Who Am I?
Hi! My name is Sol Aguirre Saravia and I was born in 2003 in Los Angeles, California. With both parents Argentinian, I've lived in Buenos Aires, Argentina as long as I can remember.
Living in Argentina has brought to me beautiful memories that I will always treasure, but it has also taught me how it's like to be a young woman in a country where systematic misogyny is practiced.
Through the years I have learnt that the situation in my home was very similar in other countries in Latin America.
The feeling of injustice took over me and I started learning more and more about movements like #NiUnaMenos or #MeToo in the USA. I educated myself to the point where I began considering myself a feminist. But I never new what could I actually do to make a change, until I understood that art is a form of expression.
I fused art and feminism together, creating my own artwork expressing my anguish towards issues women in Latin America are obligated to face at some point during their lifetime.
Papayas
"Papayas" is my intention to in a way mock those who consider female genitalia a taboo topic. Woman are rarely ever talked to about our own body and sexuality and my intention with this piece is to break with the stigma with a fruit which resembles and symbolizes the female vulva: the papaya.
I also adapted my own version of pop-art with colorful and vibrant papayas.
I did so by literally stamping the fruit on the canvas with different colors repeated timed.
El Mundo Esta Mirando
Unfortunately, today, abortion is illegal in Argentina, causing thousands of deaths annually among women because of so.
The wire hanger is a symbol of clandestine abortions, and it also has been presented like that in The New York Times 2018 publication. It made woman in Argentina feel watched and looked over, giving us more power and motivation to keep up the fight. The quote "The World Is Watching" was on the page, and that is why this piece was titled the way it is.
Cocktail de Pastillas
The pills that compose this piece are all diet supplements, anxiety remedies and contraceptives.
In "Cocktail de Pastillas" my aim is to tackle what women are obligated to consume, not only literally, but also psychologically.
Both matters are imposed by the society we live in and I believe that these expectations affect women negatively.
Presión Alta
This image is inspired by Hans Bellmer's “Unica”, which is also the reason for the black and white filter on this piece.
Using today's photography and technology I decided to make my first version of the refigured and distorted woman through photoshop and wires and cords.
What happens in the image is the representation of a woman in a state of alert (big eyes) forced to smile (hooks in the mouth). This deformation of her face is because of the state of stress and pressure caused by her environment.
El Dice
"El Dice" is a representation of how I visualize women when they are in a meeting, or simply in conversation with only men.
With the use of photoshop (with the FaceTune application), I managed to erase the woman's mouth: to present the feeling of the lack of importance that a woman's word has before men.
As for the technique, this image was the result of an investigation on surrealism.
Su Ultima Cena
"Su Ultima Cena" is an adaptation of Da Vinci's work "The Last Supper" and inspired by Mary Beth Edelson's work, "Some Living American Women Artists", 1972. My version is of some of the Latin American women who were victims of femicides in 2020.
I took the title of my work literally in Spanish, all of the women on this work had a last supper.
The technique I used was photoshop with the applications "Superimpose" and then for retouching and to increase the quality of the image "FaceTune".
Dentadura
"Dentadura" is the beginning of a serie that I created that tackles fears that women face throughout their lives.
I decided to work with teeth, since it symbolizes wealth and social class though history.
Having shiny white teeth implied that this person came from a wealthy family, including the economic classes.
I not only enlarged my teeth, but I also narrowed my eyes. The face is assimilated to that of a mouse, an animal that symbolizes (especially in cartoons) poverty.
Particularly, teeth frequently becomes a insecurity during adolescence, or at least I went through so.
Grito
In this image, my goal was to capture the woman in the moment where she got tired of remaining silent after enduring situations and demands imposed by society for being a woman.
I use photoshop in this way to create an extremely exaggerated image and generating a giant mouth, exploding, and in a saturated way. Always emphasizing the hyperbolic, avoiding the cartoonish.
Consumo
This image refers to when patients are forced to open their mouths by doctors to verify that they have swallowed their medication. In this work I want to express the amount of filth that women consume, whether literal or psychological.
I decided not to include literal pills in the woman's tongue for aesthetic reasons because of the image.
The mouth is abnormally large because of this idea that what one ingests is too much, too much for what the body is designed to.
Mi Vieja
One of the fears that women face is becoming an old, mean and ugly woman. Based on the stereotype of the character of a witch (from a fairy tale and princesses where women are perfect, presenting a delusional image about them). I work with the emesis of that idea of perfection.
The princess is young, cute and nice.
The witch is old, ugly and mean.
I work on the nose and chin the most because it's a typical characteristic in cartoons.
Pods: Collage Experimentation.
Inspired by Mondrian's “Broadway Boogie Woogie”, working with JUUL pods was intentional, I wanted to convey a message of questioning and reflection to all those who make foolish decisions that seem unconscious. There is a reason behind the cartridges seem different paths, and it is following the metaphor of "you choose your own paths in life", referring to the different options or decisions that one has or can make. And I think that having done it with a product that in the short term is more dangerous than tobacco cigarettes, I think it is funny, since it is the opposite of life. Finally, I want to raise awareness and make my colleagues wake up before it is too late and think about the decisions that could risk health and if they are really worth it.
Rosa: Acrylic on Canvas Experimentation.
With this work I wanted to demonstrate the chaos and disorder in my head, and I think I managed to achieve it, because it is exactly how I imagine it. There is disorder, stress and anxiety (presented as Max Ernst’s frottage), and on the other hand the figures inspired by Juan Felipe Noe, order, tranquility, and joy, represented in their vibrant colors.