Guillermo Verde

This print is a portrait of my cousin, Guillermo, one of my favorite family members. Guillermo immigrated from Peru to the United States at a very young age and started his own small house cleaning business. He was one of my only family members who encouraged me to be free and expressive, and he also talked to me about healing. He was one of the first men in my life who talked to me about his childhood trauma and talked about the impacts of domestic violence and neglect. That left an impression on me because he showed me that it was ok to talk about these issues in our family. His honesty chipped away at stigma and shame.

In this collage, I wanted to work with the full figure instead of just the face. And I also wanted to experiment with different kinds of shapes for the characters. This was a portrait that kicked off a body of work that was centered on figurative depictions.