Today we’d like to introduce you to Antonieta Carpenter-Cosand.
Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
I can tell you some stories, I was born “de paso”* in El Paso, Texas from a Mexican mother, called Maria Antonieta, like the beheaded French queen or a very popular Mexican comedian and an American (United States) swindler, whom evidently was in Mexico escaping justice when they meet each other.
Their relationship did not last long. I only met my father once, when I was eight or nine years old for a couple of hours on a random summer day. I never knew my father’s family until I was nineteen, I actually meet them through Facebook, and that’s actually the reason I live here in Arizona, they wanted to help me go to school here in the United States…. I would call that chapter of my life: The American dream of a kind of “Mexican-American”?
I tell you all of this because those stories are reflected in my art, you cannot unbind where your story begins and yourself…. I liked drawing cartoons or flowers since I can remember, but at eight years old, one of my cousins in Ciudad Juárez (my hometown) was studying graphic design and she was sketching with soft pastels. I asked her if I could use them and I drew with them and later knowing that I would ruin them, she gave them to me. I absolutely fell in love.
After that, I asked my mom for more supplies and she bought me all kinds of stuff, oil paint (did not even know how to use it, but I used it), acrylic, pastels, watercolors, charcoal, and drawing pencils and everything you can think off. I painted and since then I knew I wanted to be a painter, of course, I didn’t make a conscious decision of saying “I want to be a painter,” I just felt it.
And now, here we are, observing time: two years ago, I finished my undergraduate on painting and Spanish Literature at Arizona State University and now I am working on my master and Ph.D. in Spanish Literature with the specialization of visual and cultural production in Latin-American, which means I research and study painting, photography, film and even music. And finally, I must say, I occasionally paint to free my creativity, it helps me survive the workload of a Ph.D.
*De paso – passing through.
Please tell us about your art. What do you do / make / create? How? Why? What’s the message or inspiration, what do you hope people take away from it? What should we know about your artwork?
My life is art, like Ai Weiwei, I don’t separate them. And if I have to label myself, I would say I am a painter, a book-artist and sometimes a writer, not for conviction but for nature. I make paintings with words and words with paintings and sometimes I make covers to protect them (books). I am verborrea* of words. I create art because of the impulse, the passion, the excitement it creates on my cells. I just feel alive when I am thinking, planning and making art, and I think that is a good reason, if not what is the point of living?
I have a lot of hidden messages in my art, concisely and unconsciously people can decide what they get of it. One of the ongoing series that I am working right now, it’s about family history and that melancholic desire of getting to know family members that died, or I never got a chance to meet, like my father or grandparents. It’s a desire of creating a connection with them through meditative observation, to get to know myself through the process of painting them.
The latest series of painting that I started which I am continuing to work on is very mundane on the surface, but it comes from the impossible and pretentious desire of bringing again freshness to the perception of the viewer, to make him a consciously an observer of one and his/her present moment. This idea came just by observing the images I collect throughout the years. I have images of children playing, people walking or talking, or staring at you on the streets, unworthy objects such as sinks, water glasses, staircases, toilets or even cheeses. I also think I collect this because I am a moody melancholic, I save them to try to understand me and my surroundings and to keep feeling the sensations I first felt when I observe that lost moment. I like feeling happy melancholy of the loss. Aesthetically, I also tried to create softness and ethereality, as a way to create that preciousness of the moment, but I am still failing miserably at this point, so it will take some time to make them very good paintings. Finally, I am also part of the Cartonera Collective with Cardboard House Press here at Phoenix and a couple months ago, I designed the cover one of their books.
What do you think is the biggest challenge facing artists today?
Indifference, self-absorption, and sometimes, voluntary ignorance. People have become so self-absolve, that they can’t see more than themselves and their needs and desires. They are not interested in anything of their surroundings, things that are far from their careers or close relationships. This ambitious and consumerism society has left the arts and the humanities aside and neglected; consequently, this has brought us a lot of challenges.
I think art is an open conversation of vulnerability, heart, and visions. What we do as artists is always something close to our hearts and it makes us vulnerable, but people are not as interested to see, talk, and feel art. It is not important to them, they do not see the beauty and it’s because our society simply has not been educated and emphasize the importance of art as a more “humane” and loving way of communicating whatever we feel as humans. But in reality, art is an open conversation of anything we want to say and its open for everyone. So as artists we have to find a path to reconnect with everyone, to make them see this openness of expression and empathy. And this is right now a big challenge but a necessary one, to bring again the importance of art again into our society.
How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
Currently, I am not showing much of my work because of my academic endeavors, but I would happily show, collaborate, work or talk with anyone, I always love to meet someone who has a passion for something. People can support me by just loving life. That makes me enormously happy and to see that more in the world would be pure magic!
Contact Info:
- Email: miriamantonietacarpenter@gmail.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/carpentercosand/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/carpentercosand
Image Credit:
Photo of me: Lacey Philips Young
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