Biography

Born and raised in San Antonio, Texas, Chicana painter Marta Sanchez has been inspired by traditional Mexican folkloric art expressions and contemporary social issues. Her works on paper are linocuts and monotypes, and her paintings are on aluminum. She uses these media to follow the social and cultural traditions of Mexican and Chicano/a Art and connect to present day concerns.

Marta has worked on a series of prints and paintings of the San Antonio train yards near her childhood home. Through these works she explores the role of trains in Mexican migration. A collaborative serigraph suite was created at Coronado Studio in Austin with Chicana poet and folklorist, Norma E. Cantú, and later published by Wings Press, titled Transcendental Train Yards.

Marta’s public art commissions can be seen at the Children’s Hospital in Montgomery, Pennsylvania and in Philadelphia at Simons Recreation Center.  A recent sculptural project is the steel installation “Reclaiming Gurney Street,” located in North Philadelphia, commissioned by the Hispanic Association of Contractors and Entrepreneurs. This project was part of widespread efforts to reclaim an opioid encampment for a community public rails and trails project. Additional murals and outdoor sculptures can be seen throughout the neighborhood as part of HACE’s public improvement projects.

Marta’s work is in the collections of The Philadelphia Museum of Art, The State Museum of Pennsylvania, The McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, Texas, The Fine Art Museum of St. Petersburg, Florida, The National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago, and the Woodmere Art Museum. Marta’s work is also in actor/director Cheech Marin’s extensive private collection of Chicano art now housed at The Cheech Museum in Riverside, California. 

Marta earned an MFA in painting from the Tyler School of Art, Temple University, and a BFA in painting from the University of Texas at Austin. She has taught at the Philadelphia Museum of Art and St. Joseph’s University, and she works at the Brandywine Workshop and Archive as Special Programs Coordinator. She is co-founder of the grassroots organization “Cascarones Por La Vida,” which assists families affected by HIV/AIDS. She has participated in many outreach programs in Philadelphia and throughout the Delaware Valley. Her work is currently archived at the Benson Latin American Collection at the University of Texas at Austin.