final blurb #4 – Argentinian Artist Ana Traversa

The video for this podcast is so bare because I don’t have a good picture of Ana (only the facebook default photo that shows up when I search for her) and I wasn’t allowed to photograph at the library…she has no official website, either. I have her email address, though, and might ask her for any pictures she has so you guys could see her work. Also, I really (weirdly enough) recommend going to a bilingual event. That was half the fun. The Latin American perspective on visual art is something I think I’d like to study more.

On Sunday, December 6th, I was on the E train going into Queens when a woman sat down next to me and began to read a book about music and psychology. I was humming the tune of a chorus from The Marriage of Figaro by Mozart, and the woman asked me what I was singing. We got into a discussion then that lasted my entire train ride. She is an artist, she told me, from Argentina, who loves to meet people of like mind to her and talk about the important things in life. That is, art and love and happiness. Her name is Ana Traversa and she paints and sculpts, has left four significant men in her life in the pursuit of her art and considers her dogs to be her children. She told me that she never plans on marrying and is sure that in this life, she is destined to pay mind to her art and only her art. She invited me to her “Meet the Artist” event she was having the next day, and it was an interesting experience. She discussed her works that are currently on display at the Hamilton Grange Branch Library of the New York Public Library that have various subjects and are made from a few different mediums. She spoke first in Spanish and then translated it into English, which made the discussion a little lengthy and difficult to follow at some points, but overall I was very glad I went. Ana opened up the floor to those at the exhibit to give their opinions on what her pieces conveyed to them, and it was a great real-life example of how differently art affects everyone. Some of her pieces were detailed and some not so much. Nonetheless, her passion for the craft was obvious in each work, though maybe I think that because I spent half an hour talking to her about what it means to devote yourself to your art. I’m going to try to keep my eye out for her in local art listings and see if she remembers me in a few months.