Influences...

Photo of Frida

I have had many people ask me what is behind my artwork, why do I paint it, who influences me...

And I took the time to think about this over the weekend.

I have been painting for many years, since I was a child. My brother is an athlete and my sister is intellectual, but I had my art. Art was something I naturally was drawn to and loved. Picking up a pencil and drawing for hours and painting with watercolors was something I felt I needed to do. It was so natural that I never put thought to it. It was like walking.

I think each of us have something that we are naturally drawn to. Some people love sculpting, other love play a sport, but I had art in my life.

I would paint women, people, animals, and landscapes. Landscapes were my favorite. I still paint landscapes, though I havent posted any of mine here. I might share them with you one day :)

If you saw my landscape paintings you would think I was surrounded by mountains all my life. For many years that's all I painted, starting when I was about 9. All I painted was mountains and water. I must have lived around mountains in my other life..because I find them to be so beautiful.

As I got older...and I am not that much older, I am 26. I began painting Day of the Dead and Frida influenced art. Many pieces were of skulls, death, skeletons, and graves...I didnt find them to be morbid or unusual. I was just attracted to painting these things.

Self portrait with money by Frida Kahlo

I found enjoyment and happiness painting them. There was a time in my life that I felt I was painting for others...painting what they thought to be nice and what they liked. I decided to make a transformation, from illustrations of the fashionista chic girls to Day of the Dead/Frida/Burton inspired artwork...I finally was painting what I was happy doing, reflecting my own culture and my surroundings..I had a message of life and death, of faith, and hope..

Photo of Frida

I relate to Day of the Dead for so many reasons, I enjoy the history and idea that it shares and celebrates and when I see my paintings I face my own life and my own death. It something I think about and I know that one day, the end of this life will come for me and I will pass on to the next.

I am so happy in life and it will be sad to leave this one, but my paintings allow me to think about it, to ponder life and death and my feelings towards it. I always related to what Frida once said: " I paint my own reality. The only thing I know is that I paint because I need to and I paint whatever passes through my head without any other consideration"

My reality of culture, ethnicties, death and life, innocence and corruption, beauty and unsightly, light and dark...I try and reflect in my paintings.

I also wanted to share with you a little inside look of Frida. Sometimes people only see her outside, her famous uni-brow, her tragic love for Diego, but she was a very unique and deep person, and I thought that these little homemade videos I found show that: