WE Elevate
WE ELEVATE • SWEET HOME TALLAHASEE • AROUND TOWN • COMMUNITY
By Briana Smith
FINDING BELONGING THROUGH ART
T
Local LIVING Living LOCAL
his month we highlight a local artist and professor at Florida State University. Lillian Garcia Roig brings her unique culture and lived experiences to life in her art. Her powerful and intriguing pieces, infused with vibrant colors speak to the meaning of life, emotions and her cultural values. I had the
rare opportunity to interview this phenomenal woman that elevates so many in her roles as an awardwinning, highly acclaimed artist and professor. She is of Cuban American heritage and the new chair of our department at Florida State University. I know that you will be inspired by her words and art.
Lillian Garcia Roig Florida State University
How do you describe your art? In three words; intense, engaged and layered. My works feature large-scale on-site painting installations of dense landscapes that overwhelm the viewer’s perceptual senses. Each painting is created over the course of the day in an intense wet-on-wet cumulative manner, that underscores the complex nature of trying to capture first-hand the multidimensional and ever-changing experience of being in that specific location. They are about being present and opening to seeing what is revealed over time in front of me, in the moment. Formally her works are as much about the materiality of the paint and the physicality of the painting process as they are about mixing and mashing the illusionist possibilities of painting with its true abstract nature. On a more personal level, all of the on-site works she has made are at their core, about trying to negotiate the complex propositions of sense of place and
belonging, which so influence the construction of personal identity.
How does your Latinx heritage flow through your work?
complexity and fluidity are seen as normal elements in our worlds. I believe this comfort with and parallel aesthetic attraction to a multifaceted existence, comes from my background as a Cuban refugee and first generation immigrant. I had to be open to seeing things from at least two culturally distinct, and often opposing perspectives. Unsurprisingly, these identity struggles are common themes in Latin American art of recent decades. For example, the postmodern Latin American subject is presented as fragmented and fluid, with multiple unresolved, and at times contradictory identities.
What challenges have you faced? Many challenges. It may not be
I think that my intuitive belief in the “maximalist aesthetic” and believe that more could be more, rather than the Bauhausian mantra I was taught in school, that “less was more.” This is directly connected to my immigrant background where one wants to both assimilate and hold onto ones traditions and cultural root as much as possible. This often leads to having to accept and live with two seemingly contradictory positions where
tallahassee woman | 22 | october • november 2020
apparent now, because my life seems pretty darn good, but I could probably fill an entire magazine with my challenges. What I can say is that I have always been called “Cabesota”, which translates to ”hard-headed” in Spanish. This is a term I always thought was much more of a good thing than a bad one. Yet, this is one that when applied to women, has an negative implication. Luckily, I must have been born a hard core feminist because I always thought that if I really believed in something, studied and worked hard at understanding it, my opinion, view, and desire to do that thing was a
