I am a disciple of Jean-Michel Basquiat, Pablo Picasso and Diego Rivera. I paint intuitively with zero hesitation in my brush strokes. I attribute that to Basquiat’s style. Picasso’s work taught me to break the rules but also to learn and know those rules before breaking them. The work of Rivera inspires me to paint my heritage with pride and to represent my culture.

I was an American kid who grew up in a Mexican household on the West Side of Saint Paul, Minnesota. I grew up in a modest townhouse with two younger sisters and two younger brothers, raised under the watchful eye of my Grams. I went to a private school and I had a really hard time but I adapted and found a way to get through my classes and graduated by the skin of my teeth. As a kid I learned more about people than many adults have learned over a lifetime. I learned what makes people who they are. I learned the qualities that build character and integrity and what breaks it down, or prevents it from from developing at all.

By the time I was 25 I had already worked multiple jobs as security in casinos and bars, and eventually became a bartender. It was my job to observe people, to anticipate their actions, to recognize a shift in the energy of a room. I was really good at it. I still am.

When my son was born, new perspectives had me feeling I needed to do something different with my life. Knowing I wasn’t going to conform to any kind of ‘normal’ job, I started going to school for photography. By the time my daughter was born, photography had already turned into painting. In 2007 I showed my first painting, Adelitas, at a little coffee shop on West 7th in Saint Paul.

When I first started painting all my work reflected my culture and I was referred to as a Mexican artist. I wasn’t ashamed, but I started painting abstracts just so people couldn’t put me in that box. I live in a city that allows me to interact with a lot different people and it all affects me as an artist. Now I want people to say “He is a Mexican artist…and look at the diversity in his body of work.” I paint to represent people of many nationalities. I paint for those who are oppressed and for those who stand up against their oppressors. I paint to make the marginalized glamorous and beautiful, just as I see them.

Minnesota taught me a lot, especially from my West Side neighborhood. I learned to be tough in the world because people would take advantage if I let my guard down. I learned about my culture and that ‘holding your head up’ is how we present ourselves. Minnesota taught me love and heartbreak, not only from a romantic perspective but from family and friends also. I learned to work my ass off because you always reap what you sow. It taught me to be vulnerable in order to have connections, not just between individuals but between families. And there is a flip side. Minnesota, for me, was like a complicated relationship. It wasn’t good for me but I didn’t know how to get out. I knew it wasn’t ever going to let me grow as an artist or even as a person. I never felt welcomed as an artist there. People who knew me as a bartender couldn’t understand what I was doing. The work I did as a painter didn’t get acknowledged as work because art, to most people in Minnesota, is just a hobby. I wanted to be like the heroes in my life, relentless and driven to succeed. I wanted the world to have proof of my existence. I spent a lot of time with my son when he was a child, but not being an everyday dad to both my children will always be my biggest regret. The circumstances just didn’t allow for it. I have Mayan glyphs tattooed on my fingers to represent their birthdates because inevitably, everything I do with my hands affects them. I want my children to be proud of me.

The decision to move away from my family and take a chance on myself was crazy but it was a chance I had to take. I found that the West Coast gave me the feeling I had searched for in Minnesota. There was a true appreciation for the work I was doing. On both the East and West Coasts art is serious business and I understood that. When I left the Midwest I was entering a completely different world. It was just me, my dog Chica and anything else that would fit into my little Mazda P2600 pickup truck. I eventually found myself in Seattle with an opportunity to sell my work at Pike Place Market. I was screened in with my work and accepted as a vendor, but more importantly, I was accepted as an artist by the people there. I was learning how to sell my work and trying to find a balance between figuring out what people wanted and staying true to my art. I was learning how to deal with uneducated comments from the public, rejection and being vulnerable in a completely different way. I’m not gonna lie, it was a struggle. A lot of things got in my way including housing issues. I wanted to give up. People from the Market community stopped me and said, “No, you belong here.” I also became good friends with many people in the medical marijuana industry where numerous opportunities opened up for me. A lot of people have helped me and encouraged me to keep going on this path that is my destiny.

At the end of the day art has allowed me to step out of the world and into myself. It has been a form of therapy for me. Painting is a necessity that has transformed my life and ultimately helped me through some dark times in my earlier years. My paintings are emotions, conversations and opinions. They are disappointments and hope. Pain and forgiveness. They are past memories and dreams for the future. Not just my own future but for the future of my children and for my family. For all people, really.

~ Ernesto