Fine Arts

Permanent URI for this collection

http://hdl.handle.net/10066/7373

Browse

Browsing Fine Arts by Author "Garcia, Mar"

Now showing 1 - 1 of 1
  • Thumbnail Image
    Item
    The Living
    (2015) Garcia, Mar
    Of particular interest to me are transgressive identities—identities that transgress societal boundaries and definitions. In my life and in my work, I am acutely aware of the tension between my innate human desperation for belonging and an enigmatic magnetism that draws me ever toward my true self. As a biracial and bicultural child, I became familiar with this tension early on, rarely feeling the security of knowing where I belonged in the social sphere. Now, as a young adult, I remember my nervous first years of life with gratitude, thankful that I was loved and never felt comfortable; I learned to find a place with others, while always feeling somehow outside. I now find beauty in the tension between what is easy and what is true, a stretch that is familiar to me, but that I suppose I will never get used to. By appreciating this kind of strain, I appreciate my place as a biracial, bicultural, queer, gender non-binary, pansexual, polyamorous artist. In this body of work, The Living, I express this tension through prints, plaster, fabric, clay, rubber, and thread. The works are explorations of the complex relationship between humans and human-made definitions. A 6-foot tapestry depicts a crowd of looming adult figures, which are pulled outward by the plaster figure of a single crawling infant, in a work titled Crawling. The figures have words from 90 different languages printed on them, all of which mean “I am,” “me,” or are some other form of self-referential language. These words are repeated until they cover the figures in a faded patchwork. The resulting installation is a literal manifestation of an infant transgressing the fabric made up of others’ words. It is neither possible for the infant to escape the fabric it emerges from, nor for the crowd to let go of the infant that pulls it. Next to this piece is an arrangement of prints, utilizing a range of printmaking techniques including monotype, etching, lithography, and Chine-collé. The imagery in these prints further explores the motifs of the infant and the silhouette. I use these as a way of exploring my own emotional challenges and inhibitions, revealing color combinations that are sometimes ethereal, and sometimes battered and violent. Below this array are the small clay hands and face of an infant, breaking out of a rubber mold, all of which are held together by nothing except for a thin white thread that is repeatedly wound around the entire object. This piece, entitled Wrapped, mirrors and is an essential partner to Crawling; they use the same face and hands (this time in clay instead of plaster) and they each situate the infant in a kind of inescapable restraint.