Today we’d like to introduce you to Natalia Garcia-Lee.
So, before we jump into specific questions, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
My artwork has served as a language that has allowed me to interpret the world around me and my place in it. My family is Cuban with varied backgrounds including Spanish, Chinese, and Norwegian. I was born in Madrid, Spain and we moved to Miami when I was two. I have always been surrounded by art and naturally gravitated towards making images as a way of communicating. I have had a lifelong interest in science, especially in all aspects of how humans behave; what we do, what we make, how we think. I graduated from Pratt Institute in 1995 with a focus in sculpture but felt very comfortable working in different mediums. The years since have been a journey towards painting, drawing, and collage as my primary mediums. It has also been a journey from seeing the world through my own eyes to seeing the world as just one member of a species.
Beginning with my collage series from 2014 “The Things Humans Do”, I began depicting our use and understanding of science to create the environments we inhabit. From my “Dwellings” collage series in 2016 to my most recent series “Single Family Home” 2019 of paintings and collages, I have continued to explore related themes. Architecture, power plants, processing systems for agriculture or objects, and infrastructure are a few examples of the imagery I use in painting and collages. I use space, layering, overlapping and erasing in my work. Color and line are used to create ambiguous spaces. Objects and structures feel like they could be coming or going. My work is always about the things that humans do collectively.
Has it been a smooth road?
It has been both exciting and a challenge to work from a perspective that is at once deeply personal and universal to all humans. Realizing that the things that I experience and think personally are also the same as others. To remove my feeling from myself so that my work is about human behavior rather than about just me has been revealing.
Please tell us more about your art.
I am strictly a visual artist working independently of any institution. I am represented by LnS Gallery in Miami which has allowed me to begin sharing my work with others.
Is our city a good place to do what you do?
Miami is a great city for artists of all kinds. With so many people from so many different parts of the world it is brimming with mixing and clashing cultures and perspectives. It has grown tremendously and offers opportunities for just about any endeavor.
Contact Info:
- Address: LnS Gallery
2610 SW 28th Lane
Miami, FL 33133 - Website: https://lnsgallery.com/NATALIA_GARCIA_LEE/
- Phone: 305-987-5642
- Email: INFO@LNSGALLERY.COM
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nataliagarcialee/
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