Create! Magazine is pleased to share an interview with Mexican hyperrealist painter Marcela Montemayor (born Monterrey, México 1990). Marcela is a visual artist working mainly with acrylic and oil on canvas. She has a Bachelor's degree in visual arts and graduated in 2012 from the Autonomous University of Nuevo Leon in Mexico.

She has shown her artworks at exhibitions nationally and internationally including in Mexico, the United States, Italy, and India, and has won awards in Mexico such as the Liverpool Prize and The Food Art Awards in Italy. Her work has been featured in "What’s new in Mexican contemporary art" on Canvas, a blog from Saatchi Art, and in the "Artists to look out for" catalog from Starry Night Programs.

You can currently find two of her paintings featured in PxP Contemporary online art gallery’s summer exhibition “Treats”!

To learn more about the artist, make sure to give her a follow on Instagram or visit her website.

Artist Statement:

Pleasure of seeing comes from various theories that posit the sense of sight as the most significant of all, referring to the way in showing us the world around us and lets us know without excluding the other senses, in the case of art, we talk about the sense that protrudes more time to appreciate it, but both the eye and the other senses at the time, becomes a rare experience because of customs and rules that exist to keep the distance. My concerns are mainly focused on awakening the other senses, especially taste, not achieve it and generate reflections on the painting not only as an object but as something that has the ability to perpetuate the ephemeral over time.

In fact, I talk about food and the pleasure experienced in eating and in turn metaphorically speaking, to extend a pleasure (whatever that is) suppressing pain or discomfort that affects us, this only as an ideal, when asked about habits such as denial, an issue that states the German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer as well as the issue of fleeting satisfaction.

My intention is to endure the feeling of desire by sight, although the taste is not activated, the viewing pleasure you can endure the feeling of desire through images of food that are visually very attractive. Similarly, the taste is usually associated with appetite, the urge that drives us to eat, but can also refer to provisions and personal preferences as when we say the words:'‘I like this thing’', because the view allows us to appreciate and learn about our surroundings and any sense by itself could fill the roles of others and turn when the light is also turned the experience around the recognition of the image as it may be the memories.

Tell us about how you got started in the arts. Where did you grow up and when did you first begin painting?

I discovered the world of art through drawing, there was a children's drawing contest in my city Monterrey and my parents encouraged me to participate and from then on, I haven’t stopped. I also started taking painting workshops when I was in high school and then I decided to study art.

Share your interest in painting in a hyperrealist style and your subject matter.

When I started my bachelor I went to an exhibition of the painter Claudio Bravo, and when I found out about his work I said that one day I would like to paint realism or hyperrealism. Later in my career, I was discovering artists such as Andy Warhol, Jeff Koons, and Wayne Thiebaud, among others, who where making my idea of painting merge between wanting to paint hyperrealism but also pop.

What are some of the themes and ideas you explore in your work?

I have painted food, food wrappers, and now balloons. I like representing daily life objects that in the collective memory represent pleasant emotions. I have always liked painting images with shrill and vivid colors that attract the attention of the viewer.

How long does each painting take? What is your process like?

It depends on the size of the canvas, it usually goes from 3 weeks to 1 month and a half for each painting and I begin taking lots of pictures of the objects I would like to eventually paint. I do color tests first on paper and when I have the right colors, then I start painting with acrylic and oil afterwards. I am very meticulous with the details. This is why It takes me so long sometimes.

Three must-have things in your studio?

Many shades for each oil color, my raskog cart that I love, and coffee always, of course!

Do you have any upcoming shows, projects, or collaborations this year that you'd like to share?

I'm starting a series of paintings in round frames, something that is new to me, the first ones were the ones I have in ''Treats'' and I'm planning to do more during the rest of the year. It's something that makes me very excited!