Written by Evelyn Martinez and Kirby Conda
Photography by Jason Page
For painter Steve Russell, the earliest sparks of creativity arrived not in a classroom, but in the improvised quiet spaces of childhood. As a self‑described “obnoxious little boy,” he laughs remembering how adults would hand him paper simply to keep him busy. “They’d say, ‘Go draw something,’ and I would. Then I’d show it to them, and they’d say, ‘That’s real nice. Now go draw another one.’” He pauses, smiling at the irony. “I’m still doing that to this very day.”
Throughout her nomadic upbringing, multimedia artist Laura Konecne learned how to carry her life in portable bits and pieces. She keeps fragments of “home” inside her carry-ons, within her collapsible wooden studio setup, among the comforts of her engraved chisels, in the pages of her 14-year-old sketchbook—and especially in the memories she takes with her of the communities she leaves behind.
Omar Gonzalez can trace his artistic beginnings back to a single piece of construction paper. It was elementary school, and like many children, he drew the world immediately around him—stick figures, trees, the driveway, the homes that formed the center of his young universe. But unlike most childhood drawings that get lost to time, Gonzalez’s mother saved and framed his. That small act of recognition became one of his first conscious memories of art, a quiet signal that what he created mattered.
Every night, when she settles into the quiet corner of her studio, Mexican folk artist Nora Verdin works under watchful eyes. More than a dozen handmade Mexican masks hang behind her, overlooking her process in a range of emotions—smiling, frowning, worried, proud. Some stick out their tongues; others resemble folk legends more than people. Each tells a wordless story, echoing ancient traditions through color, texture and form. Folk art, often an elusive genre to define, connects the faces on her wall to the alebrijes on her shelf and to the piece currently taking shape beneath her hands, sharing a common thread: generations of artists whose inherited traditions make even a single stand-alone gallery piece possible.
