Painting is what I’ve done since I was 10 in El Salvador under the tutelage of Violeta Bonilla, student of Diego Rivera. Settled every Saturday morning in her modest house and ravine on the San Salvador Volcano, I had the privilege of her Diego stories, her deep understanding of art, and caring mentorship. I still cherish painting outdoors, which I do often, and the intimate stories about Diego, which haven’t yet made it into the history books.
Growing up in a country with poverty that envelops, with religion that defines, and with society that imposes, I worked hard to earn the privilege to go to University in the United States, where I could question, learn, explore and redefine. Vassar College Art History and New York City were my first stop, followed by Rice University Architecture and Art and Houston. I found no upper limits.
New York City, San Francisco, San Antonio and Houston became home, and my creativity went into designing sustainable spaces for people. Clean lines, elegant solutions, geometry, and tight constraints were the constructs of my design. Art is my freedom.
The ancient knowledge of my Maya Pipil ancestors about living in balance with nature, being part of a larger universe, and deep time that bridges humanity past, present and future is what I think, and what I am. Human migration and the essence of what connects us all is what I paint.
I’m a contemporary Maya artist, depicting in abstract pictorial language the space within time and bringing people into the active place that it occupies. I like to infuse energy and activity into my paintings through color and gesture. I want to reach people and transport them away from the interior walls, into new worlds and unknown times.
Immigrating is an act of uprooting; many get lost in between the here and the there. I paint maps of primordial worlds that speak to the intellectual and spiritual roots of so many descendants of the Maya in the US. Abstracted and imaginary symbology based on ancient glyphs and numeric notation appear throughout my art as a connection to a culture past.
The dialogue between my art and my architectural background is a constant, as I work with common precepts, including conceptual narrative, ethnography, balance, proportion, complexity, and contradiction. My paintings reflect the absolute intellectual and personal freedom that my new country has afforded me and the joy of making art that connects and elevates people.
