Carolina Caples

I was born in Guadalajara Mexico in 1971. My mother is American and my father is Mexican. I grew up an only child and found I loved to draw. In college, I initially thought I would pursue a degree in graphic design to have a practical career but I took one painting class and was hooked! Around this time, I became obsessed with reconnecting with my family in Mexico and started painting about it. Painting was the perfect way to express myself with whatever was going on in my life. It was and is pure magic and I have continued this practice ever since. As long as I’m painting or creating images, I know I am serving my life purpose. Eventually, I did also become a graphic designer and I now face paint as well. I currently live in Tucson, AZ with my teenage son and three dogs.

I use bold graphics and vibrant colors in my paintings, heavily influenced by Mexican and American painters, Frida Kahlo and Alice Neel. I paint as as a way to reflect on my life and the situation I was born into. As the daughter of a white, Amer ican mother and Mexican father, I experienced the results of the Mexican ‘machismo’ culture firsthand from being abandoned by my father as a child for being born a girl. This drove me into an ongoing investigation of the affects of machismo attitudes and how they have shaped my life which I explore in my paintings. I do portraiture working from photographs, adding conceptual elements like intestinal, organic shapes and natural elements that explore themes of struggling for self worth and the search for security. I also create abstract paintings that explore the subconscious and my connection to spirit. This is portrayed energetically and sometimes chaotically with fluid, balanced, rounded lines, beautiful rhythmic color, and psychedelic qualities of layering shapes and subtracting colors. My process allows me to get to the root of my ideas about who I am by turning visuals that come to me in meditation by quieting the mind brought into a reality on canvas.

Get in touch with Carolina: www.carolinacaples.com

Instagram: carolinacaples