Page 19 - May 2017 Edition

Chihuahua luchador la Verdadera Mujer Maravilla
The Man froM Chihuahua
Juan Carlos Medina aT arizona handMade
Color. That was the first thing that struck me about Juan Carlos Medina’s work. His use of strong, often primary colors pulls the viewer into his images. His use of black and a host of other dark colors create depth and emotion, bold shadows flowing through his subjects, filling each with impacting gravity.
When visiting his humble home studio in Chinle on the eastern edge of Arizona, this writer had the pleasure to peruse much more of his art than ever seen before. The variety of his subjects — from graphite portraits of famous artists, to a luchador wrestler, to comic book heroes, to Christ wearing the crown of thorns — all carry a sound basis in realism, but the softness in the images is reminiscent of tattoos, many of them easily imagined as inspiration for skin art.
“I’ve drawn and painted since I was a kid,” he says. “But it wasn’t until my art teacher in high school noticed I had talent and really encouraged me that I realized I could make a living off of art. I wasn’t a full-time artist until I moved to Arizona. I’ve always worked other jobs in addi- tion to doing my art, so it took a little getting used to. I’m really grateful for the opportunity.”
An undeniable theme in his body of work is his Mexican heritage. He was born in Chi- huahua, and grew up in Southern California. Dia de los Muertos skeletons and the Virgin of Guadalupe are tangible examples of how he blends traditional imagery with a beautifully comfortable connection to pop culture. A new piece in his studio painted on a snowboard depicted a Chihuahua dog’s face in a luchador mask, flanked by Southwestern cacti, sunflow- ers, and roses. One of his small acrylics displays the Virgin Mary transformed into Wonder Woman, the double W laced on her robe and the signature tiara, bracelets, and lasso of truth adorning her.
Most of his pieces are acrylic painted on canvas, although he is just as capable with pen and pencil. Flipping through his sketchbook, each page brings a new smile – a sketch of Conan the Barbarian from the old movies, the grandmother from the Abuelita Mexican hot chocolate boxes drinking a Tecate beer, a pug in a stately hat and bow tie over the Grey Pou- pon logo. The tired, sun-beaten face of a Mexican cowboy with gray just beginning to sneak into his hair stared out from the paper with tangible longing.
Working from photos, he retains a high-contrast style emblematic of his paintings; using long, dark shadows and stark lines with subtle shading to create an intimate accessibility in his portraits without the distinctive color of his acrylics. When asked how he chooses his subject matter, Mr. Medina replies, “Really, whatever speaks to me. When I was a kid I was into comic books and would draw what I saw. I pull a lot from my religion and my culture, but it could be anything.”
He points to a painting of a colossal stone head sculpture created by the ancient Olmec people of Mexico. The image of the sculpture occupies the whole of the large canvas; ivory,
by sTephanie sTinski
yellow, and white at its center, fading to black at the edges, emphasizing the size of the sub- ject. “That statue was carved from a huge piece of a kind of stone not found anywhere near the place where the sculpture was found. The people who created it had to go through so much work to move it. The devotion and effort involved in bringing such a large stone from so far away appealed to me. I wanted to paint it,” he says.
His art doesn’t end at the canvas. Ornate frames accent many pieces, continuing the color swatches from the paintings. In one piece he created as a Valentine’s Day gift for his wife, a single curious eye peers out from a heart. The edges of the canvas darken to a subfuscous red and an intricate black frame surrounds the piece, doubling its size. The bright eye encom- passed by this dark background gives it a subtle mystery: where is the heart staring out from and what is it looking for? Some of his frames are complex, gold-adorned affairs, while others have a softer, vintage styling. “Whenever I go to antique stores or thrift stores, that’s what I look for. Sometimes I need to paint them to fit the piece, and sometimes they just work.”
Recently he found a new source of inspiration. He followed his wife to northern Apache County last year and has been pleasantly surprised. “I never expected to move to a place like Chinle,” he admits, having grown up around Los Angeles. “But I love it here! It is a great com- munity and there is inspiration all around.”
On a whim, we drive out to nearby Canyon de Chelly. “I love taking people out here,” he says with enthusiasm as we walk down little steps carved into the stone ground of a canyon lookout. The canyon plummeted down below us and spread out into curves on either side. The stone walls were their own natural canvas of reds, tans, browns, and blacks; painted by time and rain. Deep shadows, not unlike those he uses in his paintings, shaded large por- tions of the canyon walls and made black holes out of caves in the side. Bright green was beginning to spread along the canyon floor with the coming of spring, even though snow still speckled its higher ledges from a storm earlier that week. “It changes with every season, it always looks different,” he says, eager to show me Spider Rock, a famous pair of stone spires rising almost 800 feet from the middle of the canyon floor. “I’ve never painted landscapes before, but I’m planning to paint Spider Rock. I come out to the canyon all the time, and I never get tired of it. It’s incredible.”
Mr. Medina’s innate kindness comes through in his work and just by meeting him, one can feel the positivity of this up-and-coming artist. “I believe life is short. We take each fleeting mo- ment for granted. Sometimes fear makes us close our eyes and we miss opportunities in our daily life to enjoy it. My art is bold and colorful reflecting the idea that life should be celebrated.”
Juan Carlos Medina currently shows his work at Arizona Handmade Gallery in Flagstaff. He will be present during the First Friday ArtWalk on Cinco de Mayo, from 6-9PM and his art is featured the entire month of May. AZHandmade.com
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