Artist Speaks

The heat on my shoulders I remember during my numerous trips riding El Chalan to cross the border from la casa de mis abuelos en Los Ebanos, TX to the homeland of mi papa en Diaz Ordaz, Tamaulipas, Mexico warms my shoulders each time I set my pencil down to create art or write a story. It is the feeling of the scorching, burning, and bright sun ripping through skin, through lies, through masks, through colonized stories, through western expectations, and through fear that I connect with the many emotions that come alive in my artwork and writing. 

My artwork is necessary today, especially in the absence of Lesbiana author Gloria Anzaldua who once said, “I write because I have no choice, and I.  The world I create in my writing compensates for what the real world does not give.”  (This Bridge Called My Back)

I create images through my art and literature portraying bare-boned, broken-open and intensely animated truths and metaphors of the Queer Mujer because I too “must keep the spirit of our revolt and myself alive.” Our stories of survival among violence, homophobia, economic injustice, domination, religious persecution and sexism as a whole will continue to be dismissed – to be left out, to be pushed away and all together lost if we don’t continue to create.  I am scared without the unfolding of these stories, these truths, these realities, these lessons – the sustainability of the Mujer will not carry on. 

In my effort, I believe in being honest, respectful and passionate while committing myself to being responsible, responsive, professional, dedicated, trustworthy and open handed with my resources. In the face of challenge, I promise to strive toward the truth in presenting and preserving the stories of my community, our ancestors and myself.

I envision a world where the Mujer – Lesbiana, Chicana, Latina, Mexicana- is welcomed with respect and honor despite the challenging stereotypes that continue to marginalize and trivialize her experience; a world that values her inherent characteristics of being a leader, mother, sister, organizer, grandmother, artist, academic, individual, soul, and spirit. I dream of tables, classrooms, homes and communities where her silenced stories are recovered and shared publicly, to rouse confidence, teach triumph through struggle, empower the oppressed, clarify the vitality of her experience, and enhance the quality of all women’s lives.

In confronting stories of the Mujer through the creation and presentation of words and images, my purpose is to offer windows for people-beyond society’s repressive cultural characterizations blasted throughout mainstream media.