Saturday, August 6, 2011

Meditation and Endowments-You Are What You Eat

HOY SPACE: Sonia Romero's Inner Landscape
Sonia Romero
Vincent Price Museum
East Los Angeles College
1301 Avenida Cesar Chavez
Monterey Park, CA 91754
May 20, 2011-August 19, 2011

Sonia Romero's art work is part of the inauguration of the new Vincent Price Museum at East Los Angeles College.  Romero is featured in"Hoy Space", a space in the museum dedicated to emerging artists.  As a young artist that was invited to exhibit 2 1/2 years ago, Romero stated that she began her work in a "feisty-political mode" and ended her journey on the "beautiful side".  The beginning has images displayed in piles.  "Dead Piles" (2009), consists of a pile of "fleshy" pigs.  Also, there is a wall installation of three piles, in which, the pile of bison skulls, retells a story of North American carnage. Romero described the piles as signifying "consumptions" and "abundance".  She is interested in the "historical and contemporary relationship" culture has with food.  The "beautiful side", culminates with the paper cut "Inner Landscape" (2011).  The paper cut depicts a voluptuous woman in a slumbering-existential pose enveloped by garlands of flowers on the vine.  A bouquet of three roses protects her heart.  The female is not a drowning "Ophelia", but a woman who has discovered a gift through meditation and transformation.  Romero learned the importance of "coming from the inside out" and knowing that "we choose what to put in our bodies".

Romero was forthcoming when she spoke about her parental legacy of renowned Chicano artist Frank Romero and Nancy Romero, whose art contains her study of anthropology and mythology.  She said sometimes she feels a pressure from the Chicano community to be more political.  I told her that all art is political.  Romero has her foot in more than one world.  However, she said that her post-college career has changed her art perspective and that "being her father's daughter has influenced her life".

No comments:

Post a Comment