Alexandra Fernandez

What do you do when you’re not the perfect Mexican daughter? What do you do when society never lets you forget it? I use my experiences as a multicultural woman in addition to the social constructs and bias surrounding women and the Latin-American community to inform my work. Inspired by cultural communication, family history as well as feminine themes and symbolism, I aim to question the relationship between the concept of what the ideal Latin-American woman is perceived to be and its reality.

Printmaking has been an integral medium in the spread of ideas and information throughout history. Its varied mediums and techniques allow for the unification of disparate materials, effectively allowing for the blending of cultural symbolism and, therefore, identity. I combine traditional printmaking techniques such as woodcut relief prints and etchings with imagery rooted in Mexican and American cultural tradition. Depictions of female protagonists, monarch butterflies, the sacred heart, ribbons, maize and symbolic flora and fauna propel narratives centered around the experience of living within the cultural limbo that many individuals today have become accustomed to. The juxtaposition of including various familial and cultural artifacts from opposing communities allows for those who live between cultural binaries to be seen, understood, and accepted.

It was unlikely that a Mexican man with a mustache that would make even Cheech Marin blush and a white woman with hair as gold as Rapunzel’s would collide to create me, an outlier. This story is not unique. Latin-American diaspora throughout history has led to vast integrations of culture which as a result birth generations of people who fail to occupy a singular space. My work explores the realities of moving through a homogenized world as a result of cultural displacement and integration.