Issis Macias relies on “a deep knowing” plumbed from Mexican ancestry and the complexity of lived experience to power her creative practice as an intuitive abstract painter. She turned to art full time after devoting many years to water conservation work and becoming a mother. For her, navigating those shifts via intuitive painting is both method and medicine. Ethereal Spaces, a solo exhibition of her latest work, is on display at Arts & Literature Lab from Tuesday, November 19 through Saturday, December 21, 2024 with an opening reception on Friday, November 22 at 5:30–8:00 p.m.
Issis Macias is one of two Bridge Work: Madison artists for 2023–2025, along with Jessica M. Gutiérrez, whose exhibition Gifts from the Dark opens simultaneously at ALL.
The following conversation between Issis Macias and Jynelle Gracia took place at Common Wealth Gallery on October 29, 2024. It has been edited for length and clarity.
Jynelle Gracia: I'm curious about your journey of teaching yourself to paint. Did you take community classes or study formal art elements on your own?
Issis Macias: The biggest influence in my beginning to make art was my connection to a community of artists in the downtown L.A. art scene when I lived in SoCal. A friend of mine owned a gallery. He is a self-taught abstract painter, extremely prolific. He would host community events making Christmas ornaments or painting classes, and I would pop in. I was deeply inspired just by watching.
I’d followed a very conventional path—going to college, getting a master's degree in Public Administration, and having a career in public service, so this bohemian community was new to me. When I started to paint it was very much a therapeutic practice, a form of play and catharsis. During that time I was processing heavy emotional experiences and major transitions I was making. From the beginning my art was my healing balm.
JG: What specifically does painting give back to you?
IM: The act of painting for me is a ritual. When I apply colors to the canvas, I can completely shut down the parts of my brain occupied with being a professional and a caregiver to my daughter. I can connect with a deep self that is somehow in contact with the ancestral women in my life—my grandmothers and women that I've adopted as maternal figures.
When I moved to Madison in 2016 I was ripped to shreds after the sudden loss of a friend. After a traumatic birth experience during the onset of the pandemic, I was in such deep grief. Painting has been my solace during times when I have been inconsolable. I have this feeling sometimes that I'm almost embraced by the act of painting.
JG: The paintings in this show are larger than anything you've done. What was your experience creating them?
IM: Yes, they're around five by seven feet. The Bridge Work program gave me the opportunity to push myself as an artist. The Micaela Salinas Artist Fellowship sponsored by LOUD (Latinos Organizing for Understanding and Development) gave me a month of studio space at Common Wealth Gallery. That space facilitated the exploration of different materials at this larger scale. It became this freeing physical experience which was also very cathartic. I was sweating at times, which felt very liberating and also comforting, because I could fully be in the canvas. I've had to walk on it. That's why I paint barefoot, because I have to reach certain sections that my arms can’t.
JG: What do you tell someone who finds abstract art difficult to access? The person who says, “I don’t get it. What am I looking at?”
IM: I think that's a common feeling, right? One of my recommendations would be to stay curious and ask yourself questions. What is it about the artwork that confuses you? Also: keep it simple. I love color so I’d say find an artwork that has your favorite colors. How does that make you feel? How does that color interact with other colors?
And it's okay to not like it. It's okay to say, “It's not for me.”
JG: You’ve said that the gifts of survival are what inspires your paintings. How important is it that someone viewing your vivid and exuberant work for the first time knows that all that light exists because there’s been darkness.
IM: Life is complicated. We each have personal stories that contain pain or maybe even trauma. The world is full of suffering, right? Well, let's pause. Are you going to be self-destructive? I was for a while. I found that I’m now able to translate my experiences into color, into beauty. I’m hoping that the connection with the viewer is the message that they can, too, in their own way.
Let's celebrate your resiliency. How are you going to use that to heal and to move forward? We all have a right to heal.
JG: Healing is often not a linear path. Neither is pursuing a creative life. How have you faced doubts or lapses in confidence?
IM: I was really questioning this path a couple years ago. Why am I making art? I could be useful to a lot of people if I go back and work in water conservation, right? Then one day I got an email from Integrated Art Group. They wanted to buy eight of my artworks for UW Eastpark Medical Center. That was a sign to keep believing in what I was doing.
One of my best qualities is that I don't overthink before I do things. My drive and creativity are survival skills that I inherited from my grandmothers. My paternal grandmother had to feed eight kids. She needed money, so she made bread and sold tortas in the park. She'd go to Tijuana, buy huge bags of candy, and sell it at soccer games. She just did it. So out of necessity, I turn to art.
JG: Speaking of influences, you’ve said your daughter is your muse. How so?
IM: It’s feeling unconditional love for the first time. I carry her light and joy when I paint, especially when I’m feeling dysregulated or grumpy. Her essence helps me release into my art.
Sometimes I see something in her drawings or her color choices. There’s one painting in the show that is more of a literal interpretation of one of her scribbles. Magenta is the color that I associate with her.
JG: I once read a BBC article explaining that the color magenta is an illusion. What guides your approach to color?
IM: Definitely not a book or a reference manual. I’m guided by color combinations in nature and fashion. From an early age—being exposed to Vogue, having four sisters—I was absorbing all the patterns and color. Nature is a huge influence. Mother Earth is the queen colorist.
JG: I remember being told by a stylist at a summer leadership camp for Latinas that dressing for success meant wearing no more than three colors at a time. We were all wearing jean shorts and like 14 colors.
IM: Yes, I remember hearing that too! I’m also deeply inspired by our vibrant culture. Dia de los Muertos festivities, the ballet folklórico attire from different regions in Mexico. The elegant whites of Veracruz and the Chiapas dress, the bright colors on black. ¡El bordado!
JG: You just flipped into Spanish, excited about Mexican embroidery. Tell me about the artist talks you’re giving in both English and in Spanish at your show’s opening reception.
IM: I have a greater appreciation for my language and my culture now that I live in Madison. I took it for granted in L.A.
I want to create a space for the Latinos I’ve connected with here who are primarily Spanish-speaking and invite them into the gallery to connect with my art. I'll also collaborate with Little Picassos on an artist talk tailored for young children. We'll do an art project in which they’ll use oil pastels on two canvases that I’m donating. The Madison Arts Commission gave me a grant to support this project, Building Community through Art. The aim is to collaborate with other artists and organizations to elevate Latina perspectives and actively engage youth with limited or no access to the arts.
JG: Ethereal Spaces makes me think celestial, gauzy, otherworldly. Present and not present at the same time. What was your intention with this show’s title?
IM: How many times have we experienced that feeling of awe with Mother Nature, or during celebration, or a moment when traveling, or skydiving? It pushes you out of the mundane, brings you joy or ecstasy, or maybe just takes you beyond your daily experience.
At this scale, I want people to think: I want to walk into this one; it feels like a portal. That they’d be entering a different dimension or something. I’m hoping the titles and the feelings of the paintings push people a little bit into that thinking.
