Ana Teresa Fernández's guest appearances

Ana Teresa Fernández

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IU Assistant Professor of Photography Elizabeth Claffey speaks with artist Ana Teresa Fernández about the ideas of immigration and gender she explores in her work, and what inspires her to create.

Artist Ana Teresa Fernández

This week, news leaked of the Trump administration’s deployment of an unspecified number of military service members to paint stretches of the border reinforcements in the California town of Calexico. The goal: to improve the border’s "aesthetic appearance." There’s precedent to this. Wall builders go to great lengths to hide and distract from the brutality of border walls. For example, during the Cold War, the East German government ordered the Berlin Wall to be fully rebuilt more than once for the purpose of gaining prestige. That was before visual artists transformed that wall into the world’s largest canvas for expressions of resistance. For contemporary artist Ana Teresa Fernández, the idea of painting the U.S.-Mexico border is not new. Fernández is a renowned artist and social sculptor. She was born in Mexico and is based in California. Back in 2011, she painted stretches of the U.S.-Mexico border fence blue to resemble the color of the sky for a project she called Borrando La Frontera (Erasing the Border). Fernández has worked at the U.S.-Mexico border for over 15 years, before the Trump presidency, and has seen the border fence become increasingly militarized. “Where I became aware and it completely just hit me with a huge bang in my gut when I first saw it and witnessed it.” We spoke to Fernández about her life growing up in Mexico and Southern California, and what happened when she painted the border near Tijuana in a dress and high heels. We also discussed her continued artist’s practice at global border lines and crossing points for migrant families including the Mediterranean Sea, and her recent collaboration with writer and cultural geographer Rebecca Solnit.

This week, news leaked of the Trump administration’s deployment of an unspecified number of military service members to paint stretches of the border reinforcements in the California town of Calexico. The goal: to improve the border’s "aesthetic appearance." There’s precedent to this. Wall builders go to great lengths to hide and distract from the brutality of border walls. For example, during the Cold War, the East German government ordered the Berlin Wall to be fully rebuilt more than once for the purpose of gaining prestige. That was before visual artists transformed that wall into the world’s largest canvas for expressions of resistance. For contemporary artist Ana Teresa Fernández, the idea of painting the U.S.-Mexico border is not new. Fernández is a renowned artist and social sculptor. She was born in Mexico and is based in California. Back in 2011, she painted stretches of the U.S.-Mexico border fence blue to resemble the color of the sky for a project she called Borrando La Frontera (Erasing the Border). Fernández has worked at the U.S.-Mexico border for over 15 years, before the Trump presidency, and has seen the border fence become increasingly militarized. “Where I became aware and it completely just hit me with a huge bang in my gut when I first saw it and witnessed it.” We spoke to Fernández about her life growing up in Mexico and Southern California, and what happened when she painted the border near Tijuana in a dress and high heels. We also discussed her continued artist’s practice at global border lines and crossing points for migrant families including the Mediterranean Sea, and her recent collaboration with writer and cultural geographer Rebecca Solnit.

Erasing the Border and the Wall in Our Heads with Social Sculptor Ana Teresa Fernández

Julio César Morales

Tuesday, October 2, 2018, Art Practical hosted an evening of conversation between Ana Teresa Fernández and Julio César Morales, who spoke about how their respective practices are influenced by each other’s work and processes. This conversation was recorded live at the San Francisco Art Institute.Between You &amp; Me is a series of dialogic exchanges between artists and their collaborators and peers to materialize the countless conversations, musings, and debates that are often invisible yet play a significant role in the generative space of artmaking. This program is organized as part of an editorial column published online by Art Practical with support from the Kenneth Rainin Foundation, a private family foundation dedicated to enhancing quality of life by championing and sustaining the arts, promoting early childhood literacy, and supporting research to cure chronic disease.Ana Teresa Fernández, born in 1981 in Tampico, Mexico, lives and works in San Francisco. Her work explores the politics of intersectionality through time-based actions and social gestures, translated into masterful oil paintings, installations and videos. Within her work, performance becomes a tool for investigation as strong feminist undercurrents flow together with post-colonial rhetoric. Through her work, the artist illuminates the psychological and physical barriers that define gender, race, and class in Western society and the global south.Fernández has exhibited at the Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO, the Nevada Museum of Art, Reno, NV, Arizona State University Art Museum, Phoenix, AZ, the Grunwald Gallery at Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, Humboldt State University, Eureka, CA; the Tijuana Biennial, Tijuana, Mexico; Snite Museum at Notre Dame University, Notre Dame, IN; Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, CA and The Oakland Art Museum, Oakland, CA. Her work has been collected by institutions such the Denver Art Museum, the Nevada Museum of Art, and Kadist Art Foundation.Julio César Morales By deploying a range of media and visual strategies, Julio César Morales investigates issues of migration, underground economies, and labor on the personal and global scales. Morales’ practice employs multifarious mediums specific to each project or body of work. He has painted watercolor illustrations that diagram human trafficking methods, employed the DJ turntable, produced video and time-based pieces, reenacted a famous meal, all to elucidate social interactions and political perspectives.--Subscribe to Art Practical on iTunes to catch more episodes! Check us out on Instagram at @artpracticalsf. #APaudio

Tuesday, October 2, 2018, Art Practical hosted an evening of conversation between Ana Teresa Fernández and Julio César Morales, who spoke about how their respective practices are influenced by each other’s work and processes. This conversation was recorded live at the San Francisco Art Institute. Between You &amp; Me is a series of dialogic exchanges between artists and their collaborators and peers to materialize the countless conversations, musings, and debates that are often invisible yet play a significant role in the generative space of artmaking. This program is organized as part of an editorial column published online by Art Practical with support from the Kenneth Rainin Foundation, a private family foundation dedicated to enhancing quality of life by championing and sustaining the arts, promoting early childhood literacy, and supporting research to cure chronic disease. Ana Teresa Fernández, born in 1981 in Tampico, Mexico, lives and works in San Francisco. Her work explores the politics of intersectionality through time-based actions and social gestures, translated into masterful oil paintings, installations and videos. Within her work, performance becomes a tool for investigation as strong feminist undercurrents flow together with post-colonial rhetoric. Through her work, the artist illuminates the psychological and physical barriers that define gender, race, and class in Western society and the global south. Fernández has exhibited at the Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO, the Nevada Museum of Art, Reno, NV, Arizona State University Art Museum, Phoenix, AZ, the Grunwald Gallery at Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, Humboldt State University, Eureka, CA; the Tijuana Biennial, Tijuana, Mexico; Snite Museum at Notre Dame University, Notre Dame, IN; Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, CA and The Oakland Art Museum, Oakland, CA. Her work has been collected by institutions such the Denver Art Museum, the Nevada Museum of Art, and Kadist Art Foundation. Julio César Morales By deploying a range of media and visual strategies, Julio César Morales investigates issues of migration, underground economies, and labor on the personal and global scales. Morales’ practice employs multifarious mediums specific to each project or body of work. He has painted watercolor illustrations that diagram human trafficking methods, employed the DJ turntable, produced video and time-based pieces, reenacted a famous meal, all to elucidate social interactions and political perspectives. -- Subscribe to Art Practical on iTunes to catch more episodes! Check us out on Instagram at @artpracticalsf. #APaudio

Between You & Me: Ana Teresa Fernández and Julio César Morales