YO NO HABLA | By Vicente Telles

YO NO HABLA | By Vicente Telles

Available in the following options:

• 20"x24" - Edition of 25
  • Includes 2" border
• 11"x14" - Edition of 50
  • Includes 1" border

• Presented on acid-free, archival German Etching paper, 310 GSM  by Hahnemühle
• Archival pigment inks
• Hand signed & numbered by artist
  

Vicente Telles is a contemporary artist from the South Valley of Albuquerque whose work centers on identity, cultural inheritance, and self-definition within the Nuevo Mexicano–Chicano–Latinx experience. His work has been shown in galleries and museums nationwide and was recently selected for the prestigious Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery.

This self-portrait uses the image of a piñata mask to explore the tension between cultural expectation and lived experience. A symbol of celebration becomes a metaphor for concealment—reflecting the artist’s experience as a Chicano who doesn’t speak Spanish but is deeply rooted in community, place, and tradition.

The word Vecinos (neighbors) on the shirt grounds the piece in the collective identity of the South Valley. The layered textures and symbolic imagery—like the bird carrying its own piñata—evoke generational shifts, cultural pressures, and the complex ways heritage is carried and reshaped.

Rather than define identity in fixed terms, Telles embraces its nuance, offering a portrait that is both deeply personal and widely resonant.