Su Teatro burns the mortgage: With land ownership comes power

The temperature was in the single digits, but there was plenty of heat outside the Su Teatro Cultural and Performing Arts Center on Friday afternoon in the form of fire and warm, fuzzy feelings.

Dozens of members and supporters of the nation’s third-oldest Chicano theater company cheered, sang and toasted the ceremonial burning of the mortgage on the former Denver Civic Theatre, its home at 721 Santa Fe Drive since 2010.

Over the past 50 years, Executive Artistic Director Anthony Garcia has moved Su Teatro from the cultural margin to the mainstream. But Friday was more about looking ahead than celebrating the past.

“This really puts us in a position to start thinking about the future,” Garcia said. “Today is about closing one book – and opening a new one.”

Su Teatro, born out of protest and activism in 1971, grew from the displacement of Westside Denverites to make way for construction of the Auraria Campus. The company has been telling stories of the Chicano, Hispanic and Latino experience ever since, everywhere from stages to parks to picket lines.

The Su Teatro Cultural and Performing Arts Center consists of a 320-seat mainstage theater, a smaller studio theater and an art gallery in the heart of the Santa Fe Arts District. And now it's all theirs.

For a company that is indigenous to the land upon which its building sits, the term “land ownership” means something more. It represents independence, stability, the healing of old cultural wounds – and at least one other essential thing. 

“Growing up, my mom always instilled in us that with land ownership comes power,” said Jesse Ogas, longtime company member and 9News Executive Director of Social Responsibility. ”What’s interesting to me is that in 2023, we are fighting to hold onto our civil rights once again. But with land ownership, we have power – and we have a voice.

“You look at what’s happening in Florida and what (Gov. Ron) DeSantis is trying to do. You look at how fascism is rearing its ugly head all over our country. The only way to prevent that is to make sure that we hold onto what is ours and we don’t ever let it go.”

Su Teatro, which means "Your Theater," moved from the Auraria neighborhood into a small space in Elyria (north-central Denver) in 1989. In 2007, the company announced it would build its own arts center at 215 S. Santa Fe Drive. But when the Civic went into foreclosure right up the block, then-Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper nudged Garcia into simply moving in there instead. The city bought the building for $790,000 and extended a bridge loan – Hickenlooper even put up $50,000 of his own money. Su Teatro took occupancy in February 2010.

"You and I have not been subjected to the racism that someone like Tony Garcia has endured for 50 years,” Hickenlooper told me at the time. “At every opportunity, I will remain his champion."

Friday’s celebration began with a shivered gathering in the south parking lot and a performance by Las Dahlias, a Colorado-based female Mexican Trio. A fire pit was lit and staff, board members and donors were invited to drop copied pages from the deed mortgage into the fire. The crowd was invited to participate by writing down anything they wanted to be rid of on a small piece of paper and add it to the fire.

"This is for all the cold days performing in the streets!" 45-year company member Angel Mendez-Soto said as he dropped his paper on the fire. “Burn, baby burn!”

They’re used to being cold. “This is our fourth home, and the one thing they all have in common is that the heat hasn’t worked in any of them,” Garcia said to laughs.

The program ended with fried chicken, champagne and a cake topped by an illustration of the theater’s exterior.   

To Bobby LeFebre, a Su Teatro company member for 20 years and Colorado’s current Poet Laureate, “land ownership means there will always be a place where our community and our culture will be represented. It means that we will have control over what happens to us, and to our stories in this space.”

Community leaders in attendance included SCFD Executive Director Deborah Jordy, who is in charge of distributing $60 million every year to metro culture and science organizations; and Jo Bunton Keel, retired co-founder of the groundbreaking Eulipions Theatre Company, which was dedicated to telling stories by and about people of the African diaspora.

“It was important for me to be here today because we are talking about the survival of a culture,” said Bunton Keel. “I don’t think people realize how much heart, hard work and sacrifice that Tony and everyone affiliated with Su Teatro had to put in for this company to survive. And now it is a national company.”

Added Jordy, who was a member of Su Teatro’s 2010-12 capital campaign: “Su Teatro is the heart and soul of such an important Denver community, and this means that Su Teatro will live on and on and on.”

Over the past 13 years, Su Teatro has produced or presented thousands of cultural events from plays to musicals to film festivals. It has also made its facilities available to a range of cultural partners from the disability-affirmative Phamaly Theatre Company to the Rocky Mountain Theatre for Kids.

Next up in Su Teatro’s 50th anniversary season: “El Espiritu Natural,” written and directed by Garcia and Daniel Valdez, running March 9-26.