Low: René Amado

August 2, 2024 – July 19, 2025
Windows on Fifth Gallery at Racine Art Museum

René Amado
Jefferson 6-Tre, 2023, printed 2024
High-gloss metal print
Photography: Courtesy of the Artist

Who are we if we don’t say it ourselves? Gangsters? Illegals? A project for you to photograph? Nah homie…these cars—the patterns in the paint, the brushstrokes of the pinstripes, the details of the engine, every chiseled cut from the engraver, each and every stitch of the upholstery to the style of rims—they are the expressions of us. They are us. Our joy. Our pain. They are members of our families. They are our loved ones passed on. They are our love. They are our art. —René Amado

Engaged in lowrider culture most of his life in one way or another, Racine-based René Amado showcases the cars, bicycles, and community through photography and video. Both a photographer and a teacher, Amado has focused on a broad range of subjects in his work—whether by professional necessity or personal interest—from street photography to portraits to culinary themes. Low: René Amado blends his photography with custom bicycles and other small vehicles from various builders/makers (including himself) and a video in which he expands on the story of lowrider culture through interviews and documentation. Each component of the exhibition—photographs, bikes, and video—stands on its own, but together create a powerful narrative underscoring how objects and images can address personal and community development, tradition and innovation, and creativity and aesthetics.

Amado began honing his craft around 2013, in downtown San Antonio, Texas. For Amado, walking the streets and capturing the various scenes and unique individuals he would encounter was a great way to flex his creativity while unwinding from a stressful workday. Since then, he has gone on to work in many other genres of photography including: concert and live music, photojournalism, fashion, wedding, culinary, automotive, portraiture, and documentary. Amado’s interest began in the 1980s when he was a young boy thumbing through photography magazines his father, an amateur photographer, had lying around the house. Later, he enjoyed taking photos at car shows and went on to take photography classes while in college. In 2017, he started René Amado Photography. In addition to working on freelance projects, he also teaches photography to high school students. Amado was the inaugural recipient of the RAM Artist Fellowship Emerging Artist award in 2020.

More About the Exhibition

Gallery Guide—English (PDF)

Gallery Guide—Español (PDF)

Press Room

Owing to the award of an Equity Innovation Fund grant from the United Way of Racine County, RAM is organizing three different exhibitions and multiple community outreach programs that feature Mexican American artists Nicole Acosta and René Amado. Both artists use their work to address cultural identity—often centering a multidisciplinary approach that highlights their perspectives as artists of color and offers a dynamic platform to examine and reframe personal, social, and cultural issues.

Programs such as these are vital as they spotlight significant voices of color. Acosta and Amado speak to their heritage while adding to the dynamism of the contemporary art landscape and offering perspectives that can potentially engage those not otherwise inclined to visit contemporary art museums. Playing to that, Amado’s installation, on display in RAM’s Windows on Fifth Gallery, will be available to the public 24 hours a day, seven days a week—a point underscoring both the value of the ideas and the desire to make the work accessible to anyone on the street, not just those who go into the museum building. Additionally, these two regional artists reflect the strength of creativity in the area.

Bicycle/vehicle builders featured in the exhibition

Armando Alba, René Amado, Edin Gamboa, William Guardado, Junior Herrera, Emanuel Lagunas, Bombita Lopez, Francisco Rubio, Hector Salinas, Jr, and Omar Villa