Super Bowl LIX is around the corner. This year, it’ll be at Caesars Superdome in New Orleans and pit the Kansas City Chiefs against the Philadelphia Eagles. But, two years ago around this time, we here in Phoenix were the ones preparing for the spotlight to be on our city for the big game.
The spotlight also ended up landing on one local painter, selected to be that year’s Super Bowl artist — and she was the first Indigenous one.
Lucinda Yrene Hinojos goes by the name La Morena and her story struck a chord with the country as her brightly colored, Arizona-inspired Super Bowl design was unveiled. But, as she told The Show when she came into our studios nearly two years later, she also faced backlash for claiming that identity.
Full conversation
LUCINDA YRENE HINOJOS: I was just trying to make extra means for the kids and, you know, sports is expensive and especially if you're doing it on your own.
GILGER: Hinojos was a single mother of three who started selling her art as kind of a side hustle to pay for her kids to play Pop Warner football around the same time she had left her children's father and was diagnosed with depression.
HINOJOS: The therapist that I had went to go see has suggested that either she can put me on medication or I can get into meditation, which back then I was like, I don't, what is that, you know. Or, she asked me what do I like to do or what are things that I like to do for myself? And I was like, I don't know. I was like, I just can't take care of my kids, you know, I really didn't have an answer. And I said, you know what, well, I do like art, you know, something I've always loved to do since a kid, but really didn't think much of it. And so she suggested, why don't you tap back into that? And I was like, huh.
GILGER: So she got into the local art scene. She started hosting shows. A few years later, she jumped in to help a group of artists with a mural project about immigration downtown that was nearly shut down. She rallied the community together to keep it going.
HINOJOS: You know, artists invited me to paint. I was like, I don't know, I don't do this. I don't know what I'm doing, but encouraged me to pick up the can and then get to the wall. And I won't talk about the piece because it was horrible, but at least I did it.
GILGER: It sounds like that was an important moment for you.
HINOJOS: Yeah it was. It totally planted the seed from everything. It politically awakened me, culturally awakened me, spiritually awakened me, and even changed my perspective on the topic, you know. I wasn't paying attention to politics and I didn't know. I remember SB 1070 happened, and in 2010, and I remember being scared to be brown for the first time. And so that mural kind of did that for me. So I thought to myself, well, If that can do that for me, imagine the many more I can do it for. And that's why I started to paint.
GILGER: She picked it up fast. And not too long after her career opened up, the opportunities started coming and her popularity grew. The first mural she completed was on a wall that was 80 feet long and 25 feet tall.
HINOJOS: When I finished it, I remember posting it and thinking nothing of it, right? I woke up and my phone was just going off and I was like, what the heck is going on? And the mural was just being shared over and over and over, and it just started going viral and I was like, what the heck and I remember people saying, viva La Morena, viva la Chicana. I was like, what? I was like, what is going on?
GILGER: Well, so, let me ask you about that, right, about that connection that like very inherently obvious connection between your culture, your heritage, and your work. It sounds like you weren't even super aware of this until, until you started doing it, until people kind of told you that's what you were doing almost.
HINOJOS: Yeah, that's exactly, you got it right.
GILGER: That's fascinating.
HINOJOS: Yeah, that's exactly right. I was not, I was not raised in my culture. I didn't know who I was growing up at all. I was very Americanized, right? I had New Kids on The Block on my wall, you know.
GILGER: Me too.
HINOJOS: So I'm like, I can't, I now say I can't help how I was raised, you know. But when I started to paint these murals, something started to awaken. Things started talking to me. And my grandmother started recognizing things and opening up and sharing stories. I was like asking her, what happened? Why was there such a huge disconnect, you know, because my grandfather, my Yaqui grandfather told my grandmother before he passes, do not forget about your Yaqui roots, you know, but she kind of did, but I don't blame her, you know, I was like, what happened?
And she said that they were, she grew up in Golden Gate Barrio. At the time, there was hardly any Native, other native families, and there's a lot of racism going on from the other neighbors and the community members in that area. There was another family that was Pascua Yaqui. They, they too lived there, and my nana said that one time she was outside and they're making fun of her for being Native, and she went home and told my, my nana … and she said, just tell them you're Mexican so they can leave you alone. And that's what happened.
GILGER: So that's how you kind of lost it in your family?
HINOJOS: Kind of really started losing things. And I understand now, but at first I was really angry. I was really mad at my family like, well, how could you do this, you know, I didn't understand assimilation until you look at the history, right?
GILGER: So, art brought you back to that. It sounds like helped you discover it. But I mean, like, do you remember what that felt like? Did it feel like a reclaiming? Did it feel scary? Did it feel you were angry obviously a little bit?
HINOJOS: Yeah, I was angry at first, but when I started painting, it was a huge awakening and it started reconnecting me. And the more I painted, the more I learned. And the more my grandmother started opening up. And things started coming to me. I can't explain it, but I know for some you know, may not believe, but I'm very connected to my ancestors and my loved ones who've passed. I've seen things that I can't explain that I'm on the right path. I've learned so much about myself and who I am.
And, you know, it is, it is a hard place because I can never speak for all Native people. I can only speak for one of us and that's from me, my experience only. I'm considered a, I'm a descendant, right? I'm not knowledged about the tribes. And I also learned that like I have Apache in me, but I cannot claim those communities because I was not raised in those communities. I did not know that, so I got a hard lesson during the Super Bowl. I got called out. I got called out. I got called to “pretendian.” I get called a “descendian” from those who are acknowledged. And I didn't understand why and it hurt, but I was, then I had, I learned. I am reconnecting with my Pascua Yaqui tribe and community. I'm even learning the Yaqui language, which is awesome for me.
And so speaking with the tribe, I actually had a keynote in Tucson with them, and I let them know I am this, this, this, but I identify as Chicana, and they're like, why don't you identify with Yaqui? And I was like, ah.
GILGER: Well it's fraught, right? I mean, so that's really interesting. Let me pause you there and just ask you about that moment you mentioned at the Super Bowl, right, because this is probably what most people might know you from. This was a big moment in your career, a huge moment around the country, around the world. You're the first Indigenous artist to do the art for the Super Bowl. It was here in Phoenix. It was this really impactful piece where you used a lot of symbolism from your heritage from your culture. Talk a little bit more about that backlash. Did that feel like a slap in the face or did that feel like I understand?
HINOJOS: Well, when I did the Super Bowl, I had to be very careful. I had to sign an NDA. I was not able to reach out to like elders for any guidance or anything like that. So, I tried to be culturally relevant the best I could. I mixed both my Mexican American and my Native roots into this piece I did the best way I could, so I did get backlash for not including more of certain things, but I understand that people don't understand that you can't, you're, you're, you know, you're working with the NFL and we literally went back 22 times on this design.
So I did the best I could. And so people were like, why didn't you do this? But, but honestly, I got a small percentage of that. There was like 90% of love and support and tears from the community and from my Indigenous peers and from my, you know, Mexican and Mexicanos and the Chicanos, you know, I, I can't, it was just such a surreal moment. I still, it's going to be two years and I still can't believe it. But there was some hard lessons. I had some really hard lessons during that time and I've learned. I took steps back, I reflected and just moving forward, you know.
GILGER: But that's not an uncommon story, I bet, in kind of Indigenous communities, right? Like people who were not raised connected to those things and, and, you know, not really by any fault of their own.
HINOJOS: You’re right. It's not our fault for this disconnect, but I will never deny them. I will never deny my roots and my ancestors because they all walk with me and they're like literally in this room standing behind me.
GILGER: It's such an interesting journey to hear about. I wonder, like, do you think back ever to that person that you were right when you were in therapy and dealing with depression and feeling like you needed to get out of it somehow and you turned to art? Like, do you think that was foretold somehow? Do you think it was meant to be?
HINOJOS: I didn't see it then at all. I'm, I still trip out. I'm like, holy crap, because I was this little dark Morenita, you know, girl, quiet, shy, goofy. I'm so goofy and dorky. I can't help it. Oh my God. But back then I didn't see it. But now looking back, why not? I think a lot of my determination came from my mother's side, so I'm just, I'm super proud of myself.
I'm so proud of myself because I have been through some dark times and I, when I see those flashes and now I'm here. And I just want to keep going and I want to share my story with other women, with other Chicanos and Mexicanos and people of color in my Indigenous communities because like we don't have to be in this box. We can break out and be something great, and I've done that. Like I did Super Bowl, come on.
GILGER: Well, congratulations, we can't wait to see what is next.
