Felicia Montes

Felicia Montes

Felicia ‘Fe’ Montes is a Xicana Indigenous artist, activist, community & event organizer, educator, emcee, designer, poet, performer & professor living and working in the Los Angeles area (Tongva territory). She believes art is a tool for education, empowerment and transformation and has translated her passion for art and social justice as the cofounder and coordinating member of two groundbreaking creative women’s collectives, Mujeres de Maiz and In Lak Ech as well as the online mercado for the movement – El MERCADO y Mas.

Felicia creates work based on social and spiritual change as she works on the front lines of activism and organizing. Known throughout the Southwest as an established Xicana cultural worker of a new generation, she has worked with most of the key arts and cultural centers and social service agencies in the greater East Los Angeles area including Bienestar, Self Help Graphics, Proyecto Pastoral and the United Farm Workers. She has also been influential in Los Angeles transnational art and organizing efforts including work with the Zapatistas, Peace & Dignity Journeys and La Red Xicana Indigena. 

Felicia has both organized and performed in hundreds of cultural events, conferences, classrooms and protests for many artists and social justice causes for almost two decades. She has performed across the Southwest as well as Colombia and Mexico including Chiapas, Mexico City and Oaxaca. She has published her poetry in the Mujeres de Maiz yearly art and poetry publication since 1997. In 2011, she self-published her own poetry book titled “Ten Fe” which features her poems and performance pieces. Felicia is currently working on her album, which will feature spoken word, floetry and hip-hop. In addition, she has a published essay in the book “Rushing Waters, Rising Dreams” and a poem in the book “Fleshing the Spirit.” Her self-named FE clothing line is featured in a co-written article in the book MeXicana Fashions out of University of Texas Press. In the Spring of 2024, the University of Arizona Press will publish a book anthology she coedited and writes in on the organization she co founded and directs, Mujeres de Maiz. 

Felicia also creates visual and multimedia art and performances including silkscreen, installation and performance art and has exhibited both individual and collective work at places including 18th St. Art Center, Vincent Price Museum, Self Help Graphics and other East LA cultural centers alongside such notables as performance group La Pocha Nostra, and Grammy award winning, Quetzal.

As an educator, Felicia taught for years as a substitute teacher within the Los Angeles public school system. She has taught Chicana/o Studies courses at UC Santa Barbara, East LA and West LA College, Cal State LA and Dominguez Hills and is a keynote speaker at various campuses. Felicia holds a B.A from UCLA in World Arts & Cultures with a minor in Chicana/o Studies and a M.A in Chicana/o Studies from Cal State Northridge, and a MFA in Public Practice Art from Otis College of Art & Design. With these papers, her clothing line, her performances and decades of work she has reached many communities and circles across Abya Ayala and beyond with a message of empowerment through art and activism. 

She brings 25+ years of experience as the new tenure track assistant professor in Chicanx/Latinx arts and social practice within the Chicano/a Latino/a Studies department at Cal State Long Beach.