"akwarela: petty peminist poetry and paintings" by Melinda Luisa de Jesús
akwarela: petty peminist poetry and paintings
Melinda Luisa de Jesús
Summer 2023
ARTIST STATEMENT;
akwarela: petty peminist poetry and paintings
During my spring break in March 2023 I decided to dive into painting, something I’ve always wanted to explore but felt stuck by my own inadequacy. I’m the only one in my family who can’t paint or draw, and as a kid I eschewed visual art and threw myself into music and literature. This time around I committed to painting every day and consciously embraced the concept of beginner’s mind. I took a few online painting classes, starting with acrylics, but learned quickly that abstract watercolor florals was my medium. Soon painting daily became something I looked forward to, and I started gaining more skills and confidence as I embraced the idea of flow. Eileen saw a few of my early attempts and suggested I consider juxtaposing my rather trenchant poetry to these delicate paintings, and thus this exhibition started taking shape. The title refers to "
It’s been over 90 days and I’m still watercoloring daily. I’ve loved planning poems around works in my sketchbook, as well painting images to illustrate a particular poem’s mood and intent.
Thanks for taking a look at my new work! I hope it inspires you to embrace beginner’s mind and to explore your own artistic impulses, in any form.
melinda
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The following presents close-ups of some of the individual works (click on all images to enlarge):
Dr. Melinda Luisa de Jesús is Associate Professor of Critical Ethnic Studies and former Chair of Diversity Studies at California College of the Arts. She writes and teaches about Filipinx/American cultural production, girl culture, monsters, and race/ethnicity in the United States. She edited Pinay Power: Peminist Critical Theory, the first collection of Filipina/American feminisms (Routledge 2005); her first collection of poetry, peminology, was published by Paloma Press in 2018. Melinda’s most recent article traces the legacy of Lynda Barry’s peminist aesthetic in the comics of Trinidad Escobar and Malaka Gharib.
As a US-UK Fulbright Visiting Scholar in 2012, Melinda convened the first international girl studies conference “After Girl Power: What’s Next?” at the University of York, UK (https://aftergirlpower2012.tumblr.com/). In Spring 2019 Melinda was the Muriel Gold Senior Visiting Professor at the Institute for Gender, Sexuality and Feminist Studies at McGill University in Montreal, Canada where she organized the Pinay Power II: Celebrating Peminisms in the Diaspora conference, the first gathering of Canadian Filipinas in the diaspora (http://pinaypower.ca/).
Melinda is also a classically-trained mezzo-soprano, an Aquarian, and a mom who loves hard liquor and admits an obsession with Hello Kitty. More about her at peminist.com.
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THE REFUGEE'S ART GALLERY
Note From the Gallery Director:
Due to California's 2020 Glass Fire, gallery operations at North Fork Arts Projects (NFAP) were temporarily suspended. But as NFAP's curator, I didn't feel like giving the wildfires the last word. I decided to open NFAP’s offsite operations at my fire evacuee residence. Given that this residence and studio is much smaller than my pre-fire digs, the gallery's physical space also has downsized to, not even the closet but, the closet door. The Refugee's Art Gallery may well be the world's thinnest gallery—perhaps I should apply for a Guinness World Record!
My studio has a closet fronted with two sliding doors. One sliding door introduces the gallery. Slide that door away and the second door will be revealed with the hanging artwork. Obviously, all artwork will be flat as the distance between the two doors is 3/8th of an inch. But I can work with that (e.g. this postcard art exhibit). I am glad to present NFAP's offsite Refugee Art Gallery because ART IS RESILIENT. I hope viewers also enjoy the presented artworks.
(Click on all images to enlarge)
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