Photo by Dana Amihere. Marité Vidales, an artist who emigrated from Costa Rica, explores the human soul in flight and the physicality of moving from place to place using bold orange butterflies. “Wings” will remain on display with the “Caminos, CAMINANTE: A Path as we Travel” collection through Sunday at the Lustine Center’s ArtDC gallery in downtown Hyattsville.

Published on: Thursday, October 27, 2011

By Dana Amihere

In celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month, four Latin American artists came together Oct. 15 to open their exhibit at the ArtDC gallery in downtown Hyattsville.

“Caminos, CAMINANTE: A Path as we Travel” is a collection of works inspired by the words of Spanish poet Antonio Machado, translated, “Traveler, there is no road. The path is made as we travel.”

For artist Marité Vidales, an émigré from Costa Rica, her work represents both a real and spiritual journey through a passion for symbols and colors.

Vidales, who has exhibited internationally for two decades, depicts paper boats in several colorful acrylics on canvas series. A visual metaphor for an immigrant’s journey to find a new home, the paper boat symbolizes the fragility of the hope for a better life. Her painted triptych “Wings” explores the human soul in flight and the physicality of moving from place to place using bold orange butterflies.

“Caminos, CAMINANTE” largely includes works studying the artists’ own experiences as immigrants, a shared experience with many residents of Prince George’s County.

From 2000 to 2010, Hispanics saw the largest wave of growth in the Washington, D.C. area, so much so in Montgomery County that the population is now a minority-majority 50.7 percent Hispanic. In Prince George’s County, the Hispanic population nearly doubled in a decade, according to U.S. Census Bureau data.

Though hung in a small two-room venue, 50 works ranging in media, including acrylics on canvas and found objects, feature Latin American emigrants who have made lives in the United States but continue to be inspired by Latin American culture.

Chilean artist Claudia Olivios, who says she drew before she even learned to walk, uses her painting to work out issues of sex, ethnicity and gender. She used to paint strong Latino figures but felt she was being pigeon-holed into a stereotype, Olivios said. Her work since evolved into white figures, mostly women, which represent a lack of ethnicity because “white is the absence of color,” Olivios said.

Olivios’s work today is centered on the more fluid emotional aspects of femininity as opposed to the stagnant physical aspects of being female.

Ironically, however, her favorite work in the show, she completed with her husband and fellow artist Sergio Olivios. “En la Playa” is a collaborative work created with encaustic, one of the oldest artistic methods. Sergio, who prefers the medium for its emphasis on tactility, spread heated beeswax with ink to develop amorphous, playful swirls of color and texture. Once the background was complete, Claudia says she set to work to “find the image in it.”

“I’m a woman and (painting women) is something I like to do for my sisters who still live in a male-dominated society. Embracing femininity is valuable,” she explained.

Similarly, artist Gloria Valdes “Tarasca” paints to honor her ancestral people in her work. Self-taught, Tarasca’s work intercalates the colors, shapes and identity found in the culture of the Tarascans, the original inhabitants of Michocan state in Mexico and her namesake. Tarasca says her paintings are her personal fantasy world in which she becomes “patient and psychoanalyst.” Tarasca has exhibited in and around the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area, including a 2010 exhibit in Lanham.

“Caminos, CAMINANTE,” which also features the work of Elba Molina, will remain on display through Sunday at the Lustine Center’s ArtDC gallery, located at 5710 Baltimore Avenue in Hyattsville.