Art Chat with Yngrid
Mosaic Souls had the pleasure of sitting down with the very talented, global visual artist Yngrid Chacon, who is currently residing in our local DMV area.
We got to hear about her introduction to art, her experiences in creating art in 3 of the 5 countries she's lived in, and how she connects her art with keeping her mental health sound.
READ OUR CONVERSATION BELOW!
Can you tell me a little bit about yourself and the different types of art that you create?
I’m Honduran-Dominican, and lately I’ve been creating digital visual art, and doing photography. I started off as a visual artist and what led me to design was when I began creating posters and magazines for my high school and people were very receptive to them, so I realized that this could be a possible career choice for me. It would give me the opportunity to stay in the creative field, still be a visual artist, and get some practical use out of my skills as well.
Nice! So you answered this a bit in your last response, but how long have you been creating art?
I started with sketching when I was about 11 years old. My dad was really into comic books! He would stop by the comic book store, bring me back some books, and I would just draw the different characters. It turned out that I was pretty good, and that my drawings actually resembled the characters.
Wow at 11! I was still doing stick figures then.
Yea I was very surprised! Before I would draw stick figures with their hands behind their backs because I couldn’t draw hands *hahaha*. But then I found out that when I had something to reference, I was able to draw -- not well, but now I can. And professionally around the time I turned 20, I started to get paid gigs for my art.
Do you remember your first paid gig?
Let me see -- I think for visual arts I was hired to paint this 7 foot 'Statue of Liberty' into a “Ganja Goddess” for this dispensary in Vancouver. I was painting this outside of their store, so I would get a lot of people on the street interacting with me and I was able to express myself creatively. but it was great because it also fostered community engagement. Anyone who came to the store would tell me their suggestions on the piece, what they liked, what they didn’t like, would ask me about myself, and tell me about themselves. And that’s what encouraged me, because art is so personal, I wouldn’t say it’s lonely but you can do it by yourself, you know. It’s not something where you NEED other people because you need varied skills. So that really encouraged me to take the process of creating art on a public level.
I like that. Well I know that you’ve lived in a number of places -- first can you tell me all of them?
Yea, so I’ve lived in Honduras, United States, Dominican Republic, Thailand, and Canada.
Wow, so many different places with different cultures. Did living in these diverse environments play a part in how you create?
Oh definitely! When I was really young I was influenced by Japanese anime a lot and in Thailand that was a very prominent art form. Thailand has so many great artists. I use to go to a studio every weekend and see all different types of art styles. I studied Realism, and then we would have a comic book artist come in who would draw a mural in 2 days, or people who had very eclectic abstract styles, so I got to be exposed to a variety of art styles and learn early on that there is no 1 generic way of making art.
And how old were you around this time?
I lived in Thailand from age 13 to 18.
Lupe la Norteña (2015)
Made In: Photoshop
This image shows Yngrid's growth in sketching -- from pencil and paper to the digital screen.
Moving to the United States, did you see your skills change in any kind of way?
My skills became much more refined, when I moved to the U.S., especially working at a design firm. Here small things are scrutinized such as spacing, so it all taught me to become more detailed oriented. Even when I compare older pieces that I’d done 1-2 years before, especially digital pieces because of the construction of the file, I can see how my work is much more professional, more organized -- I can definitely see a jump in skill since moving here.
Looking at your page and your work, I’ve seen how you’ve developed in your illustrations. And I love your Kali Uchis piece!
Awesome, yes I love her!
Would you say that you have a specific vision, or a way of creating your art? How would you define your vision?
An aesthetic that I’m attracted to right now is ‘Futuristic’ -- clean sharp lines, minimal but with purpose. I also like the idea of space, because I equate the future with us expanding our frontiers, so I like to include a lot of that. I’ve had people look at my work and ask, “Is there a reason why you always draw robots?” And well they’re not robots, but they tend to have that sci-fi type of feel, which has provided inspiration for my art.
What are some of your favorite projects that you’ve worked on?
The projects that I’m most proud of aren’t necessarily the projects that are the most iterated, but are the ones that elicit reactions from people. Recently I did a digital painting called “Fresh Flowers” that was based on a meetup I had with my friends because many of them were about to move, so it was one of our last get togethers. And it was such a great moment that I wanted to represent it visually. When I showed it to them they were in awe because they felt that I did capture the essence of our friendship. and that’s what inspires me to create art, to see people reacting to it, to be able to elicit feelings, and encourage discussions based off of my artwork.
I can imagine how they felt, because to create something with that kind of meaning takes time and real effort, so for you to sit down and do that is impressive.
You really get to learn a lot from people. Back when I was in college I did a piece called “What’s Your Archetype?”, and it was modeled after Tarot Card readings. How it worked was I had 6 different typefaces on different cards, and I developed personas for each of them. So I had a booth and people would come over and disclose a little bit about themselves to me and I would match them with their most comparable typeface.
That’s pretty cool!
That was pretty great, because it was a part of this show with a lot of my classmates from school and they were all very talented, so I didn’t really think mine would stand out -- but it was the only part of the show that had some type of human interaction. People were lining up, because it gave them a chance to talk about themselves, and for someone to give them observations on what they shared.
What is something near and dear to your heart or you think needs to be said that you would like to discuss?
I’ve been thinking about what bigger connection my art has, and personally for me art stems as a way for me to deal with my mental health. It serves as a way to visually express what I was going through, especially when I wasn’t doing so well. A lot of my pieces circle around my mental health and have sparked conversations with some of my closest friends, to find that they too are dealing with a lot of the same issues. And there’s a negative stigma with women and mental health, really with health in general because we’re often seen as the weaker sex or often seen as hypochondriacs, so people can be very quick to dismiss when we are not feeling well whether physically or mentally. so that is something that I hope my art can help with, in terms of starting discussions about real mental health problems that people deal with everyday. It’s a silent battle and there are so many going on right now in the U.S. You can see someone walking down the street and you don’t know what they’re dealing with, what sort of things are affecting them day-to-day. And I think especially with the climate that is current in this country, it’s really a time to start having those difficult discussions that make us uncomfortable but have to be said, because even though we don’t see them those struggles are still happening. And it’s not just mental health it’s sexism, it’s racism, but they all have that commonality that we all talk about it, but we don’t do anything about it.
Full of Love (2016)
Made In: Photoshop and Illustrator
Low Battery (2017)
Made In: Illustrator
Any advice to people who may want to start creating art as a way to combat mental health?
Try to put all of those feelings towards something productive. Some people may feel daunted by this task and ask, well how am I supposed to put all of my feeling into this one thing? Primarily what I like to do in moments like that I like to think, "does this remind me of anything?" For example, one of my favorite movies is Marie Antoinette by Sofia Coppola, and there’s a scene where Marie is overcome with sadness and she goes into this beautifully, decadent room and just cries into these pillows -- and it’s such a beautiful visual of a person going through something really shitty that everyone has experienced, but it's so beautifully presented. So whenever I get that visual cue I just try to recreate it and put my own spin on it. I would say if you don’t know where to start, think of something visually that the feeling reminds you of. If you happen to come across the visual in a film, pause it and draw it out. That process is going to make you feel so much better because you’ll become so engaged that mentally you’ll be transported as it starts to come to life in front of you. And then start adding and changing things, color, pieces, sizes, let it represent you and what it is that you’re going through.
That sounds like a great process -- it sounds like something I should try. I’d actually really like to.
I think that because there’s so much great art out there, people see that and then they get discouraged from thinking that they won’t be able to create something of that caliber. But I know people who have never drawn in their lives and they’ll just get the urge to start one day and it’ll be very good! Rather than having the existing art discourage, people should use it to inspire.
I don’t think mine will be great, but I’ll definitely try it!
The great thing about art is that it is all so different. I love how it varies, like those who practice fine art versus those who just create out of pure expression. There’s so much that you can take from art.
Yngrid I want to thank you SO much for your time, it was great talking all things art with you!