Mia Bella Chavez - identity on paper
About the Exhibition: Inspired by the works of Soo Kim, Johanna Goodman, and Raoul Hausman, Mia Bella seeks to find a balance between intention and experimentation. Her work points to cultural references, societal standards, and visual stereotypes by mixing elements of realism and abstraction. From somber tones to fields of color, eclectic facial expressions, manipulation of scale, and use of symbolism, her stories as a Queer, Latina living in Los Angeles come to life.
Identity on Paper focuses on her manipulation and repurposing of the medium to transmit emotions to the viewer. Similar to Norman Rockwell’s Triple Self-Portrait, Mia Bella attempts to channel how she experiences the world, lives in it, and simultaneously captures/collects the burden of information to make sense of it all. Mia Bella’s visual arrangements are concurrently full of wonder, soul, and social commentary. Various elements and twists are intentionally at play throughout her personal, multilayered creations. The result is a collection of woven stories that invites viewers to interpret the world around us through their unique imaginations.
About the Artist: Mia Bella Chavez is an interdisciplinary artist trained in photography. At the age of 15 she became one of the youngest artists to display work in the Getty Museum. In 2019 Mia Bella completed visual art courses at California Summer School for the Arts and in Cuba through a study abroad program. She displayed her first solo fine art show, All At Once, with Las Fotos Project in the fall of 2020. At the age of 19 she became the first woman of color on the NIKE photo equipment team. Mia Bella continues to make multimedia work focused on social activism, in Los Angeles and New York City.
*This exhibition is on display at Truly LA located at 216 S Alameda St, Los Angeles, CA 90012.
Triple Self Portrait, 2020. Inspired by Norman Rockwell's triple self-portrait, in which he represents his artistic process via a painting of himself painting a self-portrait while looking at himself in the mirror and a reference image. I chose to express my artistic process in three parts: observation, interaction, and "data" collection, and the articulation of your conclusion, which is the piece itself and what it tells the viewer.
Jigsaw, 2020. My work, while fulfilling, has also been an escape from facing issues and emotions. This "busyness" is represented by the fragmented image that is neither concrete nor whole because it rendered me the same.
Glitch, 2020. At school, I avoided using slang and foul language for fear of perpetuating racist stereotypes. After school, I would go back to navigating spaces that deemed communicating as such, as “speaking white.” The constant change in environment caused me to shift from one cultural dialect to the next; oftentimes referred to as code switching. This piece explores how this change can be represented visually.
Glitz and Glamour, 2020. As a Los Angeles native, Hollywood, and the fame it represented felt omnipresent. The exposure, even while at a distance, has inspired me in my career to break that barrier to success.
My Studio, 2020. The L.A River, due to its proximity to my family’s home, has become my place of comfort and inspiration. Its presence helps me work through problems and offers tokens to remember the past. In this way, the river acts as my studio or office.
Discussion Board, 2019. I was taught at a young age to be as fluid as I can in all aspects of life. At school, I could meander with the Aryan offspring of the 1% and after school, would just as easily spend time with children from working-class homes in corners of Los Angeles’ urban blight. It wasn't done consciously, per se, but I knew well enough that these two different versions of myself were not interchangeable. The serious academic version of me that strove for perfection in predominantly white spaces is represented here by this elegant, soft self-portrait which is rendered irrelevant, out of place, and arguably pretentious in this new environment which contrasts the self-portrait with the harshness of its reality.
Patchwork, 2020. I have always hidden the complexities of my relationship with my father. Sharing it made me feel vulnerable - naked even. Through good and bad, our relationship has both made me who I am and broken me apart — a cycle of hurting and healing. In more recent years, he struggled with a highly invasive cancer that forced him to go through a very physical version of this cycle before he eventually passed away. Alludes to the childhood game, Operation.
Religion, 2020. Karma and energy have been foundational in my beliefs. While not subscribing to any religion, I subscribe to the thought that “to see god, you must see through your heart” because actions and intentions speak volumes louder than words. When I think of religion I am reminded of the employment of religious symbolism in the Latinx community: specifically, Jesus on the cross. In my understanding of faith, when all is said and done, it is not a cis man I’ve never met who pays for my sins, it is my heart.