Calo

buscaniguastudio

graffiti street arts EL SALVADOR

I paint portraits of a joyful, simple people who make up the lively and highly improvised culture of the Salvadoran streets. My work illuminates the everyday faces of my people in “la rebusca,” doing whatever it takes to get by. “La Rebusca” manifests itself in many different ways, from the clowns on public busses to the man who sells craft popsicles off of a makeshift cart, to the woman in the center of the city who walks around selling everything from bras to batteries. Each one of them has a story to tell and a reason to be celebrated, and they make up part of the same struggle as my more historical subjects. The indigenous women from the peasant uprising of the 1930s, students who formed part of the resistance to government repression throughout the 1970s, and Monsenior Romero who served as a “voice for the voiceless” during the Civil War of the 1980s. I see them as divine people—my work pays homage to them. Influenced by Latin American popular art (indigenous textiles, ceramics, cut paper, and traditional celebrations) as well as new techniques of street art, I use stencils to mirror the roots and forms of the urban-tropical lifestyle. My work is created and displayed in the street; in this way it comes back to the source of inspiration and belongs to the people.