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Sigüenza (Herbert) Culture Clash Collection
URB.CC-HS
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Contributing Institution:
Special Collections & Archives
Title: Herbert Sigüenza Culture Clash Collection
Creator:
Sigüenza, Herbert
Identifier/Call Number: URB.CC-HS
Physical Description:
6.189 linear feet
Date (inclusive): 1984-2005
Abstract: A founding member of Culture Clash,
Herbert Sigüenza was born in San Francisco. Culture Clash was founded on Cinco de Mayo, 1984
at René Yañez's Galería de la Raza/ Studio 24 in San Francisco's Mission District by Richard
Montoya, Ricardo Salinas, Herbert Sigüenza, and José Antonio Burciaga. Culture Clash's brand
of Chicano comedic theater has brought them to renowned venues including the Kennedy Center
in Washington, DC, the Lincoln Center in New York City, the Huntington in Boston, the
Goodman Theatre in Chicago, The Alley Theatre in Houston, Texas, the Seattle Repertory
Theatre in Seattle, and the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles.
Language of Material:
English, Spanish;
Castilian.
Herbert Sigüenza was born in San Francisco. His parents are from El Salvador, and the
family returned there to live when Sigüenza was nine years old. During that time El Salvador
fought the "Soccer War" with Honduras. A Civil War broke out in El Salvador one year after
Sigüenza left the country at age seventeen.
Returning to California, Siguenza attended the California College of Art and Crafts and
received a degree in art, printmaking, and silk-screening. From there he went to work at La
Raza Graphics Center in San Francisco, where he was the art director, leaving after ten
years. After working with graphic art to educate and organize people, Sigüenza spent the
next six years working with Teatro Gusto. This association with theater led him to co-found
Culture Clash.
Culture Clash was founded on Cinco de Mayo, 1984 at René Yañez's Galería de la Raza/
Studio 24 in San Francisco's Mission District by Richard Montoya, Ricardo Salinas, Herbert
Sigüenza, and José Antonio Burciaga. Sigüenza had trained as a visual artist, Montoya's
background was in spoken word poetry, and Salinas had performed as a break-dancer and
bilingual rapper. The group was originally called Comedy Fiesta and conceived of as a troupe
of six actors, comedians, and poets including Marga Gómez and Monica Palacios. This group
worked with Luis Valdez's El Teatro Campesino. The group eventually fragmented, and Culture
Clash was formed with four members Burciaga, Montoya, Salinas, and Sigüenza. Burciaga left
the group in 1988 and died in 1996.
Some of their best-known plays include
The Mission (1988),
A Bowl of Beings (1991), S
.O.S—Comedy
for These Urgent Times
(1992, written in response to the Los Angeles Riots),
Carpa Clash (1993),
Culture Clash
Unplugged
(1994),
Radio Mambo: Culture Clash Invades
Miami
(1994),
Bordertown (1998),
Nuyorican
Stories (1999), and
Mission Magic Mystery
Tour
(2001). Many of these pieces were site-specific commissioned works.
Bowl of Beings is particularly well-know as it was filmed for PBS'
Great Performances series in 1992. Culture Clash performed their adaptation of Aristophanes'
The Birds for South Coast Repertory Theater in San Diego, California and the Berkeley
Repertory Theater in Berkeley, California in 1998.
Culture Clash's first book,
Culture Clash: Life, Death, and
Revolutionary Comedy,
appeared in 1998. This publication includes scripts for many
of their plays. In 2001 they published
Culture Clash in
AmeriCCa,
a book that explores what it means to be an American through a series of
vignettes. The book was inspired by the show Culture Clash Coast to Coast, which premiered
at the Japanese Cultural Center in Los Angeles.
Through the efforts of comedian "Cheech" Marin, Culture Clash developed a show for Fox
Television, entitled Fox Television's "Culture Clash." The show ran from 1993 to 1995 with a
total of 30 episodes. The comedy sketch show featured guest appearances from Edward James
Olmos, Jimmy Smits, Maria Conchita Alonso, and Dolores Huerta.
Los Boys de CC have been featured together and separately in several feature films. All
three appeared in the 1992 film,
Encino Man as Loco, Enrique,
and Chuly. Sigüenza's film credits include
Star Maps (1997) and
Hero (1992). In 1992, Culture Clash wrote and co-produced the
award-winning short film,
Columbus on Trial.
The
Herbert Sigüenza Culture Clash Collection consists of
materials related to the professional and personal life of Herbert Sigüenza, including the
production, performances, and publicity of the Culture Clash theater troupe. The collection
has been organized into three series:
Plays (1987-2015),
Troupe (1983-2000), and
Personal
(1984-2003).
Series I,
Plays, consists of articles, brochures, flyers,
letters, magazines, mailings, photographs, playbills, posters, press releases, programs,
publicity, reviews, schedules, scripts, sketches, stage and costume drawings, stage notes,
and story boards. The materials are arranged alphabetically by the title of the play.
Series II,
Troupe, consists of materials that were created by
and for the Culture Clash Troupe that are not part of the previous series. Materials include
articles, business documents, calendars of events, letters, performance signup sheets,
magazines, photographs, and schedules of events and are arranged alphabetically.
Series III,
Personal, contains personal materials from
Sigüenza. The series is arranged alphabetically.
Series I: Plays, 1987-2015
Series II: Troupe, 1983-2000
Series III: Personal, 1984-2003
Digital reproductions of selected items in this collection are available electronically as
a part of the
Latina(o) Cultural Heritage Archives
project.
https://digital-library.csun.edu/
The collection is open for research use.
Copyright for unpublished materials authored or otherwise produced by the creator(s) of
this collection has not been transferred to California State University, Northridge.
Copyright status for other materials is unknown. Transmission or reproduction of materials
protected by U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.C.) beyond that allowed by fair use requires
the written permission of the copyright owners. Works not in the public domain cannot be
commercially exploited without permission of the copyright owners. Responsibility for any
use rests exclusively with the user.
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Herbert Sigüenza, 2003
For information about citing items in this collection consult the appropriate style manual,
or see the
Citing Archival Materials
guide.
Robert G. Marshall, Rebecca S. Graff; February 2004
Other Information:
This collection was processed in part under a U.S. Department of Education Title V
Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSI) Grant.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Documents
Photographs