San Antonio-based artist Kathy Sosa is known for her striking paintings of women.
Their faces are shaded with the colors of the rainbow and their gazes range from gentle, to knowing, to dignified.
Many of the women wear traditional indigenous garments known as huipiles, others are embellished with wings or the indigenous elaborate trees of life.
Sosa’s art is featured in the newly published volume, Mestizaje: The Feminist Art of Kathy Sosa.
Sosa said while artworks across history often portray women with diminished proportions, she purposely paints women with broad shoulders and strong hands.
“Almost everything I paint that features a woman is designed to say, ‘Women are strong and at the center of everything good,’” she said.
Sosa’s collection of artworks also explores the blended cultures of the Texas-Mexico borderlands. The book is supplemented with dual-language essays in English and Spanish, including a foreword written by Chicana author Sandra Cisneros.
Sosa said her paintings describe the ongoing “mestizaje,” or mixing, of the region.
“This is a culture unto itself,” she said. “I think it uniquely describes what’s going on around us, and I think … this concept that describes us needs to be celebrated and elevated.”
Hear the first part of Sosa’s journey as an artist here.
Trinity University Press and Texas Public Radio will host a Maverick Book Club event on Jan. 16 at TPR headquarters.
Click here for more information.
