El Imparcial newspaper
July 2020
Full page feature about the series entitled “Lady with sunglasses”, produced at the artist studio during the lockdown and posted daily on Instagram.
Note published in El Imparcial newspaper.
July 2020, Hermosillo, Sonora.
About the arrival of number 100 of his series "Ladies with sunglasses" uploaded daily on my Instagram.
The 100th girl in his collection
BY ELIANA ALVARADO
Alejandro Soria has not stopped creating, even in times of crisis. On March 23, the visual artist introduced his first lady with sunglasses, the start of a self-imposed challenge for every day that the contingency lasted.
Today, Alejandro will create and upload to his Instagram the image of the 100th girl in his collection “Ladies with Sunglasses”. Each of them, he says, is different from any other. Each one has its colors, its designs, its materials. Each one is an idea, a personality in itself.
What will the 100th lady be like? What style does she have? What is her personality? That even the artist himself does not know, because it is not something that he previously defined: “In this work I seek, and in general, not to be predictable. Do not fall into clichés and do not put barriers in my work. "
THEY ARE UNIQUE
Sonoran Alejandro Soria has a history of 25 years as a graphic designer and 12 as a visual artist. He has exhibited some of his works in Hermosillo, Guadalajara, Tijuana and Tucson.
Like many, the coronavirus emergency forced him to a confinement that has already exceeded three months. He decided not to take confinement as a limitation, but as a requirement to continue creating, and he has done so through his ladies.
Among the 99 girls published to date there are all kinds: Some wear sober colors, others prefer bright colors; some on acrilic, others of paper or cardboard. One of them has a mask over her head, another wears gold.
It hardly becomes routine, says its creator, because each lady has had her own process. For him, they are eternal, safe and jovial women even though they grow older every day until they reach 100 years of age today.
“They show themselves to the public, on social media, they are confidence despite their age. And they already begin to show traits or natural characteristics of that age, which are from prudence, good sense and wisdom”, he explains.
THERE IS ALWAYS AN IDEA
Alejandro's mind and hands seem to be always creating, thinking of some new idea. He defines it as a laboratory "where no idea is bad."
He shares that his work fundamentally starts from observation, from looking closely at people and studying the structure of the face, non-verbal language. This, even when there is no possibility of leaving, as they have been in recent weeks.
"There are other means: From watching a movie on Netflix or chatting on Zoom or Instagram with a friend, a friend, and suddenly you see features, I have my notebook and there I write down a feature. I am very struck by how people smile, how they make their expressions, move their eyes, mouth, head, it is my job and I enjoy it” he says.
This is how some of the best ideas emerge, although not all have to do with the series "Ladies with Sunglasses". In fact, he is already working on two projects for individual exhibitions that have emerged “as collateral lines” at this time.
"Right know we know that we cannot, but in the coming months they will hear from me," he anticipates. "I even talked to some people from a charity association, but I don't want to give more data right now, better when I launch it."
THERE IS NO LIMIT
With 99 ladies in sunglasses created and the number 100 about to see the light this day, how many more will make it to the collection? Alejandro affirms that this will depend on the duration of the confinement, and therefore he hopes that there will not be many more.
He confesses that he has reached the point of imagining himself in a complicated health situation, where even in the hospital and as far as possible he would leave his girls with the glasses.
But while the emergency continues, each day implies for him to carry out that process of the conception of the idea, the exploration in the ocean of materials that is his study and the realization of his work.
He sums it up: “You have to remember that ideas work. I catch the idea, I begin to sketch, to develop, to define the concept, I translate it and then, a lady with sunglasses was born, she has just arrived at my studio and soon I will publish it on Instagram”.