Jesús Manuel Mena Garza
Biography

Photo 1: Jesús Garza School Photographer, San José High School, San José, California, Circa 1968
Photo 2: Jesús Garza Selfie, Fort Worth, Texas, June 28, 2021
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At the bottom of this page, Garza has distilled and indexed his life.

Jesús Manuel Mena Garza
Biography
August 22, 2025
Jesús Manuel Mena Garza (b. 1952, San José, California) is a photographer, artist, and cultural organizer whose work reflects his migrant farmworker heritage and deep engagement with the political and artistic movements of the Chicano Civil Rights era. Beginning photography at the age of eleven, Garza has built a career that spans more than five decades, producing an archive that documents communities, activism, and cultural expression across the United States and Mexico.
Raised in a family of eight children, Garza’s early years were shaped by his parents’ labor in the fields of Santa Clara Valley, where they joined other Mexican and Chicano families working orchards that would later give way to Silicon Valley’s tech industry. Growing up in a working-class, racially diverse neighborhood during the 1960s, Garza witnessed the profound social and cultural transformations of California, experiences that deeply informed his artistic vision. His first camera, purchased at age eleven at the San José Flea Market, launched a lifelong commitment to photography.
Encouraged by teachers Prospero Anaya and Ron Root at San José High, Garza immersed himself in the darkroom and quickly developed as a photojournalist, serving on the school newspaper and yearbook staff. By the time he graduated in 1970, he had mastered technical processes and discovered his calling in documentary photography. That same year, he began working with the Chicano Film Institute in San José, where he documented Teatro Campesino, community housing struggles, and grassroots activism. Identifying as a Chicano Photographer, Garza embedded his work within the social movements of the time.
Throughout the 1970s, Garza balanced academic studies at San José State University with active involvement in progressive causes. He photographed anti-war demonstrations, participated in the United Farm Workers Support Committee, and served with the Community Alert Patrol to document police brutality. His work placed him in conversation with Chicano leaders such as César Chávez, Rodolfo “Corky” Gonzales, and José Angel Gutiérrez. During this period, he also broadened his practice through bilingual radio with La Cosa Nueva, leadership roles at El Centro Cultural de la Gente, and as resident photographer for Teatro de la Gente on its historic 1974 tour of Mexico for the Quinto Festival de los Teatros Chicanos.
Garza’s documentary images from this era—especially his Imágenes Xicano series—form a vital visual record of the Chicano Movement. His photographs have been widely published in books and scholarly works, including The Fight in the Fields, The Devil in Silicon Valley, and César Chávez and La Causa, and continue to serve as primary resources for researchers, educators, and cultural institutions.
Over the years, Garza has exhibited nationally and internationally, with shows at the Mission Cultural Center (San Francisco), the Smithsonian Latino Center (Washington, D.C.), UNAM Museo Universitario Arte Contemporáneo (Mexico City), and the Musée d’Aquitaine (Bordeaux, France), among others. His archive also includes more than 1,000 Kodachrome slides and black-and-white negatives from the Chicano theater movement and grassroots activism of the 1970s, portions of which are housed at the Martin Luther King Jr. Library at San José State University.
Beyond photography, Garza has worked extensively in radio, television, and media production, teaching at institutions such as the Academy of Art College in San Francisco and UC Riverside Extension. He has also directed community cultural centers, hosted radio and television programs, and produced exhibitions and publications that expand access to Chicano and Latino art and history.
Today, Garza continues to lecture, exhibit, and share his work across the country, offering both artistic and historical perspectives on Chicano identity, memory, and social justice. His lifelong practice embodies the belief that photography is not only an art form but also a tool for documentation, education, and empowerment.
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Parents: Eusebio Maldonado Garza (Agujita, Coahuila, Mexico) and Guadalupe Lopez Mena Garza (Crystal City, Texas, USA)
Brothers and Sisters: Carmen Garza Trujillo, Peter Garza (passed), Dolores Garza Rodriguez, John Garza, Lucio Garza, Eusebio Garza Jr., Me and David Garza
Schools: US Grant Elementary, Roosevelt Junior High, San José High, San Francisco Art Institute, San José State (BA Journalism 1978), and Academy of Art
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