Give Now
UCLA College
  • About
    • The College
    • Leadership
      • Deans of the College
      • Faculty Executive Committee
      • College Development
      • Organization Chart
    • Divisions
      • Humanities
      • Life Sciences
      • Physical Sciences
      • Social Sciences
      • Division of Undergraduate Education
    • College Magazine
  • Academics
    • Departments and Programs
    • Institutes and Centers
    • Undergraduate Admission
  • News
    • News
    • Our Stories
  • Magazine
    • Archive
  • Events
  • Commencement
  • Search
  • Menu

News

Image of Judith Baca, UCLA professor emeritus of Chicana and Chicano and Central American studies and of world arts and cultures, at the unveiling of her mural “La Memoria de la Tierra: UCLA.” Image credit: Don Liebig/ASUCLAImage credit: Don Liebig/ASUCLA

New mural captures campus history and UCLA’s future

April 6, 2022/in Alumni & Friends, College News, Featured Stories /by Lucy Berbeo
Renowned artist and professor Judith Baca created the nearly 80-foot artwork
Image of Judith Baca, UCLA professor emeritus of Chicana and Chicano and Central American studies and of world arts and cultures, at the unveiling of her mural “La Memoria de la Tierra: UCLA.” Image credit: Don Liebig/ASUCLA

Judith Baca, UCLA professor emeritus of Chicana and Chicano and Central American studies and of world arts and cultures, at the unveiling of her mural “La Memoria de la Tierra: UCLA.” Image credit: Don Liebig/ASUCLA


By Mike Fricano | April 4, 2022

The ask was bold and befitting a Bruin like professor and artist Judith Baca: depict the history, present and future of UCLA and the land where it resides, in a mural.

In a special evening ceremony on Friday, April 1, several hundred people gathered to celebrate the culmination of nearly three years of work, as Baca unveiled “La Memoria de la Tierra: UCLA.” The nearly 80-foot mural is on the north side of Ackerman Union as part of the Wescom Student Terrace.

The mural, which translates into English as “The Memory of Earth: UCLA,” is made up of three 26-foot-long glass panels. The left panel portrays Westwood — long before UCLA — with a shimmering light-blue outline of Royce Hall where it sits today. In the center, a circle of dozens of people including faculty, alumni, civil rights and social justice leaders whom Baca called her heroes and said represent the diverse and lesser-known history of campus and the land.

The middle panel is built around a trinity of women: Toypurina, a Tongva woman who opposed the colonial rule by Spanish missionaries in California in the late 1700s; Angela Davis, civil rights activist and former UCLA faculty member, who was fired by the University of California Board of Regents for her association with communism; and Dolores Huerta, the iconic labor leader who worked with César Chávez on behalf of farmworkers.

Image of The central panel of “La Memoria de la Tierra: UCLA.”

The central panel of “La Memoria de la Tierra: UCLA.” Image credit: Don Liebig/ASUCLA


“We hope in the future that students will be able to sit here [in this courtyard] and be able to find out who these people are and what did they do,” said Baca, who retired last year, after years as a professor of Chicana and Chicano and Central American studies and a professor of world arts and cultures.

To situate the people in their proper historical context, the mural captures scenes from events such as the Black Lives Matter student demonstrations in 2020, protests against the Vietnam War in 1976 and also a depiction of the Manzanar War Relocation Center.

The future of the campus is on the right, with rhizomes (long, narrow channel-like roots) filled with the faces of other significant people — many of them faculty — who are doing the work to bring UCLA into the future and ensuring that UCLA remains in harmony with the land.

Baca told the audience that the third panel was designed “to take the knowledge that comes from the university and [spread] it widely.”

Image of Desirae Barragan, who is a registered member of the Gabrieleño Band of Mission Indians, Kizh Nation, at the unveiling of the mural “La Memoria de la Tierra: UCLA.”

Desirae Barragan, who is a registered member of the Gabrieleño Band of Mission Indians, Kizh Nation, at the unveiling of the mural “La Memoria de la Tierra: UCLA.” Barragan is a descendent of the person depicted in the center, Toypurina, a Tongva/Kizh woman who helped lead an uprising against Spanish missionaries. Image credit: Don Liebig/ASUCLA


The mural is the result of a partnership among the UCLA Centennial Committee; Associated Students UCLA, or ASUCLA, a nonprofit association that drives student services and activities throughout campus; and the Digital Mural Lab from the Social and Public Art Resource Center, or SPARC. It was in 1976 that Baca and two other artists founded SPARC, a Venice-based arts center that creates, preserves and hosts programs about community-based public artwork. The mural was created with financial support from Wescom Credit Union.

This article originally appeared in the UCLA Newsroom. For more news and updates from the UCLA College, visit college.ucla.edu/news.

Tags: Ackerman Union, Angela Davis, art, Arts and Culture, Dolores Huerta, Judith Baca, Judy Baca, La Memoria de la Tierra: UCLA, mural, SPARC, Toypurina
Share this entry
  • Share on Facebook
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Linkedin
  • Share by Mail
https://www.college.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/JudyBacaatmuralunveiling-363.jpg 237 363 Lucy Berbeo https://www.college.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Uxd_Blk_College-e1557344896161.png Lucy Berbeo2022-04-06 16:01:062022-04-06 16:04:14New mural captures campus history and UCLA’s future

Recent Stories

  • #BlackHistoryMonth: Supporting VIP Scholars
    Black History Month - Supporting VIP Scholars
  • Dominic Thomas wins international Gutenberg Research Chair honor
    Dominic Thomas, UCLA’s Madeleine L. Letessier Professor of French and Francophone Studies | UCLA
  • Sarah Haley receives Marguerite Casey Foundation Freedom Scholars Award
    Sarah Haley
  • Sustainable LA Grand Challenge receives $543,000 commitment for student programming, equitable clean water research
    Image Source: Sustainable LA Grand Challenge Undergraduate Research Scholars Program
  • Sustainable LA Grand Challenge receives $543,000 commitment for clean water research
    Water glass on a table
  • New UCLA center promotes reproductive science and sexual health
    Picture of a hand gently holding a baby’s fingers.
  • UCLA’s Dominic Thomas wins international Gutenberg Research Chair honor
    Dominic Thomas
  • Leading the Japan-America Innovators of Medicine
    Kanon Mori, wearing a nametag, speaks into a microphone
  • UCLA collaboration fosters mathematical brilliance of Latino and Black middle school students
  • Leading the College: A conversation with new senior dean Miguel García-Garibay
    Miguel García-Garibay in the Royce Hall portico

Categories

  • Alumni & Friends
  • Awards & Honors
  • Box 1
  • Box 2
  • Box 3
  • Box 4
  • Box 5
  • Box 6
  • Campus & Community
  • College Magazine
  • College News
  • College Newsletter
  • Commencement
  • Diversity, Equity & Inclusion
  • Events
  • Faculty
  • Featured Stories
  • Giving
  • Humanities
  • Life Sciences
  • Main Story – Homepage
  • Our Stories
  • Physical Sciences
  • Research
  • Social Sciences
  • Students
  • Sustainability
  • Undergraduate Education

1309 Murphy Hall
Box 951413
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1413

(t) (310) 206-1953
(f) (310) 267-2343

UCLA College

  • About
  • News
  • Magazine
  • Commencement
  • Giving
  • Contact

Related Sites

  • Equity, Diversity & Inclusion
  • Corporate & Foundation Relations
  • Centennial Campaign
  • Senior Survey
  • Impact of Philanthropy

Connect

  • Alumni
  • Prospective Students
  • Current Students
  • Parents & Families
  • Faculty
  • Staff

Information

  • Careers
  • Directory
  • Academic Calendar
  • UCLA Newsroom
  • Media & Journalists
  • Parking and Transportation
  • Maps & Directions
  • Emergency
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Linkedin
  • Instagram
  • Youtube
© Copyright 2023 UCLA - Login
Terms of Use Accessibility
UCLA researchers discover source of super-fast ‘electron rain’ Image of electrons in a Van Allen radiation belt (blue) encountering whistler waves (purple) and being sent raining toward the north pole (red). THEMIS satellites are seen near the radiation belt, while UCLA’s ELFIN hovers above Earth.Image source: Zhang, et al., Nature Communications, 2022 Image of Richard and Linda TurcoCourtesy of the Turcos UCLA Institute of the Environment and Sustainability receives $1.5 million pledge...
Scroll to top