Karla Gabriela De La Fuente (The Land Within Us)
Tell us more about yourself. What is your background?
My name is Karla Gabriela De La Fuente, I am a mother, graduate student, art history teacher, artist, overall busy bee exploring the Mexican-American/US experience in my artwork.
How would you describe your art practice in three words?
Materiality, Representation, Form.
What is your favorite art medium to work with?
I use a variety of media in my work, but you can say collage is my favorite type of work to make. I feel I gravitate towards the act of placement, layering, and finding balance and harmony in my compositions.
Please tell us about the artwork you are showing in The Land Within Us?
The piece I am showing in The Land Within Us Exhibition is a self-portrait entitled 956. Edition 1. This piece is based on the personification of the Rio Grande Valley as myself. It is charged with the iconography of our region. The piece includes: the palm trees that serve as landmarks and welcome us back from trips away from home; the Expressway 83/ 281 Interchange that gives us access to every city within in area; an anatomic nopal heart representing the ancestral roots that we bring to our side of the border wall, and the Rio Grande, a river of tears that has been used to divide Mexico from the United States.
Are you working on anything new that we should know about? What’s next?
Recently, I participated in a performance piece paying homage to our female ancestors by Jana K. Harper. It will be part of the Uncovered Spaces Exhibition at the International Museum of Art and Science in Mcallen, Texas. I felt truly connected to the piece because I had done some genealogy research on my family and unfortunately I was not able to find much information and absolutely no photos of antecedents. By including them in the piece I feel it creates a concrete connection with myself and the women who came before me.
I have a pair of artist workshops that I am really excited about. I’ll be working with Dallas-based artist Sarita Westrup, learning techniques on woven sculptural forms. I am also planning on expanding my collage techniques alongside artist Michele Stitzlein.
Weekly, I interact with my professors, Tim Gonchoroff, Brian Dick, and Constance Cortez, each serving as fountains of knowledge to my practice. I feel extremely fortunate to be part of the growing artist community in the Rio Grande Valley. My goal is to absorb all the skills I can learn from my environment and incorporate them into my work.
Where can we find more of your artwork online?
I post updates on my work and current exhibitions on:
My Instagram page - instagram.com/@DLF.STUDIO
My Facebook page - facebook.com/delafuente.studio
My website: karlagabrieladelafuente.com