I think we're going to make some calabacitas.
Okay.
We have Oaxaca cheese.
In my region, you can't forget about tacos and tortillas.
What do you want me to do?
We have to wash them.
Should I wash the zucchinis?
Let's wash them.
I was starting out my career,
and you were one of the first people who
I started painting from life,
because you were very patient and you sat there a thousand times.
I ended up painting your daughter and all your family.
I think art is also a way to gain more confidence.
It depicts a more colorful life.
I think it helps me to be in harmony.
The colors--
I think it transforms us.
There's one family, Verónica and Marissa,
that I've painted
over the years.
Now my relationship with them has extended over 10 years.
You can sit there, more or less, like the face--
I'm trying to replicate this when you were laying down
with your mom at your home.
I think that was how the face--
Is that tall enough for you?
This body of work is revisiting Marissa and Verónica in their home in Queens.
Revisiting that couch that I painted Marissa in with her father
many years ago,
with her mom and their papel picado, and all their accouterments
of their living room.
Because we live in a one-bedroom apartment,
my parents would mostly sleep outside in the living room
because they didn't want to let me sleep on the sofa.
Even though our space is very limited and it's very small sometimes,
it's filled with a lot of joy.
The music sheet on the stand has songs written in Náhuatl.
That speaker is my mom's best friend.
She blasts music at home, and then she also takes it to the park
for her bailoterapia classes.
My mom really loves the bicycle.
Her mom would always criticize her, telling her that's something
that a man does.
For her, it's also a form of resistance, knowing that she can really go anywhere.
I feel like whenever I get together with Veronica, we talk about Marissa non-stop.
because your mom and I are both so proud of your
being in college at Cornell.
No, but I'm actually very proud of her
because she's one of my biggest inspirations.
I think one of my earliest memories is actually drawing with my mother,
drawing dancers with her.
Her pencil moving is one of my earliest recollections of art.
I grew up in Mexico City.
My grandfather came from Belorussia to Mexico when he was three
and my mother arrived to Mexico to study Art History.
There's a saying in Spanish, "Ni de aquí ni de allá,"
which means you're neither from here nor from there
because I was always half Mexican, half American.
I grew up speaking English with my mother in Mexico.
I had the privilege of being an American citizen.
I didn't have the fear that a lot of immigrants have here,
that might not have papers.
I moved to the Midwest, to Chicago, to study art at the Art Institute of Chicago.
I went through a period in grad school where I was an abstract painter.
Then I moved to New York.
I started to make these little still-life paintings.
They were inspired by street vendors in Mexico with flower arrangements.
I started studying psychology.
This one philosopher, Emmanuel Levinas, talks about how all ethics comes
from the face-to-face relationship.
The encounter with another person that elicits an ethical demand.
That ended up coming into my work, this idea of sitting
with somebody face-to-face and painting them from life.
A lot of painting, because of its materiality
and because of its gesture and texture, almost feels like the presence
of another person.
I love capturing a moment when a person might be lost
in their own thoughts and imagining what their interiority might be.
Depicting people in moments of contemplation
where they're for themselves.
I was always torn between whether I wanted to be a social worker or a painter.
I feel like it took all my life pretty much up to this point
where I've integrated both of those things in some ways.
I met Aliza through IMI, Immigrant Movement International,
back when I was 12 years old.
It was a long time ago.
Welcome to this--
Tania is this Cuban artist.
She founded Immigrant Movement International.
The first movement called “Prelude.”
My mom got really involved and then started taking some classes
with Aliza.
I think it was 2012 when I first met Tania Bruguera and
I was so moved by her project that I told her I wanted
to participate somehow and I wanted to teach a class.
She told me that what was most needed were English skills,
so I devised a class that was basically for a group of women, like English
through art history.
A lot of it ended up being feminist art history
because it's what they were asking me about.
I'll never forget that it was because of the class I took with you
on how to learn English
through Frida's story.
It was through art that I began to grasp some English words.
I got so interested in the people's stories that I asked Tania
if I could set up a makeshift studio in one little corner
and I'd leave my paintings overnight.
I'd come back and depict every person in my class.
And then I started to depict their extended families as well.
Just being able to walk into that space,
feeling supported.
My parent’s immigration status,
they would go in looking for support.
I think it was also a place that brought
a lot of hope.
Things have still continued beyond the physical space,
like Mobile Print Power, which is an art collective
that I'm still part of til this day.
And Mujeres en Movimiento that my mom is still doing.
I just had this desire to learn,
never imagining that I'd be the one to stick around afterward,
self-guiding with videos, and then finding myself dancing there.
Fellow colleagues, mothers who would tell me,
“You can do it, yes, you nailed it, you danced beautifully.”
I was a little embarrassed.
I loved breaking those stigmas, those stereotypes,
those insecurities.
Ever since I moved here from Mexico, I've been living in Corona.
My dad and sisters were already here,
but I was sad leaving my mom and my community
and not knowing anyone here.
Adapting was a challenge.
I feel like I started to connect with the community
when Marissa began school.
Reach out, connect with more people or in places
like schools, libraries, or museums.
I don't say this thinking, “I've done all of this myself.”
It’s been the strength of a warrior community.
It's very special to come back to Queens almost 10 years
after the Immigrant Movement International,
to be in residence at the Queens Museum.
I reverted back to the class I was teaching at IMI.
There's a group of women that lead a food pantry
that every Wednesday gets distributed in the museum.
And so I wanted to do something for these volunteers.
Every Tuesday night I'm teaching a class through art-making this time,
and I've taught them drawing and painting.
Ready? Let’s get started.
Today is the last class where we'll all be together,
taking a look at all the pieces we've crafted over the semester.
We call it the Group Critique.
Group Critique.
I've named mine “Mi Libertad” (My Freedom).
When I was going through some really tough times,
I loved running through the countryside on horseback.
The more I ran with the wind whipping my face, the freer I felt.
It was as if I could fly.
Hence, I named it “My Freedom” after a mare I had.
This painting is meant to represent
something quite simple and straightforward: materialism.
We see fragments of banknotes, but why?
Because it destroys families, it shatters homes.
We lose lives at the borders.
This country indeed welcomes us, immensely so,
but it also separates us.
I have this next painting.
The next painting symbolizes the endurance of Indigenous woman
because I am a descendant of the Cañaris.
Sometimes we are voices that go unheard,
at times we are invisible.
But despite that, we are a powerful force here in this country.
Thank you.
When you have that sense of agency of expressing yourself.
You can also share resources with each other and feel a sense
of empowerment in that community.
For people to really feel like they can use the museum
as a resource
and as a space that's really for them.
I also am interested in the structural economy of paintings
and I've done profit sharing
when I work with a community
or with a particular individual over a long period of time.
With this particular family, I gave them the first paintings that I made of them
and they were able to benefit later on from that.
I work as a housekeeper,
but that wasn't enough for me to get by for one year
or some months during the pandemic.
The gallery was able to provide us with money so that we could pull through.
For me, that was a relief, Aliza.
I’ll never forget it.
Do you know who is there?
Who is it?
Do you see yourself?
I believe that creating spaces
where we practice art or make art
is a way to connect.
It is the most beautiful way.
Being with this community here, it’s like finding a home in a way.
Aliza, hello!
So nice to see you.
The biggest resource we have is these relationships and the communities
that have continued.
Your resources are your people around you.