(Tom) This week on Arizona Illustrated Celebrating the enduring legacy of Tucson photographer Louis Carlos Bernal.

(Elizabeth) I want the photo world to understand here's a very important photographer that has not had nearly the recongnition that he deserves.

(Tom) A Cochise County refuge for adults with developmental disabilities.

(Della) Speaking for my son, he can step out of his door here and be safe and walk around where he couldn't do that in the city.

(Tom) And meet some creative Tucsonans, who believe that a community is as good as its art.

(Jeff) Motivation is to make sculpture more pervasive.

(Tom) Hello and welcome to Arizona Illustrated.

I'm Tom McNamara.

And today we're joining you from the Center for Creative Photography right here on the University of Arizona campus.

Now this museum opened in 1975 and is considered one of the leading academic centers for the study of the history of photography in the world.

Their archives house over 270 collections of some of the biggest names in photography.

Such as Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, Gary Winogrand, and Lola Álvarez Bravo.

They also contain the collection of Arizona photographer Louis Carlos Bernal.

He was born in Douglas grew up in Phoenix and ultimately ended up on the faculty of Pima Community College in Tucson.

Now Bernal's intimate photography of Chicano culture was lesser known on an international level, but that is starting to change.

A recent monograph of his work was published by Aperture and a major retrospective is scheduled for right here at the CCP this September.

Recognition that aims to elevate his work to it's rightful place in the history of American photography.

[ PROJECTOR CLICKS ] ♪ SOMBER GUITAR (Elizabeth) Louis Carlos Bernal has long been recognized as a very important Chicano photographer.

[ PROJECTOR CLICKS ] [ PROJECTOR CLICKS ] He wanted to be seen as an artist, you know, not as a photojournalist or a documentary photographer, and he was always pushing himself.

You know, even though in a way the photographs are somewhat simple, I think because of their directness, there's a great intentionality behind each photograph [ PROJECTOR CLICKS ] Bernal was born in Douglas, Arizona.

He was born right on the border you know, in a pretty poor family.

His father worked in the mining industry.

His mother was a maid, and when he was a kid, they moved to Phoenix where there would be better educational opportunities.

But he remembers the overt racism against Mexican-Americans in those days.

But ever since he was a young teenager, he was also interested in photography.

And over time, he finally decided that what he wanted to do was to become a photographer.

And photography was one of the ways, a chief way, that he realized that he could express himself.

(Bernal) The label I use to describe myself is Chicano, the reason I use the Chicano label is because to me it represents an individual who is actively involved in a-- a political effort to change the society that I live in.

And also I feel that I'm actively involved in the Chicano community, and I'm very interested in trying to give to the Chicano community some of the benefits that I've had of my education in my-- (Elizabeth) This was coming around the same time as the Civil Rights Movement, which was both an African-American and a-- Chicano-Latino movement.

But over time, he decided that what he really wanted to do was devote his photographic work to exploring what it meant to be Chicano.

♪ SOMBER TRUMPET ♪ In many cases, the big magazines, the big newspapers, they were assigning-- white photographers to come and make those photographs.

So they were outsiders coming in.

Bernal presents a very different model He's coming from the community, making pictures of that community, and wanting to reflect to the community themselves, while at the same time acting as a bridge, he wanted to tell the world at large, America at large- this is also America.

♪ TRIUMPHANT GUITAR AND TRUMPET ♪ He is photographing people who have such long roots in Tucson and southern Arizona.

I think what's important to see is this kind of panorama, you know, young people, old people.

You know, generally, people are very modest means.

And of course, this region was Mexico.

And these people had land, you know- ranchos that it's so intertwined in their identity and their heritage.

And so, you know, I think he's also saying, you know, we lay claim to this land when he has pictures of people in the barrios or people out in the countryside.

You know, the land is very important to Mexican-American people.

(Bernal) Here you are.

It's 1980, this thing.

This is your decade, man.

And you've got to reach out, and you've got to grab it now.

And I think that in lots of areas, I don't think that we are as prepared as I wish we were.

(Elizabeth) He wanted the world at large, as well as the community he was photographing, to see the resilience, the grace.

And he often talked about the spirituality.

He saw these photographs as a means of conveying the really profound spiritual nature of Chicano people.

He's photographing Catholics who, you know, had these amazing shrines.

You know, he has pictures of the Virgin Mary and crucifixes in many, many saints, you know, in their bedrooms, in their living rooms.

And so he's documenting a level of religiosity that is much more rare today.

He's quite beloved in Tucson.

He taught for many years at Pima College and has a number of students that revered him.

He was well-known in photography and cultural circles.

(David) Pima has never dedicated a space to an individual.

And I think the reason they did was because of the nature of his demise.

October of 1989, he was literally riding his bicycle out here by Tumamoc Hill and up the hill to come to West Campus, when he was accidentally grazed.

And he hit his head on a stone, and then was in a coma for four years.

(Guy Atchley) After spending the last four years in a coma, a world-renowned Tucson photographer has died.

He died in 1993 on his 52nd birthday.

It was my idea to put up an exhibition of Lou's work that had never been shown before.

Lou originally made the prints for the book, "Images and Conversations."

And there's 39 images that we have.

And I think the exhibition proves he really had a vision to communicate about the Mexican-American history.

(Becky) You know what size the prints are of the black and white ones that we have, so that gives us some reference for the prints.

(Elizabeth) Over the course of a few years, the family donated his archives to the Center for Creative Photography knowing that it would be an ideal home.

You know, here his work is amongst many of the great photographers of the United States.

And so I think the goal had always been to do a major retrospective exhibition.

But when a big collection like that comes into an archive, there's a lot of work that needs to be done.

I've been visiting the Center for Creative Photography for the last couple of years.

So I've been selecting photographs for the exhibition.

I've been researching his work.

And during this latest visit, I've been going through the entirety of the collection.

with the Center's curator.

(Becky) We're looking at more pinks than we are tans, so- (Elizabeth) I've spent hours and hours learning about him and looking at photographs of him.

I feel like I know him, you know, and I feel like he's even helped through this process.

What I'm lucky is to know people who knew him intimately.

(David) Lou was very charismatic.

You know, I was in graduate school when I first met him.

He's also very opinionated, you know, about what should be done and what shouldn't be done, you know, which is-- I think, rewarding in the long run because he had a vision.

♪ NOSTALGIC GUITAR (Elizabeth) It's so interesting because If you look at his very early work, he's working with different kind of photographic processes, and he's searching.

But at a certain point in time, he's wandering around the Barrios in Tucson and he's coming across these, you know, these beautiful old homes.

And he's beginning to think about this form of photography that would be truly his own.

♪ NOSTALGIC GUITAR ♪ So that gave him confidence to continue with that work.

That was the kind of thing that could really keep him occupied for the rest of his life.

And he said this over and over again that people trusted me.

(David) Not just living rooms.

He went actually into the bedrooms and photographed.

So, you know, to build that trust, I think that is a gift.

You know, not all photographers have that.

And Lou did.

♪ MARIACHI MUSIC ♪ (Elizabeth) One by one, he's constructing this, kind of this amazing portrait of the Chicano community.

And then at a certain point, he gets a grant from MALDEF, the Mexican American Legal Defense Fund.

Interestingly, I think he was the only Chicano who was invited and he felt a great sense of responsibility because he knew he was photographing his own community.

That commission gave him the funds to begin to travel.

And, you know, he really wanted- his goal was very ambitious to create this very large portrait of Chicanos throughout the Southwest.

(David) He was also the first Hispanic to photograph the 1984 LA Olympics.

He didn't go for the limelight.

He went to the vendors and photographed the vendors.

They're all in color.

Quite beautiful.

You know, his legacy is one that will be with us because he is of us.

(Elizabeth) I want the photo world to understand, here's a very important photographer that has not had nearly the recognition that he deserves.

And you know, when there are major books on the history of American photography or major exhibitions, I mean, he should be there as a central figure.

And so I feel just so privileged and also really kind of confident that we're going to be able to portray a very vivid picture of who he was through his work.

♪ MUSIC FADES ♪ (Tom) Louis's work is so impressive and such a great representation of the culture of our region.

You know, it's hard to imagine what he could have accomplished had his life not tragically been cut short.

But we are lucky to have the work he did leave behind, and several events this September will be celebrating him, including Louis Carlos Bernal Retrospectiva, which will open September 14th right here at the CCP, and then honoring Bernal, which will open September 11th at the Bernal Gallery on Pima Community College West Campus.

Be sure to check out this story on our website for dates to lectures and even more programming about this important Arizona photographer.

While there are resources for children with developmental disabilities, many of those programs end when the kids turn 18.

Well, next we take you to Cochise County in a place called Echoing Hope Ranch that's providing a place to call home and much-needed services for adults who are dealing with intellectual challenges.

♪ ACOUSTIC GUITAR STRINGS (Della) Echoing Hope came about as a result of wanting to be able to provide a future for a lot of people who wouldn't necessarily have one.

(Chanse) Yeah, we like to say that Echoing Hope Ranch exists because children with autism grow up.

And what happens is past the age of 17, once they get out of high school, that government tap kind of turns off and the services kind of end and then it's on the family for the most part (Della) My own son lives here and when he was entering high school it occurred to me that I had no idea what was going to happen after that.

So I went on the lookout for something, some resources, something to provide and there's none.

(Chance) Some of our most important programs are our day program where individuals come from all over the county, we provide transportation where they'll come to the ranch and they'll receive services like expressive therapies, art expression, yoga and mindfulness.

They'll do their speech therapy and they'll learn basic skills that they need to improve to become more employable and more inclusive and independent in their lives.

And we're agricultural based so we always like to make sure that we keep an agricultural flavor on everything we do.

We have about 17 individuals who are employed here on the ranch, some of them actually work here on the ranch and just can walk right out to their job.

So what we kind of focus on is getting these folks the skills that they need to either transition into employment in the community or if they want they can stay here as well.

And for folks who ranch work isn't the biggest thing for them, we're starting to find opportunities out in the community that better meet their needs.

♪ MUSIC ENDS - I usually work at the building stuff at the shop and I also do... and I also do... ground maintenance and everything.

We feed the animals, we rake the pens, pick up the stuff in the pens and then at 10 o'clock which is about a half an hour we take a break.

(Daniel) We built this ourselves modeled after a gentleman in Australia.

It's aquaponics, it's raised with fish so all the fish water gets pumped up to the top here and it gets sprayed down through the top of the tubes and it all trickles down into these pods here.

The plants get all the nutrients they need from the fish water.

They do a lot of the cleaning aspects of it and the planting is a huge skill building task that they do because a lot of the seeds are very small so it's very intuitive to their skill building.

We have a wood working program and as well we have an automotive program.

We'll do typical oil changes like light maintenance on vehicles, checking the fluids and also woodworking.

We're working on building birdhouses as well as custom made tables.

- We grow a lot of greens but we also kind of grow what is in demand in the region.

So we have our farm to school folks, they kind of choose what they want to be grown each year.

We see a lot of collard greens, we've got our kale which is really big around here and some spring greens and lettuce.

This is kind of what we put together in what we call a spice bag and we sell at the farmer's martket They harvest it twice a week and bag it up, weigh it and then take it out to the farmer's market and to the schools.

(Elizabeth) The farm to school program is a chance for us to bring whole fresh ingredients to our students to create a nutritious meal that inspires kids to have healthier lifestyles.

It came through working with the U of A cooperation.

I wanted to bring in local produce and they connected me to Echoing Hope Ranch who wanted to have some of their working programs incorporated into the community.

We take what they grow and we incorporate it into our menus.

We've done Swiss chard, mustard greens, collard greens, spinach.

One of our first recipes was our tomato eggplant bake.

We've got the fresh tomatoes and the fresh eggplant from Echoing Hope and the kids loved it.

They said it smells like Thanksgiving.

They not only provide the produce but we take field trips out there to the farm so the kids can really see where the produce comes from.

They can talk to Echoing Hope staff and the workers there and everything that it took and the hard work that it goes into growing what's on their plate.

- We have had some people say that we shouldn't have a lot of our participants out here where it seems isolated but autism is such an enormous spectrum of abilities and challenges and personalities that we, like I was talking about before, we really have to go by their unique personalities.

Speaking for my son, he can step out of his door here and be safe and walk around where he couldn't do that in the city.

He's non-verbal and he would have some challenges in how to stay safe and how to trust who he should trust.

So he's much safer here.

He's happy here.

But the main reason for it was that we're all going to die.

And that sounds grim but when I die I don't want my son's life to crumble.

♪ UPLIFTING MUSIC ♪ (Tom) Sculpture Tucson is on a mission to spread the love of the art form.

They wanna be sure that everyone appreciates the beauty of sculpture and the craftspeople who create it.

And let's not forget the Sculpture Festival they put on every year.

Sculpture Tucson believes a community is as good as it's art.

♪ UPBEAT BASS MUSIC (Hector) There's very little opportunity for sculptors and Sculpture Tucson actively finds, makes, develops programming and opportunities for us to make a living.

♪ UPBEAT BASS MUSIC (Eden) I think they're very important.

Without Sculpture Tucson and other organizations like this, I wouldn't have a resource to display my art.

♪ UPBEAT BASS MUSIC (Sabrina) I think it's really cool to finally see my work, like being seen more professional and being at places like Sculpture Tucson.

UPBEAT MUSIC (Michael) It's wonderful to have this quality of work and to be able to get all these sculptures together and it's not a crafty fair and it really highlights sculpture as a medium.

♪ JAZZY PIANO MUSIC (John) It attracts artists from literally all over the country and it's a very high end thing and so it also attracts people that are serious about art.

(Gideon) Coming to the show, talking and watching people look at the piece and look in their eyes go boom.

♪ SLOW GUITAR MUSIC It infills me, it inspires me to do more.

♪ SLOW GUITAR MUSIC (Barbara) Sculpture Tucson was formed by Steve Kimball, Jeff Tyman and myself, Barbara Grygutis.

(Jeff) We love sculpture, it's what we do and we're good at getting sculpture into the public, which we all felt was a contribution that we could make to Tucson and to our community.

It's really a love letter to Tucson.

(Barbara) The three of us are sculptors and we love the idea that sculpture should not be tucked away somewhere where in private lots.

Three-dimensional art is much harder to show in galleries and it needs to be outdoors and monumental.

I've been involved in creating monumental sculptures for a very long time and I wanted to create a space for other artists to show their work.

♪ UPBEAT JAZZY MUSIC (Pamela) I was just very interested in working with material that could withstand the Arizona elements, you know the sun, the wind, the rain and the heat.

Since we don't use a lot of lawn and grasses here in Tucson, I thought I would make something that people could adorn their homes with.

[ SCULPTURE DINGS ] (Joshua) I'm a master goldsmith and eventually evolved into sculpture that's all handmade and fabricated in my studio.

[ DINGS ] I like visually communicating stories that talk about relationships, love, family and ritual.

I've been in art for a long time and actually did nightclub theming and remodels migrating towards metal fabrication and that evolved into me being a metal sculptor.

(Jeff) Sculpture is the language that we express ourselves in best.

We see things in a different way and we're showing that because we have to.

That's the reason because for a long time and then finally started (Gideon) My dad is one of the first generation stone sculptor in Zimbabwe and I wanted to be like my dad and my dad taught me what I live for.

Every day I wake up and I like to be finding what's in the stone and share with the world.

♪ UPLIFTING MUSIC These are all one of a kind, hand carved stone sculptures.

♪ UPLIFTING MUSIC (Michael) I mostly became a sculptor because I liked the job description and the attire.

What I try to accomplish with my sculpture is trying to capture natural movement and the natural beauty of the materials.

(Mark) I was an engineer and my wife encouraged me to go back to art school, so I went back to art school.

And then once I retired, I started playing around with making sculptures.

All these materials are found in junkyards and thrift stores.

Everything is a found object.

Even the neon comes from a local, the Ignite Sign Museum here in town.

(Barbara) Why sculpture out in the environment?

Tucson has a naturally beautiful environment.

The built environment is less beautiful.

The creation of sculpture and placement in public spaces can add interest and say something about who we are as people who inhabit the planet.

(Hector) We're all emanating these energies out in the world.

I'm this central source of energy that emanates these objects from, [ SIGHS ] my soul.

Ultimately at the end, the biggest sculpture is salvation and sculpture has always been that for me.

(Sabrina) Two sculptures here.

One of them is "Head in the Clouds" and that is the big cloud that is hanging.

The concept is just basically about daydreaming.

The name of my second sculpture is "Everything in Between."

I took inspiration from life and kind of connecting parallels of like highs and lows that we have in life.

I've been really trying to integrate modern techniques with traditional sculpture.

I use a lot of really high-tech equipment that people didn't have access to even 10 years ago.

I've been learning programming with sculpture to make interactive, moving, creative machinery.

♪ INSTRUMENTAL MARIMBA (Joseph) Sculpture Tucson really provided an amazing opportunity for my students.

Usually undergrads, it's very hard for them to get exhibitions at all.

And this is the kind of thing that really gives them the real world experience of just the logistics of putting a good show together that's professional and looks tight.

♪ INSTRUMENTAL MARIMBA (Jeff) So this is a secret, okay?

But what our real mission is, is to save the world.

That's what we're trying to do.

By showing our neighbors and our community and whoever happens to pass by just a little bit of joy.

♪ MARIMBA MUSIC [ WHIMSICAL CHIMES ] (Tom) Thank you for joining us here on Arizona Illustrated.

Be sure to check out the Center for Creative Photography's new exhibit come September.

I'm Tom McNamara and we'll see you again next week.