soundpedro2020schizophonia participation:
Echoes of Liquid Light
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Some, if not all of my experiences have shaped how I create work. Previously I had worked in metals, forging and smithing the metals, manipulating it to create female centered pieces. Wanting to connect more intuitively with my audience, I left the work of woman behind. I now work in plastics, manipulating plexi the same way I would have a piece of steel. Wrapping it with clear plastic to create an environment for my viewer to engage with. Some works are wrapped with poured resin, pouring, bending, bleeding and pulling the material to into objects that will withstand the test of time. The pieces I make tap into stories of my past, experiences I have had as a bi-cultural, multiethnic woman.

I grew up in Panama on a military base and later California. As a child, I was constantly marked by my non-white identity, not belonging to anybody, not belonging to the US or Hispanic communities. A lot of my work is about visibility and identities, having people see themselves or their struggles mirrored in it much like my own visibility, being seen and unseen.

When I started thinking about this project, I kept thinking about the weight of the current social and political climate taking place in the US. The heaviness I encountered, along with my students, in this time of COVID along with the Black Lives Matter Movement. I felt a deep sadness that our country, after all of the hardships it has faced, had not created a safer space for people of color and the LGBTQ community. I wanted to make a piece to physically expel these things that had been unearthed.
This current body of work has forced me to reflect on my own experiences of bias, unearthing a voice and a wound that cannot be sterilized. The work has become multiple sculptures that reach up, twist, converge and writhe, as if to be fighting within itself, searching and reaching for hope while being pulled in multiple directions.

My work isn’t just about my experiences; it’s about my audience’s experiences. We have all been through something that links us all together and draws us to commune together in different environments. I tell my story through my art to remind all viewers that they are not alone.

Proposed work as accepted for soundpedro 2020:
Golden Shell

Based off the Golden Ratio and inspired by Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty, Confessional Part VII, Golden Conch, is an intimate interactive sculpture that invites you to participate by stepping inside, either alone or with a partner and contribute your confessions.

In order for the piece to come full circle, I invite you, the viewer, to become part of the piece itself, encouraging you to set aside time for self-reflection and contemplation, anonymously or actively as a participant. The experience attempts to engage, challenge and inspire you to view confession in a new light.

As viewers enter the piece the lights inside will turn on and illuminate the piece. Viewers will speak to each other through a tube provided.

Conchi Sanford, aka Mizz Conchi, is a first generation American raised on military bases across the globe. Influenced by her mother who is a painter, the artist credits her unique perspective to a lifetime of living with cultural diversity, and to her own journey as a multicultural multi, ethnic women.

Conchi creates works built from her own personal experiences in an attempt to remind viewers that they are not alone.

With a MFA from Claremont Graduate University, she is a Professor of Art and Art History at 3 community colleges, In addition, she also curates shows at different venues in the greater LA area.

Artist Location: Chino, CA
Social Media: Artist Website | Instagram | Facebook