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from San Antonio — August 26, 2020

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Find more arts coverage every day at sacurrent.com Pink Toilets, Beer Bottles and Blow Dryers

Victoria Suescum puts her ‘Folk Pop’ into context

BY BRYAN RINDFUSS

As a teenager growing up in Panama, Victoria Suescum experienced one of her fi rst real-world art encounters in the unlikeliest of places: outside a hole-in-the-wall bar.

A far cry from the paintings she’d seen in books, the artwork in question was a six-foot beer bo le being painted on the exterior of a bodega.

“[The painter] was pu ing the sparkle on a li le drop of sweat on the beer bo le,” Suescum recalled. “And I was blown away. … [That] was the fi rst time I saw somebody actually make magic.”

The irony of this memory isn’t lost on Suescum, a widely exhibited artist who’s made a name for herself with exuberant paintings that recreate — and riff on — quirky, hand-painted advertisements that grace beauty salons, hardware stores, restaurants and other small businesses in South Texas, Mexico and Latin America.

Born in Washington D.C. and raised between the U.S. and Panama, Suescum relocated to San Antonio in 1989 when Panama was under the rule of Manuel Noriega.

“[Noriega] was ge ing very violent because, as we are going to fi nd out in this country, dictators don’t like to lose power,” Suescum said. “I left Panama because it was so violent, and I didn’t want to become a statistic. … It’s a long story, but to make it short, I ended up at UTSA.”

While earning her MFA there, Suescum experimented with various styles and themes. The jungle scenes she’d painted in Panama gave way to a black-and-white period sparked by the dictatorship she’d escaped.

“I worked on that until about 1996,” she explained. “And then I had a son and it changed my outlook on life. I started [painting in] monochrome and then slowly built my way back to a full pale e.”

Around that same time, Suescum began to photograph hand-painted advertisements as source material for paintings she calls “tienditas.” Interpretations of low-tech signs she’s captured in Texas, Mexico and Panama, these playful paintings pay tribute to the unassuming products and services they depict — raspas, paletas, tacos, tires, toilets, hairstyles, manicures and more, often accompanied by Spanglish phrases — as well as the overlooked tradition of hand-painted signs and the largely anonymous creators behind them.

“I celebrate these images,” Suescum said. “I study from them as seriously as I was taught to study Bonnard or Matisse or Renoir or Rembrandt.”

Courtesy Photo / The McNay

Although Suescum has exhibited everywhere from San Antonio’s bygone Museo Alameda to the Venice Biennale, her recently opened McNay Art Museum exhibition “Folk Pop” marks a milestone in her career. Housed in the McNay’s Charles Bu Paperworks Gallery, it’s also something of a departure for the museum as Suescum’s unframed works are fastened to the walls with thumbtacks.

During our preview of the exhibition, McNay Curator of Collections Lyle Williams described the paintings as “memory triggers” he hopes will resonate with viewers.

“As a kid growing up in South Texas, I would often spend weekends in Nuevo Laredo,” Williams said. “I remember walking on those hot sidewalks and smelling those smells and looking at these signs. … I wanted people to have that sensory-overload experience like you do in Mexico … smells and visuals and everything. I wanted to have that sense of environmental immersion. Of course, we can’t pipe in the smells.”

In hopes of learning more about the inspirations and stories behind “Folk Pop,” we scheduled a Zoom interview with Suescum, who is rightfully animated by recent developments in her career. “The planets must be lining up for me,” she said. Beyond her McNay show (on view through January 10, 2021), Suescum is in the planning stages for an exhibition at Galería Mateo Sariel in Panama, an international Latin festival at Austin Community College (where she has taught for the last 14 years) and a guest spot at “Brilla,” a leadership development program designed to empower Latina high school students in New London, Connecticut. Condensed excerpts from our conversation follow.

Has your work always been inspired by a big deal in several places. … I love it hand-painted signage? when I see an idea repeated. … One of No. … It was around 1996 that I started my top-notch favorite images is a li le photographing the tienditas. … One salt shaker pouring chile on a corn of my absolute favorites actually went cob. And [it] still exists at Frutería Los to Honduras for a symposium about Valles — they haven’t go en around women in the arts in Latin America. to repainting the side of the building, … That summer, somebody all along thank goodness. … Blow dryers [are the Pan-American Highway had been another San Antonio favorite]. … The painting pink thing about the toilets (laughs). blow dryers is, I It’s just hilarious think they are the to me because subject ma er that as I’m painting art history missed. these things, I’m You know, we have thinking a lot odalisques, and [about] what went still lifes of fruit, through the mind but art history of the person who skipped the blow created the image. dryer. So, somebody painted a pink toiHow did the McNay let and somebody Courtesy Photo / The McNay show come about? else says, “Oh that I’ve known Lyle is a really good idea. I want a pink toilet [Williams, McNay curator,] for a very on my hardware store.” Isn’t that crazy long time. … And I invited him to my that someone would think a pink toilet studio about two years ago. … And is what [they] need to get customers so, it’s something that has been in the through the door? works for a long time. Can I tell you something that’s really important to Do you see the tradition of hand-painted me? For a long time [after] I got to signage diminishing? San Antonio, my work was politically That is really an interesting question, minded. And when I was in Panama for because you would think it would be the dictatorship, I was doing protest completely replaced by digital images. art, painting on the streets, all kinds of But every single year that I go back to stuff . And so, when I started working Panama or take a drive through the on these colorful paintings, I thought, West Side, I see new ones. … So, they’re ‘Oh, they’re not political.’ But what’s recontinuing to be made. What I think ally interesting is that especially in this is very important is climate in the United that they tug culturStates right now ally at one’s heart. … where we’re being I think they sell the told go home, and product in a way that people don’t want a photograph canme here … you know not. Because they’re in what way my work very welcoming. I is very political that see those images ma ers to me? If and I know I can we — people from aff ord what’s in the Mexico and from store. But indeed, for Latin America — are example, Frutería Los being called rapists Valles here in San Anand murderers, the tonio, used to have only people who can the most fabulous really believe that painting of aguas Courtesy Photo / The McNay are people who don’t frescas all across the know us. But if peotop. And they just replaced it about ple then get to know us, then there is a two years ago — total photographs. glimmer of hope that they will learn to … So, there are fewer made as media value us. By merely existing right now, becomes more aff ordable, but they’re I’m a political statement. But my work defi nitely continuing to be created. at the McNay, by celebrating these painting that come from the poorest What are some of your favorite examples neighborhoods and pu ing them in in San Antonio? one of the most expensive art salons, I love the ma resses — twin y queen. His it causes people to value them. If there and hers — who knew? It’s actually a set can be any healing, this is my li le drop of [pink and blue] ma resses, and it’s in the bucket.