7 Latinx artists based in Nevada

Nevada is home to notable Latinx artists specializing in a variety of styles and mediums. Here are seven with works you can’t miss.

Artists from different backgrounds have been calling Nevada home for years, including these seven who are currently based in the state. While this list is by no means exhaustive, we will discuss a few individuals who are making an impact in our communities through various mediums. Some artists specialize in graffiti painting, whereas others concentrate on sculptures or pyrography (don’t worry, we had to Google the term too).

We’d also like to encourage you to do your own research to find local artists whom you’d like to learn more about and support. Uplifting members of our community who are telling our stories is an important act of solidarity, and it’s also an easy way to learn something new and meet new people in the process.

For a closer look at other Latinx artists who are shaping narratives about immigration in Nevada, click here. And here are a few artists highlighted by the City of Las Vegas.

Juan Ochoa and Melody Gallegos

Juan Ochoa is a Mexican-born artist who was raised in Las Vegas. He specializes in graffiti work and painting and contributes to Graffiti Park Las Vegas. On his website, Ochoa describes how he got into graffiti work when he was younger, saying that “I didn’t have the best materials to start with, but I made the best out of what I had.” He believes it was these unique, humble beginnings that ultimately propelled him into becoming the successful artist he is today.

Take a closer look at Ochoa’s artwork here, and follow him on Instagram if you want to keep up with his current projects.

Ochoa is managed by fellow artist Melody Gallegos. The duo’s website describes her as someone driven by positivity who enjoys using a variety of designs and colors in her artwork to express her mood and bring happiness to others. To connect with Gallegos on Instagram, click here.

Tia Flores

Tia Flores is a Nevada native who specializes in pyrography, which is a more formal way of referring to the art of decorative wood burning. Essentially, when you’re a pyrographer, you decorate wood with a heated object to create one-of-a-kind designs and images.

Flores states on her website that her designs are primarily inspired by her maternal and paternal grandmothers, as well as her family as a whole. She also says that, “I view my artwork as a creative interaction with Mother Nature by simply accenting its natural beauty while maintaining the individual uniqueness of the calabaza. Spurred by a desire to know more about my ancestors, my creations have evolved into a new area of culturally themed gourds, including vessels, drums, masks, totems and jewelry.”

Flores creates her pyrography designs on various objects, including masks, totems, sculptures, and jewelry. Take a closer look at her work through the gallery on her website or by following her Facebook page.

Cristian Sosa

Cristian Sosa is a metalworker based in Las Vegas. He operates Sosa Metalworks, which is billed as “a shop with a soul” that specializes in handmade motorcycles. Sosa has owned the company for two decades and is often praised for his original designs and skilled fabrication.

Check out a few of his highlighted creations here, and follow along with Sosa on Instagram for a more in-depth look into how he designs and builds each of these uniquely made machines.

Zully Mejía

Though she’s currently based in London, England, Zully Mejía attended the University of Nevada in Las Vegas and has had her work incorporated into permanent exhibits at both the Marjorie Barrick Museum of Art and in the city of Las Vegas itself. Mejía is Peruvian-American, and she creates “works that engage with the themes of immigration, womanhood, and being a person of colour.”

Click here to browse through the paintings she currently has available on her website to get a feel for the work she creates (and to buy a painting if you’re in the market for something!). Additional examples of her work can be found on her website’s portfolio.

Justin Favela

Justin Favela is based in Las Vegas, and he’s known for creating larger-scale sculptures and installations. In the past, he’s explored themes like the Latinx experience, what it means to be queer, art history, and pop culture. He also focuses on his Guatemalan-Mexican-American heritage and his Las Vegas community in his incredible pieces that are largely constructed with fringed tissue paper.

According to his website, “At the core of Justin’s art practice is his investigation of traditional Mexican or Latin American craft—specifically cartoneria (more commonly known as piñata making).” In addition to using cartoneria to create showstopping pieces, like a life-sized pinata-style sculpture of a lowrider, Favela co-hosts the Latinos Who Lunch podcast with his friend, Emmanuel Ortega, who is an art historian and curator. Favela has been the recipient of the Joan Mitchell Fellowship, as well as the 2018 Alan Turing LGBTIQ Award for International Artist.

Browse through his website to check out some of his most notable pieces and to learn more about his journey to becoming an artist.

Sierra Slentz

Based in downtown Las Vegas, Sierra Slentz was born in Laguna Beach, CA, and moved to Nevada when she was a teenager. She’s a visual artist who typically specializes in ceramic installations and objects, though she’s also a trained interdisciplinary artist and photographer. She studied at Sierra Nevada College and the University of Nevada.

According to a biography of Slentz from a previous exhibition, “Her work is informed by her interest in geological formations, archeological finds, and her time spent in the desert observing life cycles and urban sprawl. She explores ideas of the persistence of human intervention and mankind’s unintentional mark on the landscape.”

To craft her projects, Slentz first takes photographs and collects artifacts when she’s exploring an area, like the Mojave Desert. From there, she’ll make a mold and ceramic cast from the objects she found to build into various sculptures until she’s created a new exhibition of work.

This article first appeared on Good Info News Wire and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.

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