to create virtual monuments that explore just some of the histories of Los Angeles communities in an effort to highlight perspectives from across the region. In consultation with community leaders and historians, the first cohort of artists, Mercedes Dorame, I.R. Bach, Glenn Kaino, Ruben Ochoa, and Ada Pinkston, examine key moments, figures, and monumentality in the region’s past and present through augmented reality experiences.

Visitors can experience the augmented reality monuments at site-specific locations across Los Angeles including LACMA’s Wilshire Boulevard campus, MacArthur Park, Earvin “Magic” Johnson Park, and Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. The monuments can also be experienced by anyone around the world, wherever they are. Learn more about the project at lacma.org/monumental.