Camille Rose Garcia

In high school, I had an amazing art teacher for three years who taught me a great amount about art and how to build on the small amount of skills I had. My teacher fit the stereotype of an artist that many people have today: pierced nose, multiple tattoos, dark-dyed hair, but we all know that this stereotype is usually untrue. Her class was extraordinarily interesting because she focused on so many different types of artistic styles and techniques. One artist that we studied who caught my attention was a woman by the name of Camille Rose Garcia. Born in Los Angeles, California in 1970, Garcia’s works are a very unique addition to the art world today. She touches on many issues dealing with “an acute political consciousness” (www.sjmusart.org). Her art may be seen as strange or even creepy by some, but it captures the audience’s attention.

Probably the most unique part of her work is that she uses cartoon-like characters to depict her political topics. The characters she uses resemble many famous fairy tale characters. Her inspirations came mainly from “Walt Disney, punk bands like the Dead Kennedys, and sci-fi writer Philip K. Dick (www.sjmusart.org). Garcia grew up in Orange County, California near Disney Land. As a child, she began witnessing the “truths” of “the happiest place on earth.” Garcia caught a behind the scenes glimpse into the reality of this fantasy land. As she grew older, she began to take the contradictions that she witnessed as a child and add them into her art pieces to depict the faults of society today.

A key aspect in Garcia’s work is the muted colors she uses. None of Garcia’s paintings use bright, stand out colors. The tones seem to be dark and add almost gloominess to the work for lack of a better word. Garcia also uses many significant shapes within her work. It is common to see tear drop shapes in the background of her paintings to portray the somberness and seriousness of the issues that she is trying to capture from the audience. Another common aspect is the dry-brushed background over wallpaper. Garcia uses this technique to maintain the childish, yet mature them of her paintings. The wallpaper tends to have repeated designs or images which almost resemble what may be in a child’s room, but this aspect of the painting remains subtle as it is painted over. Garcia also uses a lot of cloud-like images and other things that would be common fairy-tale like images.

Many of Garcia’s works can also be seen as disturbing by some people. There are many images in which there are cartoon animals with their heads cut off, or creepy faces that almost look like they are staring at you. Although all of the characters in the paintings seem creepy, they still have a cuteness to them. They have unusually large heads extremely long arms and legs. Garcia does an amazing job of creating the fairy tale fantasy with a creepy twist.

One of her works that I remember caught my eye but I could not find online was a painting she did of Little Red Riding Hood. Instead of the story about the little girl who is trying to visit her grandmother’s, Garcia turned it into the imagery of a young girl who is coming of age. The girl in the painting is around the age of a girl who would begin menstruation, explaining the color red. The wolf, however, portrays men who try to simply take girls’ innocence. Even though some people may view this as a disturbing twist on a childhood fairy tale, Garcia uses the story to display a real issue in society. I thoroughly enjoy Garcia’s art, even with it’s “creepy” nature.