Today we’d like to introduce you to Erika Alonso.
Hi Erika, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I’m Erika Alonso, a multi-disciplinary artist living and working in Houston. I’ve lived in Texas for over 25 years and currently find myself as an artist emerging from the ever-burgeoning Houston art scene.
I started out as a watercolorist, making works on paper from my apartment in the Heights. In 2019, I got my own studio space, which allowed me to work on a larger scale, so that’s when I started painting with acrylics. Fast forward five years to 2024, and I’ve had three solo exhibitions and been part of dozens of group shows. I’ve completed two artist residencies, including one at Bush Intercontinental Airport, as part of their artist-in-residence AIR program. My paintings were shown alongside other incredible artists in Contemporary Texas Women Artists: Abstraction Here and Now at the Art Museum of Southeast Texas. I’m also a 2022 Supporting Artists and Creative Individuals grant recipient, a grant funded in part by the City of Houston through Houston Arts Alliance. I have management and gallery representation. What’s even more? Hundreds of my paintings are out there in the world, living their best lives with fine art collectors throughout the United States and internationally. Yet despite all of these exciting achievements, I approach my artmaking with the same curiosity and compulsion to create as I did when I first started painting.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
If making art was easy, it would not be fun! I think of paintings as problems to be solved, and over the years, I’ve found that creating problems comes easy to me—in art and in life. Fortunately, I also love solving problems, so my proclivity for destruction and resolve pairs nicely with my hard work ethic in the studio.
Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
I work primarily in acrylic and watercolor when painting, charcoal, and ink when creating works on paper, and wire for sculpture. My most recent works are an experiment with abstracting landscapes and figures to convey a dream-like memory made of paint. These whimsical, abstract-figurative landscape paintings are meant to capture a fleeting moment—the movement, rush, and whirl of it.
My method of making art is far from restrictive, but there are some commonalities across disciplines. My work often begins—and also sometimes ends—with gestural mark-making. I quickly chase a glimpse of something in the materials. This aspect of my process comes across to the viewer as figures emerge and then recede, only to appear again, perhaps slightly different than before. The indeterminateness of my artwork offers the viewer a chance to interact with the picture on their own terms and come to their own conclusions.
I like to describe my work as an escape from reality to places that are dynamic, energetic, and whimsical.
If we knew you growing up, how would we have described you?
I was always making things, going through phases of embroidery, cross stitch, latch hook, crochet, wood burning, painting, everything you could find at the craft store. Going to the craft store with my mom was my favorite. If I could define myself as a child in three words, I would say creative, compulsive, and sensitive. I would define my adult self in the same way!
Contact Info:
- Website: http://erikaalonso.art/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/erikaalonsoart/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ErikaAlonsoArtist
Image Credits
Charles Holt Photography
