Art Statement
Originally from El Salvador, my body of work is an intuitive construction of memory as a form of personal myth-making that casts political expressions, voices modes of resistance, and most recently speaks to a process of recovery, re-growth and healing.
My areas of research and art production are concerned with issues of collective memory, historical trauma and identity explored through multi-disciplinary approaches to drawing, that involve traditional printmaking techniques, stop-motion animation video and installation work. My body of work brings a confluence of motifs found in pre-Hispanic mythology, Salvadoran popular folklore, Roman Catholic iconography with styles sourced from Western art history to merge a hybridized aesthetic of historical, cultural and personal experience.
In addition, my ongoing body of research focuses on the impact and legacy of the Salvadoran civil war in the 1980s, a time my family and I witnessed and as a result of which, immigrated to Canada. Consequently, my studio process is a constant act of revision of inter-generational knowledge rooted in individual stories and collective histories, issues of migration and the subject of violence filtered through the possibilities of personal narration. As a Salvadoran, and Latin American artist, my research also investigates the cultural intersections between local indigenous storytelling and syncretic practices with political ideas of resurgence, decolonization and memory construction.
Areas of interest and study complementary to my research activities and practice include Latin American Art and history, art and social movements, contemporary art and culture, folklorism, and American Indigenous knowledge systems.
As a Salvadoran visual artist and educator I’ve lived and worked in the ancestral unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and Sel̓íl̓witulh (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations, known as Vancouver for 9 years.
For online orders or purchases of original prints of my work please visit InPrint or: https://www.inprnt.com/gallery/orcasd/
For further inquiries please contact me at: oscastillo78@gmail.com