Jessica Alazraki 

Art Statement

Jessica Alazraki brings together her experiences as an immigrant and artist to dismantle misconceptions of Latinx identity. By providing glimpses at the intimate moments of everyday life, her paintings immerse viewers in the radiant energy that challenges negatively perpetuated narratives with a celebration of people and culture.

With an in-depth knowledge of design, Alazraki translated her fascination with color palettes and patterns as an association of identity into new ways of communicating the unseen elements of daily life in immigrant households. Breaking apart traditional approaches to painting, she combines gestural and spontaneous elements associated with abstract painting into her figurative scenes. Textures and gestures emerge that heighten the development of not only the narrative of the overarching piece but also intensify the stories of her subjects.

As the abstract and realistic elements fuse together, the scenes teeter between the familiar and the surreal. Furthering this distortion, she plays with anatomical proportions, manipulates a sense of depth and perspective, and brings together unusual palettes of vibrant colors. The whimsical becomes the bizarre in her own collage aesthetic, allowing these characters' stories to differentiate from our own day-to-day.

Here, Alarzaki uses her raw, genuine, and free process of expression to emphasize the beauty and the energy inherent in these concealed displays of culture. Reimagining colors and patterns typically tied to the Latinx or immigrant identity, she creates relatable scenes that evoke shared sentiments of hope, loyalty, and family. She expresses the love, affection, and hardships that unite these families as they work to achieve a better life. In her displays, she invites viewers to rethink the impact and the cultural value of these individuals by recognizing the contributions of their resilient spirit.

By Charles Moore