“I’ve already found God and she’s a 23 year old Mexican girl with an acquired taste for dark liquor and an incredible ass.”
– Karina Padilla
I usually make it a point to not make a lot of reference to people’s gender, sexuality, beauty or “race” when commenting on their work. Mainly because I think it’s irrelevant to what they do. But I’m realizing that neglecting their background is neglecting them. It’s sort of like saying, “I don’t see color.” You think it’s a complement, but in actuality you’re just attempting to turn a blind eye to a large fraction of a person’s identity. If you don’t see color, you don’t see me. With that being said, Karina Padilla is her demographics and more. She’s a beautiful Mexican woman who sees the beauty in everything, especially herself. For women, this is rare and often frowned upon. Padilla, who goes by @alu.naes on Instagram, makers her viewers confront the confusing double standards of beauty. That a woman’s beauty is there to be admired by everyone except herself. She embraces everything about herself and the world, from the bloating her body experiences while PMSing to old abandoned photos found at a junkyard in Brooklyn that she calls “donated memories.” It’s only right that such a beautiful and introspective soul should become an artist by trade and have the duty of interpreting life and culture for the rest of us.
Karina’s main medium is paint and illustrations with a cubist nature. She’ll literally paint anything. Whether it’s herself, a canvas, her lover or a mirror, inspiration lies everywhere. My favorite work of hers is this print she did of her own torso that she covered in red paint and pressed against a poster panel.
“…I noticed the body of a sort of raven like being with wings holding what looks like a girl up against their breast… From my body came this beautiful image that speaks to me louder than any pain I feel and came alive as a reminder for me. Nothing can ever touch me. I am my own protector.”
The print is stunning and the message is something we’d all do well to never forget. I don’t know Karina personally, but from reading her writings and admiring her creations, I feel like I do. I don’t know if that’s presumptuous or naive of me, but from what I’ve seen so far, I think the world is a better place because Karina Padilla is in it.
Find her photos, art and inspiration on her tumblr and buy prints, clothes and other merchandise with her work on them from her website alunaes.com.
