Contemporary Austin Unveils First Major Retrospective of Queer Chicanx Artist Teddy Sandoval

The Contemporary Austin has opened its doors to "Teddy Sandoval and the Butch Gardens School of Art," an expansive and overdue retrospective celebrating the life and work of artist Teddy Sandoval (1949–1995), whose influence on queer and Chicanx art circles in Los Angeles and beyond has long deserved broader recognition. This exhibition, on view through January 2026, offers audiences a rare opportunity to engage with the vibrant and subversive output of an artist who helped shape the visual language of LGBTQ+ and Chicanx communities during a pivotal era in American art .

At the heart of the exhibition is Sandoval’s playful engagement with identity, gender, and collectivity. Notably, the "Butch Gardens School of Art" was not a traditional institution but a fictional entity invented by Sandoval himself—an artistic persona he created to both satirize and subvert the exclusivity of the art world. Named after Butch Gardens, a popular gay bar in Los Angeles in the early 1970s, this “school” had only one member: Sandoval . Through this alter ego, Sandoval distributed his artworks, organized exhibitions, and created a sense of imagined community that resonated with queer and Chicanx audiences who often found themselves on the margins of mainstream culture .

Sandoval’s work spans a wide range of media, including ceramics, prints, drawings, paintings, mail art, and xerography. Central to his visual vocabulary is the recurring motif of a faceless man adorned with a Chevron mustache—a symbol that both obscures and reveals, inviting viewers to consider the complexities of masculinity and the ways in which queer individuals navigate visibility and erasure .

Sandoval was a central figure in Los Angeles’s vibrant queer and Chicanx art scenes, active in both U.S. and international avant-garde movements from the 1970s until his untimely death from AIDS-related complications in 1995 at age 49 . He often collaborated with contemporaries like Joey Terrill and Edmundo Meza—artists whose own work has received attention in recent years, while Sandoval’s contributions have remained underrecognized .

In the spirit of the “school” he imagined, the Austin retrospective brings together not only Sandoval’s own art but also works by an intergenerational group of twenty-five queer, Latinx, and Latin American artists. These collaborators and successors share Sandoval’s graphic sensibilities, experimental approach to media, and thematic interests in gender, sexuality, and identity .

A highlight of the exhibition programming is a day-long symposium, featuring leading curators and scholars such as C. Ondine Chavoya, David Evans Frantz, Joey Terrill, Alex Klein, and experts from The University of Texas at Austin, including Laura G. Gutiérrez, Ramón Rivera-Servera, and Ann Cvetkovich. These conversations have provided vital context for understanding Sandoval’s work within the broader lineage of Chicanx and queer art, exploring both its historical grounding and its continuing relevance .

“Teddy Sandoval and the Butch Gardens School of Art” is curated by C. Ondine Chavoya and David Evans Frantz, and is the product of extensive collaboration among several leading art institutions, including the Vincent Price Art Museum at East Los Angeles College and the Williams College Museum of Art, with major support from organizations like the Getty Foundation, the Terra Foundation for American Art, the Mellon Foundation, and The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts .

A scholarly catalogue accompanies the exhibition, furthering the curatorial team’s commitment to deepening public understanding of Sandoval’s art and the histories it reflects. Together, the exhibition and its programming underscore the importance of reclaiming overlooked LGBTQ+ and Latinx artists, whose stories and creative legacies are essential to the broader narrative of American art.

As the largest retrospective of Sandoval’s work to date, the exhibition invites both LGBTQ+ and allied audiences to reflect on the intersections between art, activism, and identity. Sandoval’s approach—marked by humor, wit, and incisive social critique—remains deeply resonant today, especially for those navigating questions of gender, sexuality, and cultural belonging in a rapidly changing world .

For transgender people, nonbinary individuals, and all those whose identities remain underrepresented or misunderstood, the exhibit offers both affirmation and inspiration. Sandoval’s work demonstrates the power of art to claim space, challenge norms, and foster community, even in the face of marginalization.

Visitors to The Contemporary Austin can experience the exhibition through January 2026. With its rich array of artworks, archival material, and public programming, “Teddy Sandoval and the Butch Gardens School of Art” stands as a testament to the enduring significance of queer and Chicanx creativity, and a call to honor the many voices that have shaped—and continue to shape—the LGBTQ+ cultural landscape.