• My teaching at Trinity University focuses on Latin American art and public art. I am a scholar of transpacific art, and I research the artistic exchanges between Latin America and East Asia after WWII via international leftist networks. My current book project examines Chilean artist José Venturelli’s murals and prints in Chile, China, Cuba, East Germany, and Switzerland. 

    Before joining Trinity University in Fall 2025, I taught at Northwestern State University of Louisiana, the University of Pittsburgh, Wuhan University, the Tecnológico de Monterrey, and was a visiting scholar at Tulane University’s Stone Center for Latin American Studies. I have curatorial experience from the MoMA in New York, and the Museo de Bellas Artes de Bilbao, Spain.

    I was born and raised in Chihuahua, Mexico, in a cultural region not too different from San Antonio. After leaving twenty years ago to pursue studies abroad, I am happy to be back in this part of the world.

    • Ph.D., History of Art and Architecture, University of Pittsburgh.
    • M.A., History of Art and Architecture, University of Pittsburgh.
    • M.A., Art theory, China Academy of Art.
    • M.A., History of Contemporary Art and Visual Culture, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, and Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía.
    • B.A., Humanities, Universidad de Navarra (first in class).

    “Doves and Machetes: Rina Lazo's Portable Mural Venceremos (1959) in Guatemala, North Korea, and Beyond,” Art History 45, 5, November 2022, 1038-1057. Online Recipient of the 2024 Association for Latin American Art Article Award. 

    拉佐，布斯托斯方谈”郑胜天《风起扶桑：二十世纪墨西哥与中国的艺术对话》湖南美术馆出版社，2024，190-199.  (“Interview with Rina Lazo and Arturo García Bustos,” in Zheng Shengtian, Winds of Fusang: 20th Century Artistic Exchanges between China and Mexico, Hunan Museum Publishing House, 2024, 190-199)

    “La llegada de 1956: el modernismo socialista y los intercambios artísticos de China y México en la década de 1950,” América Latina y el Caribe y China: Historia, cultura y aprendizaje del chino 2019, ed. Liljana Arsovska. Mexico City: Unión de Universidades de América Latina y el Caribe, 2019, 231-249. Online 

    Translations in Zheng Shengtian, Winds of Fusang: 20th Century Artistic Exchanges between China and Mexico, Hunan Museum Publishing House, 2024:

    • “周总理评墨西哥绘画”(Premier Zhou Enlai’s comments on Mexican paintings”)  262-263.
    • 西盖罗斯1956年访华时发回国的信件(Siqueiros’s letters from his 1956 visit to China) 265-266.
    • 西盖罗斯1956年洲际旅行记 (Siqueiros’ intercontinental travel notes) 267-271.
    • 万徒勒里致西盖罗斯的信 (Letter from Venturelli to Siqueiros) 272-273.

    • Art History II: Renaissance to Modern Art
    • Art and Architecture of Latin Americas Since the 16TH Century
    • Public Art Across the Border
    • People’s Art in San Antonio and Beyond