Amado M. Peña Jr.

Amado Maurilio Peña Jr. (born 1943) is an American visual artist and art educator of Mexican and Yaqui ancestry.

Peña refers to himself as Mestizo due to his mixed Mexican and Yaqui ancestry, a fact that informs his artistic practice.

[2] Growing up with a working class family in a border town, Amado M. Peña Jr. witnessed firsthand the conditions that led to the Chicano Movement.

In the 1970s, Texas-based Chicano artist and educator Mel Casas inspired Peña and others of his generation to create art aimed at documenting Mexican American culture and life.

The exhibition was the most extensive and widely seen show of Chicano art to date and introduced the artists involved to wider audiences.