Librería Donceles

Librería Donceles

Vincent Price Art Museum, September 17, 2022 – June 24, 2023

Conceived by Pablo Helguera

Organized by Steven Wong, Joseph Daniel Valencia, and the entire exhibitions team

Community programming designed and led by Joseph Daniel Valencia, Gloria Ortega, and Isela Rangel

Librería Donceles is a socially engaged art project created by artist and educator Pablo Helguera out of a desire to address the lack of bookstores that serve the growing Hispanic and Latinx communities in the United States. Part functioning bookstore and part participatory installation, Librería Donceles provides space for the community to engage with Spanish-language-specific books and multilingual programming designed to encourage cultural understanding, tolerance, and social activism.

Taking its name from the historic street, Calle Donceles, in Mexico City that is lined with used bookstores, the installation premiered in New York in 2013 and has since traveled to Phoenix, San Francisco, Seattle, Chicago, Boston, Indianapolis, Anchorage and Santa Cruz. In each of these cities, it has been the sole Spanish-language bookstore. After nearly a decade of traveling, Librería Donceles has arrived in Los Angeles, home to one of the largest Spanish-speaking populations in the country, to celebrate and build upon its numerous years of community engagement and impact.