Each series is made with at least an ethos. Some are born from specific interests.
My return to serious painting began with the “Casa” series. A small batch of acrylic and oil pastel works that depicted my home with a new-found celebratory edge. Bright colors, molcajetes, chili peppers, serape motifs, and the occasional cucuy in the closet. My partner and I are both half-Latin. Together we began to connect with our roots—something we often didn’t think much of until we expressed our similar memories. Being half-Latin and white often leads to a lack of belonging. You have so many specifically Mexican memories, but don’t speak the language. Or you speak the language but never knew your ancestors. Regardless, we found power as well as joy, peace and spiritual guidance. The series is a testament to that time and place.
“Susto” was next and is currently ongoing. The series uses the modes established in “Casa” like serape motifs and bright colors but expresses anxiety and anguish. Many misfortunes have occurred since the Casa series was made. Susto aims to show them. Halloween iconography, such as bats, mummies, boogeymen, and ghosts appear and darker but highly saturated colors show the fear in each piece. As anxiety and anguish are frequent states for me, the series will not conclude anytime soon.
“Exotico” is the most recent and ongoing series to date. It blends my lifelong interests in exoticism and cultural heritage through an initial process of unconscious spilling called Ancestral Recall. The pieces are both provisional and refined and feature many motifs that stem from Mayan and Aztec mythology, Spanish conquest, treasure, gold, oceans, jungles, jaguars, skeletons, curses, snakes, and brujas. I am acutely interested in my own conflicting interests in respecting sacred culture and the Western depiction of the exotic. Films like “Aguirre Wrath of God” and “Apocalypto” as well as the history of looting and iconoclasm of cultural heritage are the roots of my current exploration of the “Exotico” series.