The Art of Maria Tomasula 1527590488, 9781527590489

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The Art of Maria Tomasula

The Art of Maria Tomasula: Embodiment and Splendor By

Soo Y. Kang

The Art of Maria Tomasula: Embodiment and Splendor By Soo Y. Kang This book first published 2023 Cambridge Scholars Publishing Lady Stephenson Library, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2PA, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2023 by Soo Y. Kang All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-5275-9048-8 ISBN (13): 978-1-5275-9048-9

TABLE OF CONTENTS

List of Illustrations ..................................................................................... vi Acknowledgments .................................................................................... xiv Introduction ............................................................................................... xv Chapter One ................................................................................................. 1 Chronology of Life and Art Chapter Two .............................................................................................. 38 Mexican Catholicism Chapter Three ............................................................................................ 77 Neo-Baroque Syncretism Chapter Four ............................................................................................ 112 Nature as Concept Chapter Five ............................................................................................ 135 Embedded Feminism Chapter Six .............................................................................................. 161 New Materialism Appendix ................................................................................................. 186 Tomasula’s paper delivered at the Institute for Latino Studies, University of Notre Dame, on November 14, 2017 Selected Exhibitions ................................................................................ 197 Bibliography ............................................................................................ 201

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Color Plates Plate 1 Maria Tomasula, Rhythm, 1990, oil on canvas, 72 x 48", © Maria Tomasula Plate 2 Maria Tomasula, Lot, 1997, oil on panel, 10 x 8", © Maria Tomasula Plate 3 Maria Tomasula, Rite, 1998, oil on panel, 16 x 12", © Maria Tomasula Plate 4 Maria Tomasula, My Alba, 1998, oil on panel, 42 x 42", © Maria Tomasula Plate 5 Maria Tomasula, Skindeep, 1999, oil on panel, 18 x 12", © Maria Tomasula Plate 6 Maria Tomasula, All I Know, 2000, oil on linen, 67½ x 43½", © Maria Tomasula Plate 7 Maria Tomasula, By Hands Unknown, 2000, oil on panel, 42 x 42", © Maria Tomasula Plate 8 Maria Tomasula, Pull, 2001, oil on panel, 10 x 8", © Maria Tomasula Plate 9 Maria Tomasula, Recure, 2002, oil on panel, 16 x 14", © Maria Tomasula Plate 10 Maria Tomasula, Two, 2002, oil on panel, 18 x 12", © Maria Tomasula Plate 11 Maria Tomasula, Birth of My Silence, 2002, oil on panel, 10 x 8", © Maria Tomasula Plate 12 Maria Tomasula, The Doctrine of Affections, 2002, oil on panel, 24 x 20", © Maria Tomasula Plate 13 Maria Tomasula, As No Gives Way to Yes, 2002, oil on panel, 10 x 8", © Maria Tomasula Plate 14 Maria Tomasula, Reach, 2002, oil on panel, 14 x 12", © Maria Tomasula Plate 15 Maria Tomasula, Web, 2002, oil on panel, 42 x 30", © Maria Tomasula Plate 16 Maria Tomasula, Held, 2002, oil on panel, 16 x 14", © Maria Tomasula Plate 17 Maria Tomasula, Held (Funnel), 2003, oil on linen, 48 x 36", © Maria Tomasula

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Plate 18 Maria Tomasula, Claim, 2004, oil on panel, 14 x 11", © Maria Tomasula Plate 19 Maria Tomasula, Lacuna, 2004, oil on panel, 48 x 36", © Maria Tomasula Plate 20 Maria Tomasula, The Structure of Coincidence, 2004, oil on panel, 14 x 11", © Maria Tomasula Plate 21 Maria Tomasula, Music of Chance, 2004, oil on panel, 24 x 18", © Maria Tomasula Plate 22 Maria Tomasula, Signs of Intruders, 2004, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula Plate 23 Maria Tomasula, Meridian, 2005, oil on panel, 36 x 24", © Maria Tomasula Plate 24 Maria Tomasula, Music of Chance II, 2005, oil on panel, 36 x 36", © Maria Tomasula Plate 25 Maria Tomasula, Rapture, 2006, oil on panel, 24 x 18", © Maria Tomasula Plate 26 Maria Tomasula, Thrall, 2007, oil on panel, 16 x 16", © Maria Tomasula Plate 27 Maria Tomasula, Luminesce, 2007, oil on panel, 36 x 24", © Maria Tomasula Plate 28 Maria Tomasula, Cantata, 2007, oil on panel, 42 x 36", © Maria Tomasula Plate 29 Maria Tomasula, Never Let Me Go, 2007, oil on panel, 42 x 42”, © Maria Tomasula Plate 30 Maria Tomasula, Royalty, 2008, oil on panel, 32 x 36", © Maria Tomasula Plate 31 Maria Tomasula, Intercession, 2008, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula Plate 32 Maria Tomasula, Cathedral, 2009, oil on panel, 4 x 4", © Maria Tomasula Plate 33 Maria Tomasula, Please Don’t Go, 2010, oil on panel, 42 x 42", © Maria Tomasula Plate 34 Maria Tomasula, Ground of Being, 2010, oil on panel, 12 x 9", © Maria Tomasula Plate 35 Maria Tomasula, Second Nature, 2011, oil on panel, 5 x 5", © Maria Tomasula Plate 36 Maria Tomasula, Settlement, 2012, oil on panel, 24 x 18", © Maria Tomasula Plate 37 Maria Tomasula, Everpresence, 2014, oil on panel, 48 x 42", © Maria Tomasula

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Plate 38 Maria Tomasula, The Complete Yes, 2015, oil on panel, 36 x 32", © Maria Tomasula Plate 39 Maria Tomasula, When I Was You, 2014, oil on panel, 42 x 42", © Maria Tomasula Plate 40 Maria Tomasula, Murmur, 2016, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula Plate 41 Maria Tomasula, Refrain, 2017, oil on panel, 24 x 18", © Maria Tomasula Plate 42 Maria Tomasula, Mothership, 2017, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula Plate 43 Maria Tomasula, When I Knew You, 2017, oil on panel, 24 x 18", © Maria Tomasula Plate 44 Maria Tomasula, Call Me by Your Name, 2017, oil on panel, 24 x 18", © Maria Tomasula Plate 45 Maria Tomasula, Star Eater, 2017, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula Plate 46 Maria Tomasula, Echo, 2016-8, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula Plate 47 Maria Tomasula, River, 2017-8, oil on panel, 36 x 24", © Maria Tomasula Plate 48 Maria Tomasula, All the Breath We Can Hold, 2018, oil on panel, 36 x 24", © Maria Tomasula Plate 49 Maria Tomasula, Reach, 2018, oil on panel, 36 x 32", © Maria Tomasula Plate 50 Maria Tomasula, I Can Feel It, 2018, oil on panel, 36 x 32", © Maria Tomasula

Figures 1-1 Photo of maternal grandparents, Regino and Maria del Refugio Anguiano, and paternal grandmother, Carolina Garcia, 1980s 1-2 Photo of Maria Garcia at her First Holy Communion in 1966 1-3 Photo of Raymundo and Ester Garcia with their children, Maria, Ray and Lilia in 1965 1-4 Backroom at Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe, church in East Chicago, Indiana, photographed on March 9, 2020 1-5 Our Lady of Guadalupe, painting at Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe church, photographed on March 9, 2020 1-6 Maria Tomasula painting, photographed on September 29, 2017 1-7 Maria Tomasula, Against Nothing, 1988, oil on canvas, 72 x 48", © Maria Tomasula

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1-8 Maria Tomasula, For Everything, 1988, oil on canvas, 72 x 48", © Maria Tomasula 1-9 Maria Tomasula, Fruit of Knowledge, 1989, oil on canvas, 48 x 72", © Maria Tomasula 1-10 Maria Tomasula, The Expulsion, 1988, oil and acrylic on canvas, 48 x 72", © Maria Tomasula 1-11 Maria Tomasula, Bloom, 1985, graphite on paper, 4 x 5", © Maria Tomasula 1-12 Maria Tomasula, From Cuca, 1989, graphite on paper, 5 x 4”, © Maria Tomasula 1-13 Maria Tomasula, Penitent II, 1991, oil on linen, 16 x 12", © Maria Tomasula 1-14 Maria Tomasula, Romanus, 1991, oil on canvas, 50 x 26", © Maria Tomasula 1-15 Maria Tomasula, Sustenance, 1991, oil on canvas, 58 x 16", © Maria Tomasula 1-16 Maria Tomasula, Bearer, 1993, oil on canvas, 50 x 26", © Maria Tomasula 1-17 Maria Tomasula, Divina, 1995, oil on linen, 14 x 14", © Maria Tomasula 1-18 Maria Tomasula, Mother’s Well, 1994, oil on linen, 14 x 9", © Maria Tomasula 1-19 Maria Tomasula, Rhythm, 1998, oil on panel, 12 x 12", © Maria Tomasula 1-20 Maria Tomasula, Plumb of Memory, 2000, oil on panel, 50 x 50", © Maria Tomasula 1-21 Maria Tomasula, Recognition, 1998, oil on linen, 60 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 1-22 Maria Tomasula, Attainment, 2000, oil on panel, 36 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 1-23 Maria Tomasula, All in All, 2001, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula 1-24 Maria Tomasula, Corona, 2011, oil on panel, 6 x 6", © Maria Tomasula 1-25 Maria Tomasula, It Happened One Night, 2010, oil on panel, 12 x 9", © Maria Tomasula 1-26 Maria Tomasula, Cat’s Cradle, 2013, oil on panel, 54 x 42", © Maria Tomasula 1-27 Maria Tomasula, Anatomy Lesson, 2019, oil on panel, 36 x 36", © Maria Tomasula

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List of Illustrations

2-1 Maria Tomasula, Fault Line, 2004, oil on panel, 12 x 9", © Maria Tomasula 2-2 Maria Tomasula, Delirium, 2004, oil on panel, 66 x 48", © Maria Tomasula 2-3 Maria Tomasula, Lot, 1997, oil on panel, 10 x 8", © Maria Tomasula 2-4 Maria Tomasula, Recure, 2002, oil on panel, 16 x 14", © Maria Tomasula 2-5 Maria Tomasula, The Fabulous Confession II, 2004, oil on panel, 12 x 9", © Maria Tomasula 2-6 Maria Tomasula, Ojo de Dios (Eye of God), 1995, oil on panel, 48 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 2-7 Maria Tomasula, Saint’s Logic, 1995, oil on panel, 10 x 10", © Maria Tomasula 2-8 Maria Tomasula, Halo, 2000, oil on panel, 31½ x 27½", © Maria Tomasula 2-9 Mexican. Mano Poderosa (The All-Powerful Hand), or Las Cinco Personas (The Five Persons), 19th century. Oil on metal (possibly tin-plated iron), 137/8 x 101/16" (35.2 x 25.6cm). Brooklyn Museum, Museum Expedition 1944, Purchased with funds given by the Estate of Warren S.M. Mead, 44.195.24 2-10 Maria Tomasula, By Hands Unknown, 2000, oil on panel, 42 x 42", © Maria Tomasula 2-11 Maria Tomasula, Held (Funnel), 2003, oil on linen, 48 x 36" , © Maria Tomasula 2-12 Maria Tomasula, What I Know, 1997, oil on panel, 12 x 8", © Maria Tomasula 2-13 Sacred Heart, prayer card 2-14 Maria Tomasula, The Doctrine of Affections, 2002, oil on panel, 24 x 20", © Maria Tomasula 2-15 Maria Tomasula, Meridian, 2005, oil on panel, 36 x 24", © Maria Tomasula 2-16 Maria Tomasula, Royalty, 2008, oil on panel, 32 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 2-17 Maria Tomasula, Rezo, 1996, oil on panel, 24 x 20", © Maria Tomasula 2-18 Ofrenda, Morelos, Mexico, 2014 2-19 Maria Tomasula, Please Don’t Go, 2010, oil on panel, 42 x 42", © Maria Tomasula 2-20 Maria Tomasula, Intercession, 2008, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula

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3-1 Rachel Ruysch, Still Life of Flowers on a Marble Tabletop, 1716, oil on canvas, 19 x 15½". Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam 3-2 Maria Tomasula, Lacuna, 1995, oil on linen, 48 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 3-3 Francisco de Zurbarán, Still Life with Lemons, Oranges and a Rose, 1633, oil on canvas, 24½ x 431/8" (62.2 x 109.5cm). Credit Line: The Norton Simon Foundation 3-4 Maria Tomasula, Bouquet, 2000, oil on linen, 48 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 3-5 Jan Davidsz De Heem, Festoon of Fruit and Flowers, 1660-70, oil on canvas, 29 x 233/5". Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam 3-6 Jan Bruegel the Elder and Peter Paul Rubens, Madonna and Child with Angels in a Garland of Flowers, 1617, oil on canvas, 324/5 x 25½". Louvre Museum, Paris. 3-7 Jan Davidsz De Heem, Chalice and Host with Garlands, 1648, oil on canvas, 541/3 x 492/5". Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna 3-8 Maria Tomasula, The Structure of Coincidence, 2004, oil on panel, 14 x 11", © Maria Tomasula 3-9 Giuseppe Arcimboldo, Spring, 1563, oil on panel, 26 x 193/5". Louvre museum, Paris 3-10 Joachim Beuckelaer, Well Stocked Kitchen with Jesus in the House of Martha and Mary, 1566, oil on panel, 671/3 x 982/5". Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam 3-11 Joachim Beuckelaer, Kitchen Scene with Christ at Emmaus, 1560-5, oil on panel, 43 x 66½". Mauritshuis, The Hague 3-12 Maria Tomasula, Luminesce, 2007, oil on panel, 36 x 24", © Maria Tomasula 3-13 Juan Sánchez Cotán, Quince, Cabbage, Melon and Cucumber, 1602, oil on canvas, 27 x 33¼". San Diego Museum of Art 3-14 Frans Synders, Still Life with Fruit, Vegetables and Dead Game, 1635-7, oil on canvas, 652/5 x 78.¾ ". Detroit Institute of Arts 3-15 Maria Tomasula, Never Let Me Go, 2007, oil on panel, 42 x 42", © Maria Tomasula 3-16 Abraham Mignon, Still Life with Wild Flowers, 1670-9, oil on canvas, 189/10 x 16½". Louvre Museum, Paris. 3-17 Floris Claesz van Dijck, Still Life with Fruit, Nuts and Cheese, 1613, oil on panel, 261/5 x 372/5". Frans Hals Museum, Haarlem 3-18 Osias Beert, Dishes with Oysters, Fruit and Wine, 1620-5, oil on panel, 20 13/16 x 28 7/8". Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington 3-19 Balthasar van der Ast, Fruit Still Life with Shells and Tulips, 1620, oil on panel, 18 x 251/5". Mauritshuis, The Hague

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3-20 Maria Tomasula, Trace, 1997, oil on panel, 12 x 16", © Maria Tomasula 3-21 Maria Tomasula, Corona, 2002, oil on panel, 10 x 8", © Maria Tomasula 3-22 Jacques de Gheyn II, Vanitas Still Life, 1603, oil on panel, 32½ x 21¼". Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York 3-23 Pieter Claesz, Vanitas, 1656, oil on canvas, 151/3 x 233/5". Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna 3-24 Maria Tomasula, The Memory Palace, 2011, oil on panel, 5 x 5", © Maria Tomasula 3-25 Maria Tomausla, Royalty, 2008, oil on panel, 32 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 4-1 Maria Tomasula, My Alba, 1998, oil on panel, 42 x 42", © Maria Tomasula 4-2 Maria Tomasula, My Ava, 2007, oil on panel. 40 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 4-3 Maria Tomasula, Immigrant, 1993, oil on canvas, 14 x 12", © Maria Tomasula 4-4 Maria Tomasula, The Fabulous Confession I, 2004, oil on panel, 48 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 4-5 Maria Tomasula, Looking for a Common Language, oil on panel, 2004, 10 x 8", © Maria Tomasula 4-6 Maria Tomasula, Music of Chance, 2004, oil on panel, 24 x 18", © Maria Tomasula 4-7 Maria Tomasula, Sheathe, 1994, oil on linen, 24 x 16", © Maria Tomasula 4-8 Maria Tomasula, Hold Me, 2007, oil on panel, 36 x 24", © Maria Tomasula 4-9 Maria Tomasula, Call Me by Your Name, 2017, oil on panel, 24 x 18”, © Maria Tomasula 5-1 Maria Tomasula, Ghost, 2005, oil on panel, 36 x 36", © Maria Tomasula 5-2 Maria Tomasula, Our Lady of Guadalupe, 2009, oil on panel, 59 x 37¼", © Maria Tomasula 5-3 Maria Tomasula, Rapture, 2006, oil on panel, 24 x 18", © Maria Tomasula 5-4 Maria Tomasula, Ground of Being, 2010, oil on panel, 12 x 9", © Maria Tomasula 5-5 Maria Tomasula, Second Nature, 2011, oil on panel, 5 x 5", © Maria Tomasula

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5-6 Maria Tomasula, Chorus, 2012, oil on panel, 12 x 9", © Maria Tomasula 5-7 Maria Tomasula, What the Water Gave (for Frida), 2017, graphite on paper, 22 x 16", © Maria Tomasula 6-1 Maria Tomasula, The Complete Yes, 2015, oil on panel, 36 x 32", © Maria Tomasula 6-2 Maria Tomasula, Kingdom, 2018, graphite on paper, 22 x 16", © Maria Tomasula 6-3 Maria Tomasula, We Eat the Sun, 2018, graphite on paper, 22 x 16", © Maria Tomasula 6-4 Francis Darwin, Solanum Jasminoides Clasping a Stick, illustration for Charles Darwin’s The Movements and Habits of Climbing Plants, 1875 6-5 Francis Darwin, Cardiospermum Halicacabum, illustration for The Movements and Habits of Climbing Plants, 1875 6-6 Francis Darwin, Bignonia, illustration for The Movements and Habits of Climbing Plants, 1875 6-7 Maria Tomasula, Bind the Branches, 1995, oil on canvas, 52 x 28", © Maria Tomasula 6-8 Maria Tomasula, Possession, 2006, oil on panel, 24 x 18", © Maria Tomasula 6-9 Maria Tomasula, Who Do I Remember When I Remember You? 2016, graphite on paper, 10 x 8", © Maria Tomasula 6-10 Maria Tomasula, When I Was You, 2014, oil on panel, 42 x 42", © Maria Tomasula 6-11 Maria Tomasula, Murmur, 2016, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula 6-12 Maria Tomasula, Star Eater, 2017, oil on panel, 20 x 16", © Maria Tomasula

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I first encountered the paintings of Maria Tomasula in an exhibition in 1999. I was captivated by their flawless glossy surface of brilliant colors and precise minute details as well as the intriguing symbolic use of flowers in the still lifes. I periodically searched for other works by the artist on the internet over the next years, and, by 2015, I have examined enough of her works to discern certain patterns and recurring subjects of interest. At that point, I decided to go beyond being a mere connoisseur of her works and take up her case as a scholarly project. I first presented a talk on her art in the Fall of 2015 and wrote my first article that was published in 2018. I also met the artist, whom I found to be highly intelligent and articulate. And as her students would corroborate, she also proved to be gracious, kind, and considerate. Over the years, we met in Chicago, South Bend, East Chicago, and Hammond. She introduced me to her husband, children, and parents, who all have been warm and inviting. Every time I present her works in a conference, I find the audience equally mesmerized by her works of art. Someone asked, “why don’t we know about her” and another suggested that I write a book about her. I took up that suggestion and finally completed a monography on the artist. My objective is to bring to light and enhance the understanding of the workings, processes, and depth of the still lifes of the artist. The ultimate purpose of this project, however, is indeed to make this wonderful artist and her amazing art works known to the artistic community as well as the general public. Maria Tomasula has graciously provided all the high resolution photographs of her works for this publication. Chicago State University allowed me a number of resources to complete this manuscript: the first draft of this book was completed during my sabbatical in 2019 and the CTRE (Center of Teaching and Research Excellence) grants funded my participation in conferences where I presented my initial ideas about the art works and received helpful feedback. I am most grateful to my chair Prof. Kay Dawson, who for seventeen years has provided numerous departmental funding and many accommodations for me to be able to conduct all the researches including this project.

INTRODUCTION

Maria Tomasula (b. 1958), a prominent Mexican American painter and Professor of Art at the University of Notre Dame, has been producing still life paintings for three decades.1 Her still lifes are typically composed of vivid colors, fastidiously realistic details, unusual juxtapositions and assemblages of objects starkly lit against a dark backdrop. Moreover, the painstakingly applied multiple layers of paint build a smooth and glossy surface that provokes a sensual appeal. To put it simply, her works are singularly mesmerizing. The dramatic tenor of her paintings aligns her art with the contemporary trend of Neo-Baroque, which came to the fore in the late twentieth century and characterizes a sizable portion of Latinx art since the 1990s. Although she is of Mexican descent, her art does not look anything like the well-publicized “Latino Neobaroque,” which usually manifests as overwrought compositions filled with ubiquitous popular or folk elements.2 In fact, Tomasula’s art seems antithetical to the kitsch-inspired “rasquachismo,"3 which not only deals with quotidian subjects and mass culture, but also is showcased in a coarse, unrefined manner. Tomasula’s work is crisp, pristine, and highly polished. And there are no stereotypical Hispanic images in her work. Her immaculate delineations of flowers

 1

See catalogues of solo exhibitions: Maria Tomasula: Accretion, essay “Fire and Ice” by James Yood, Chicago: Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, 2000; Maria Tomasula: Second Nature, essay by Douglas Maxwell, New York: Forum Gallery, 2003; Maria Tomasula: Vast, Los Angeles: Forum Gallery, 2004; Maria Tomasula: Meridian, essay by John Brunetti, Chicago: Zolla/Lieberman, 2005; Maria Tomasula: All the Breath We Can Hold, essay “Maria Tomasula’s Art of Immanence” by Soo Kang, New York: Forum Gallery, 2018. 2 See Elizabeth Armstrong and Victor Zamudio-Taylor, Ultrabaroque. Aspects of Post Latin American Art, exh. cat. (San Diego: Museum of Contemporary Art, 2000); Monika Kaup, Neobaroque in the Americas. Alternative Modernities in Literature, Visual Art, and Film (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2012). 3 Tomás Ybarra-Frausto, “Rasquachismo: A Chicano Sensibility,” in Chicano Art: Resistance and Affirmation, 1965-1985, eds. Richard Castillo, Teresa McKenna and Yvonne Yarbro-Bejarano, exh. cat. (Los Angeles: Wight Art Gallery, 1990), 155 ࡳ 162.

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actually recall the seventeenth-century Dutch still lifes. Her technique evokes the Flemish masters of the past who exercised countless tiny oil brush marks of intense hues and shines to wooden panels to create tactile illusions to all the objects. Her focus on flowers and insects also distinguishes her work from the dominant figural trends of Mexican American art that narrate and illustrate the lives of the people.4 Despite the apparent divergence from her contemporaries in terms of subject and execution, Tomasula’s still life paintings, nevertheless, are thoroughly ethnic in foundation and formation. Growing up in the Latino community of East Chicago, Indiana, she was surrounded by images of Mexican American heritage, including Chavez, Zapata, the Mexican Revolution, and the Aztec calendar. She explained, “It all had to do with forming a conception of yourself as a presence in the cosmos, with the history of a suffering people.”5 Foremost, she was influenced by her Catholic upbringing and spiritual milieu. She declared, “I came to consciousness in a world of extended families, a place full of a multitude of saints, spirits and forces; we talked to, and ritually remembered, the dead, as an extension of our love for them. There was God and La Virgen de Guadalupe, and so many others, unseen but ever present.”6 These “unseen” presences were abundantly evoked through art works that are found in homes, but most conspicuously featured in the Spanish-speaking Mexican American churches that her family attended. The sculptures and paintings of “Spanish Baroque stuff” in these Catholic churches were the first and most crucial impact on the artist, forming the bedrock of her entire oeuvre.

 4

For an overview of Mexican American art, see John Beardsley and Jane Livingston, Hispanic Art in the U.S. Thirty Contemporary Painters and Sculptors, exh. cat. (Houston: Museum of Fine Arts, 1987); Castillo, McKenna and YarbroBejarano, Chicano Art: Resistance and Affirmation; Gary Keller, ed., Contemporary Chicana and Chicano Art: Artists, Works, Culture and Education, 2 vols. (Tempe: Bilingual Press, 2002); Gary Keller and Amy Phillips, eds., Triumph of Our Communities. Four Decades of Mexican American Art (Tempe: Bilingual Press, 2005). 5 Maria Tomasula and Julie Farstad, “Word for Word: Artists and Their Influences Trade Tape,” Mouthtomouth (Fall 2002). http://mouthtomouthmag.com. 6 Maria Tomasula, “More than a Feeling: Painting with a Distributed Sense of Agency,” a paper delivered on November 14, 2017, as part of the Latino Studies Seminar series at the Institute for Latino Studies, University of Notre Dame, n.p. See here, Appendix.

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As a child during mass, she would focus on what these “powerful” and “amazing” art works had to say more than the homily.7 Despite her education and training in college and graduate school that equipped her with the knowledge of European art history and led her to contemporary practices, the artist never veered from the church art of her past that left an indelible mark in her youthful memory. Two seminal lessons were culled from these church decorations that form the foundation of her paintings: embodiment and splendor. From a young age, she comprehended that art represents more than itself: it points to a “presence,” a force beyond the immediate that carries an unspoken power. She also appreciated the sheer extravagance of works that directly communicated that presence: “The visual rhetoric of sumptuousness is so powerful and the tradition of opulence in those churches made me understand the link between luxuriousness and transcendence.”8 The spiritual was relayed through the very material substance of the works, to which she physically reacted through her senses. It is the very sensation that she tries to invoke through her mesmerizing works, offering a similar aesthetic experience to her viewers. Tomasula, however, creates art not solely to embody a force and create sensational effects. She expresses her ultimate goal in this statement: In my paintings, I try to give visual form to, basically, a feeling, a complex assemblage of often elusive qualities that have to do with a sense of being, of what it’s like to exist as an embodied entity constituted by a particular sense of self…and, what that’s like for me, comes from a set of experiences that are historically situated because they involve having encountered, over a lifetime, a series of different ideas that produce different kinds of subjects, the thinking, feeling entities that we are.9

Her still lifes are rich in content, derived from her sense of being that emerged from years of experiences and is grounded in a multitude of ideas. The paintings symbolically relay profound messages about suffering, bondage, creation, connectivity, and transformation related to the ontological essence of being that the artist seeks to convey. Behind the sumptuous presentation lies a depth of iconography, which, however, has not been accounted for in previous writings on her art.

 7

Tomasula, “Word for Word.” 8 Tomasula, “More than a Feeling,” Appendix. 9 Ibid.

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This book proposes to unravel the various levels of meaning embedded in the paintings by examining the life and thoughts of the artist. It canvasses all the significant components that have shaped or are pertinent to the artist’s sense of being and her art. It delves into the ethnic, religious, cultural, art historical, philosophical, feminist, and intellectual sources that instigated and transformed the psychological disposition and deep reflections of the artist that are manifested in her art. Her Mexican heritage and Catholic upbringing, though not immediately apparent in her paintings, are undoubtedly the most crucial factors in her art. Her thorough training in, and adoption and reformulation of the European still life tradition are noteworthy. Her feminist stance and philosophical leanings, fostered by copious reading, are materialized through her visual representations. Tomasula’s ideas are directly communicated through the material presence of the panel and the paints. The visual product is not a vehicle, but an immediate material embodiment of her thinking. The very materiality of the painting is crucial to the artist, who later found her views echoed in the philosophical treatise of New Materialism. This book is the first comprehensive monograph on Tomasula to introduce her lifework of still life paintings in chronological order, but also approaches them thematically. This study also adds to the increasing number of recent publications on Mexican American art which has received critical attention only in the last thirty years. The majority of the books and exhibitions on Latino art have focused primarily on works that deal with political issues and mass culture that are represented in a figurative manner, assumed to be the prevalent norm of Latinx art. Moreover, the handful of monographs on Latina artists that have been published in recent years all foreground artists of the West and the Southwest. Diverging from these conventions, Tomasula is a Midwestern artist who has been producing still lifes in the last three decades that are rendered in an illusionistic style that rivals the European oil panel tradition in detail as well as technique. This book highlights the achievements of a unique Mexican American woman artist, who has consistently drawn inspiration from her Mexican Catholic upbringing, but creates symbolic paintings that ultimately encompass subjects beyond her racial and cultural origins, interjecting prominent intellectual discourses of the day through her carefully devised assemblages and arrangements of still life objects.

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Her case also exemplifies the existence of vibrant and diverse Latinx art in the Midwest, which has received scant scholarly attention.10 Recently, two major publications on Latino art—Resisting Categories: Latin American and/or Latino? of 2012 and Our America: The Latino Presence in American Art of 2013—have highlighted the need to embrace more diverse trends in Latinx art, acknowledging particularly the complexity of the Mexican American experience which merges divergent cultural and ideological perspectives from Latin America, North America, and Europe in wildly varied ways for different and unique individuals.11 The most recent Getty Center initiative, “Pacific Standard Time —LA/LA (Latin American and Latino art)” of 2017/2018, attempted to meet this objective by showcasing a panoply of styles from figurative to conceptual in more than seventy cultural institutions across Southern California. This publication contributes to this current, presently gravitating toward diversity and inclusivity within the study of Latinx art as well as toward establishing “a more expansive narrative of American art,” as called for by the preeminent Latino scholar Tomás Ybarra-Frausto.12 The book starts with a biographical account of the artist, followed by a chronological summary of her oeuvre in the same chapter to provide a comprehensive overview of her life and art as a basis for more detailed

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Dylan Miner addresses this lacuna in “Straddling la otra frontera: Inserting MiChicana/o Visual Culture into Chicana/o Art History,” Aztlan: A Journal of Chicano Studies 1 (Spring 2008): 89-122, reprinted in Chicano and Chicana Art. A Critical Anthology, eds. Jennifer González et al., (Durham: Duke University Press, 2019), 374-393. There are currently only three books on Latino artists in the Midwest; these are on Carlos Cortéz, José González, and Marcos Raya. As documented by Olga Herrera in Toward the Preservation of a Heritage: Latin American and Latino Art in the Midwestern United States (Notre Dame: Institute of Latino Studies, 2008), there is no shortage of artists in this region. 11 Mari Ramirez, Hector Olea and Tomás Ybarra-Frausto, Resisting Categories: Latin American and/or Latino? (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012); Carmen Ramos, ed., Our America: The Latino Presence in American Art, exh. cat. (Washington: Smithsonian American Art Museum, 2013). The 2008-2010 exhibition titled “Phantom Sightings: Art after Chicano Art” featured many installations and conceptual works that seem indistinguishable from those of nonLatino artists. Thereby, the art critic Ken Johnson questions the continuation of “identity-based show,” in his article titled “They’re Chicanos and Artists. But Is Their Art Chicano?” The New York Times, April 9, 2010, under “Art Review: ‘Phantom Sightings’.” 12 Tomás Ybarra-Frausto, “Imagining a More Expansive Narrative of American Art,” American Art, vol. 19 (Fall 2005): 9-15.

xx

Introduction

analyses of her works in the subsequent chapters. Tomasula underwent the typical Mexican American experience that is aptly characterized by Roberto Guizueta as follows: “whether vis-à-vis one’s family, one’s barrio, one’s ancestors, or God, the Mexican American always exists in relationship.”13 The worldview and values concerning family, community, life, and spirits that she grew up with were thoroughly challenged when she entered college in Chicago. Those years away from the enclaves of her youth were marked by financial, emotional, and mental struggles, whilst she endeavored to discover her identity as an artist, wife, and mother. Only after her graduation, however, was she able to reconcile the two worlds and also find her voice through the genre of emblematic still life. The evolvement from figurative to simple arrangement of still life objects and then gradually denser compositions over the years can be traced through four phases of development. The core technical and stylistic ingredients that emerge and result in the scintillating appearance of her works are investigated. Lastly, recurring emblems and notable series of art works are highlighted in reference to the overarching themes and contents that are prevalent throughout the entire collection. The succeeding chapters tackle her works from a topical standpoint, dissecting the permeating conceptual flow and analyzing individual significations that undergird sets of art works with distinctive subject matter. Identical paintings, however, lend to a number of salient themes, hence they are discussed in multiple chapters. Chapter Two focuses on the formidable influence of Mexican Catholicism on Tomasula’s life and art. Her religious upbringing and art works she encountered in churches and homes are probed to uncover the Mexican Catholic sources that shaped and came to inhabit her images of flowers, insects, animals, bones, and organs. Sculptural and pictorial delineations of saints in martyrdom typically found in Mexican Catholic churches and certain votive images popularized by Spanish holy cards are compared to her paintings to unveil the origins of the prominent motifs in the still lifes. Also examined are Mexican religious observances and popular Mexican American customs that are relevant to her art. The artist honors her heritage through her employment of the church and vernacular religious sources, but she also intricately transforms them into disguised symbols and representations that speak to her own interests and interpretations of issues pertaining to suffering, death, life, and embodiment.

 13

Roberto Goizueta, “The Symbolic World of Mexican American Religion,” in Horizons of the Sacred. Mexican Traditions in U.S. Catholicism, eds. Timothy Matovina and Gary Riebe-Estrella (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2002), 121.

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Chapter Three traces the next major influence, European still life practices, which directed her toward a visual language that she could then make into her own. The connection to the seventeenth- and eighteenthcentury Baroque Dutch and Spanish art is inescapable, finding affinity in the use of tenebrism and focus on meticulous tactile details. Her paintings are compared to the seminal still life paintings of the past to reveal the appropriation of conventional motifs and ideas as well as to illuminate the alterations that the artist made in order to recreate the artistic subject. The artist’s borrowing of Caravaggism, however, is not anachronistic, as it aligns her art with the contemporary trend of Neo-Baroque. This chapter concludes by reviewing the infusion of the European still life customs in her art against the Mexican religious influences discussed in Chapter Two, to divulge the confluence that occurs in her art, leading ultimately to the creation of syncretic art. Syncretism, a concept derived from social and religious studies, is applied to her art to substantiate its full and synchronous allegiance to both of her cultural legacies. This discussion corroborates the uniqueness of Tomasula’s art, which distinguishes it from those Mexican American images that conspicuously quote indigenous artifacts and monuments as well as from cultural hybrid art, which blends different cultural traits piecemeal. Despite being grounded in established traditions, the artist developed her own symbolism in her depictions of organic subjects. Chapter Four deals with an assortment of metaphorical works that have personal and political meanings to the artist, drawing from her testimonies and interviews. This chapter also explores the writings of two philosophers, Baruch Spinoza and Gilles Deleuze, whom the artist extensively read and some of whose ideas she adopted. Their thoughts on nature are of particular interest here, as they are reflected in her art. To draw parallels between the texts and art, selected writings by Spinoza and Deleuze are analyzed as well. The common denominator between the two thinkers is the concept of immanence, as opposed to transcendence, a belief in the divine, the being, and the universal force in the very material reality of the world. Tomasula professed to adhere to this ideal, which is relayed through the sense of inherent spirituality or indwelling force evoked in her works. Spinoza’s monist claim of nature being equal to God, Deleuze’s univocal understanding of nature as self-creating, and other relevant expositions on nature are discussed to explain the innate immanent force in nature that is apparent in her art.

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Introduction

Chapter Five: “Embedded Feminism” unravels the gendered dimension of Tomasula’s art. Chicana art, as demonstrated in recent exhibitions and publications, is well known for the political and feminist statements communicated through the inventive appropriation of popular religious images such as the Virgin of Guadalupe. Although more discreetly through symbolic means, Tomasula’s still lifes find convergence with the works of prominent Chicana artists in the use of religious motifs to speak of woman’s suffering, freedom, space, and desire. Tomasula’s tortured flowers, which reference the saints, also simultaneously allude to woman’s suffering. Such juxtaposition is in line with the blatant transposition of woman’s image onto the Passion scene of Christ by a number of Chicana artists. Her altar-inspired paintings, like the altar-based assemblages by other Latina artists, connote the matriarchal tradition of female private devotion. To further elucidate the feminist dimension, two theoretical sources outside of Chicana studies are also considered in relation to Tomasula’s art. New Materialist feminists’ ownership of nature, specifically Stacy Alaimo’s redefinition of nature as an “undomesticated” free realm apart from the patriarchal world, is examined to address the overall feminist dynamics of Tomasula’s still life. Julia Kristeva’s psychoanalytical theory of the “abjection” is utilized to decode the specific abject items of bones, skulls, and hearts that ultimately point to the mother and woman. These visual, symbolic, and theoretical explorations validate the feminist facet that is integral to these works that simultaneously transmit multiple meanings. New Materialism is further investigated in the last chapter beyond its relevance to feminism, because Tomasula postulates her adherence to its ideas as the preeminent driving force behind her recent works. This twenty-first century philosophical movement advocates the posthuman, anti-anthropocentric, non-binary stance that emphasizes the nonseparability of all forms of matter. Already equipped with firm belief in embodiment and connectivity, owing to her Catholic and Mexican American background, the artist readily embraced the New Materialist ontological position that has bearing on all aspects of life and society. Subsequently, the New Materialist neologisms of natureculture, thingpower, intra-action, and holobiant, as expounded by Karen Barad, Jane Bennett, and Donna Haraway, are all applicable to the works of Tomasula. Two general concepts, however, unite all of these terms and constitute the groundwork of Tomasula’s recent practice. These are “entanglement,” which sees a connection among all classifications of existence—human or nonhuman, animate or inanimate—and “becoming,” which believes in the continual evolvement of all substances. Such erasures of boundaries, intra-

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action, and transformation of forms are evident especially in the late works, where organic and non-organic materials are increasingly integrated, intertwined, and appear to be in the midst of merging into new configurations. This aligns with the central New Materialist belief in the active “performative” nature of all material agents participating in the formation of new creations, as visually illustrated in Tomasula’s still lifes. Tomasula’s still lifes, therefore, are not merely captivating, amusing renderings of realistic flowers, insects, fruits, bones, and organs. This analytical thematic approach uncovers the multilayered depth of her iconography. Her sensational paintings project a presence and are the embodiment of profound thoughts and sentiments that are founded on various strands of history and complex ongoing developments. In sum, Tomasula’s art visually bedazzles, yet it also intrigues the intellect.



CHAPTER ONE CHRONOLOGY OF LIFE AND ART

Maria Tomasula resolutely opposes modern American adherence to individualism.1 She supports instead the belief in the connectivity of all forms of existence. She sees human relations in particular as an absolute necessity in creating a healthy wholeness as the basis of individual identity. Such conviction in interconnectedness stems from her upbringing as a Mexican American, derived from an ethnic heritage that is firmly rooted in family and community.2 Maria Carolina Garcia was born in 1958 in East Chicago, Indiana to a traditional Mexican American family. Among all her relatives, she was most influenced by her maternal grandmother, Maria del Refugio, who loved her and her siblings unconditionally. Her grandmother came from a well-to-do family with her father serving as a paymaster in the Mexican army. Due to their privileged status, when the Mexican Revolution erupted, they fled to the United States and spent their savings to make ends meet. Maria’s maternal grandmother was not particularly interested in matrimony, but she wanted to have children, so she married Regino Anguiano with whom she had a daughter and a son. Maria remembers seeing her abuelita quite often during the week as well as on Sundays, when they attended a Mexican American church in East Chicago together. She does not recall her own mother as being particularly religious, attending church only because her grandmother could not drive and

 1

Maria Tomasula, “More than a Feeling: Painting with a Distributed Sense of Agency,” a paper delivered on November 14, 2017, as part of the Latino Studies Seminar series at the Institute for Latino Studies, University of Notre Dame, n.p. See Appendix. 2 Roberto Goizueta indeed remarks that for Mexican Americans, “community is the very source of personal identity. Individuals are not the building blocks of community; community is, instead, the foundation of individual personhood.” In “The Symbolic World of Mexican American Religion,” Horizons of the Sacred. Mexican Traditions in U.S. Catholicism, ed. Timothy Matovina and Gary RiebeEstrella (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2002), 122.



2

Chapter One

needed a ride. Even though abuelita saw her grandchildren several times a week, she always screamed with joy every time she greeted them. Her love for them was profuse and overflowing, as clearly felt by the children. She was also “extremely religious,” always setting aside extended time to pray daily before her private altar in her bedroom.3 On the altar, she had installed candles, flowers, objects of personal significance, a religious print, and a statue of St. Martin de Porres, the Peruvian patron saint of mixed-raced people and innkeepers, shown frequently with a broom in his hand and in the company of animals.4 Her husband was not religious, but a striving, hard-working man. He grew up in a poor family of sixteen or seventeen children in Colima, Mexico and when his father became abusive after the death of his wife, Regino ran away to the U.S. He ended up at Jane Addams Hull House in Chicago and worked diligently to make a living doing various jobs, landing on driving a truck and eventually owning a restaurant and boarding house called El Farolito in East Chicago. Maria’s mother, Ester, grew up in a loving home, and in return also treated her own kids with affection and care.

Figure 1-1 Photo of Maria’s maternal grandparents, Regino and Maria del Refugio Anguiano on the left, and paternal grandmother Carolina Garcia on the right, 1980s

 3

Maria Tomasula, interview by the author on September 29, 2017, audio. 4 St. Martin de Porres is depicted dark-skinned, since he was of Spanish and African-Native American descent. Along with his service to the poor and the sick, he daily attended to the cleaning chores at his monastery. This housekeeping reference earned him his title as the patron saint of innkeepers. One of the reasons why Maria’s grandmother focused on and prayed to him was because her husband ran a boarding house.



Chronology of Life and Art

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Figure 1-2 Maria Garcia at her First Holy Communion, 1966

Figure 1-3 Raymundo and Ester Garcia with their children, Maria, Ray and Lilia, 1965



4

Chapter One

Maria’s father, Jesus Raymundo Garcia, left his hometown of Anahuac in Nuevo Leon, Mexico in 1956. Employment opportunities led him to East Chicago, where he eventually settled at Inland Steel as a crane operator from 1963 to 1974. East Chicago, which is located on the coastline of Lake Michigan in Indiana and close to Illinois, was a vibrant industrial town, boasting a reputation as the steel capital of the world in the early to mid-twentieth century. Immigrants from Eastern Europe first flocked there to work for the railways and mills. During World War I, both US Steel and Inland Steel actively recruited laborers from other states as well as temporary workers from Mexico. Although many foreign laborers were sent back following a backlash against immigrants, some were able to obtain green cards and remain permanently. As a result, East Chicago became a multinational city of diversity, with immigrants from thirty-six countries. It consistently sustained a 50% Hispanic population, of which Mexicans comprised the majority.5 Maria remembers her milieu surrounded by images of Chavez, Zapata, and Aztec warriors and temples pasted all over the Mexican American neighborhood.6 Every home also displayed pictures and sculptures of Mexican heritage as well as Catholic saints, since almost all Mexican immigrants were Catholics at the time.7 These popular images possessed critical instrumental value, according to Maria, as they “seemed to broadcast the community’s shared history while imaging our common aspirations. All that art generated a sort of invisible cohesive force that made me feel connected to the community.”8 Raymundo Garcia married Ester Anguiano in 1958; they had Maria the same year, followed shortly by her brother Raymundo Jr., and a sister Maria Lilia six years later. In addition to his shiftwork at Inland Steel, he also worked as a photographer for weddings and other milestone events. Maria remembers his darkroom and her fascination with the process

 5

Julian Samora and Richard Lamanna’s Mexican-Americans in a Midwest Metropolis: A Study of East Chicago (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1967) is the most comprehensive study of the Latinos in East Chicago. See also Rubén Martinez, ed., Latinos in the Midwest (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 2011); Omar Valerio-Jiménez, Santiago Vaquera-Vásquez and Claire Fox, eds., The Latina/o Midwest Reader (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1978). 6 Maria Tomasula and Julie Farstad, “Word for Word: Artists and Their Influences Trade Tape,” Mouthtomouth (Fall 2002). http://mouthtomouthmag.com. 7 See Jay Dolan and Gilberto Hinojosa, eds., Mexican Americans and the Catholic Church, 1900-1965 (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1994); Timothy Matovina and Gary Riebe-Estralla, Horizons of the Sacred. 8 Tomasula, “More than a Feeling,” Appendix.



Chronology of Life and Art

5

through which captured images emerged through the chemical applications. Annually, her father had two weeks off and he used the opportunity to take his family to his parents in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico. Every year, from 1963 to 1974, the family drove through the South to get to the country. Strangely, Mexico seemed more familiar to her than the white Southern states of America. Nuevo Laredo, she confessed, felt similar to her surroundings in East Chicago with the sounds of Spanish and images of Mexican historical figures and Catholic saints everywhere. It was when they drove through Arkansas that she felt like she had entered a foreign country with people of different life styles.9 Of the visits to Nuevo Laredo, Maria recalls her grandparents’ convenience store, which sold everything from food and stationery to tools as well as playing with the neighborhood kids. She remembers playing La Llorona, “the Weeping Woman,” a children’s game based on a wellknown folk tale figure who drowned her children and eternally cries as a ghost seeking her offspring. For the children, this tragic figure was a source of fear. Maria’s trips to Mexico ended in 1974 when her father used his savings to open a restaurant called El Taco Real in Hammond, Indiana, well aware of the decline in the manufacturing commissions at the mills, all of which eventually waned. Maria’s paternal grandmother Carolina Garcia, now a widow, lived with her family at intervals and helped out at the restaurant from 1974 to 1990. Mexicans traditionally observed rituals to welcome their dead relatives into their homes and Maria’s family likewise always commemorated the dead by observing feast days in their honor. The presence of the dead became a daily affair, as Carolina believed she could communicate with her dead husband and would frequently talk to him as if he were in the house. This was not considered extraordinary, but an accepted practice in the family, in her formative years. Other than the presence of the otherworldly, Maria’s youth was fairly ordinary with no major life-changing upheavals. She attended schools, where she excelled academically. Above all, she loved to draw. Despite periodic displacements—moving from one apartment to another in East Chicago, Gary, and finally Hammond, where her parents bought a house and settled—, she always felt secure due to the strong bonding and support from her parents and grandparents. Of her entire experience growing up in these working-class districts, the most formidable influence came from

 9



Tomasula, interview.

6

Chapter One

church. Most Mexicans were already Catholics before immigration, but their church life became ever more paramount in the U.S., as they found assistance and solace among fellow Spanish-speaking congregants.10 Almost three-quarters of Mexican Americans consistently have professed to be Roman Catholics, so that “being Mexican American and being Catholic are often seen as synonymous.”11 Like almost all of her Mexican American neighbors, Maria attended local Spanish-speaking churches in East Chicago and Hammond that catered to the ethnic population. She participated in the mass regularly, and underwent catechism and confirmation. The most memorable aspect of the Mexican Catholic churches for her was the religious images and decorations. The art works were not necessarily originals or considered of high caliber, but Maria experienced them as spectacular.12 She reminisced: “Latino Catholicism is an overwhelming sensory experience. Everything is richly decorated. The ornamentation is excessive. Every surface is covered. Walls have bas reliefs and murals. Candles throw shadows upward. Surfaces are covered in cloths and velvets. It is heightened sensory experience tied in with the spiritual.”13 During service, she was mesmerized by and more preoccupied with what the aesthetic handiwork was communicating than with the priest’s homily. She, in fact, noticed an ironic contradiction between the two: “Basically, we would get variations on the same theme: ‘try not to indulge in your sense, try not to give in to your bodily influences, try to restrain.’ Whereas the images were saying the exact opposite—they were just wild! They were distinctly unrestrained in every way: in what they depicted, in the bravura of the brushwork, in the amount of ornamentation on every conceivable surface.”14 Another jarring irony was notably apparent in the images of saints. Although captured in rapturous scenes of spiritual ecstasy, the religious

 10

Felipe Hinojosa writes, “in the unfamiliar surroundings of the Midwest, church services provided a much needed sense of community and a place for Latina/os to ask God’s continued protection.” In “Religious Migrants: The Latina/o Mennonite Quest for Community and Civil Rights,” The Latina/o Midwest Reader, eds. Valerio-Jiménez, Vaquera-Vásquez and Fox, 214. 11 Gastón Espinosa and Mario Garcia, Mexican American Religions. Spirituality, Activism, and Culture (Durham: Duke University Press, 2008), 381. 12 Tomasula, “Word for Word.” 13 Jim Houghton, “Tomasula: Exotic works that often puzzle,” The South Bend Tribune, July 2, 1998, E6. 14 Tomasula, “Word for Word.”



Chronology of Life and Art

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figures were represented in their most arduous moments on earth: the saints were portrayed in physical torment with body parts torn or pierced in the visual enactment of their martyrdom. The artist wrote, “Those images, with their themes of martyrdom, human suffering, mortality and transcendence, often depict extremely violent acts in a visually seductive way.”15 Despite the display of gruesome acts, the figures were rendered attractively, and the overall presentation was alluring so that they appeared sumptuous and wondrous even in the eyes of a child. They caused an euphoric reaction in the artist: “it was incredible!...it was so great. And they had this power…those amazing images in church. Amazing.”16 The candlelight made them even more dramatic, creating highlights and casting deep shadows of their bodies across the walls and floors. These sensorial impressions stayed with the artist, forming the basis of her own visual language that later came to characterize her mature art works. As she explained, those church images brought her with a valuable initial artistic education, informing her of the power of heightened visual expressions of content and sentiment that induce strong effects in the viewers.17 Unfortunately, almost all of the old churches in the region have been closed or fully rebuilt. The most prominent church in East Chicago that Maria attended with her grandmother for an extended time of her childhood was Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe (Our Lady of Guadalupe), which too has since been converted into a modern edifice with an interior far brighter and garniture more restrained in comparison to its previous state. Maria and I recently visited the church and found some of the original sculptures crowded into a small room (Fig. 1-4). One Virgin of Guadalupe painting (Fig. 1-5) from the past has been retained, but most of the inaugural images of martyrdom had been removed, specifically those with signs of graphic violence on their bodies, as the artist remembers. Just like the walls of the church, which are all white now, the art works seem to have been whitewashed, displaying only those that are most palatable with minimal visual reference to the martyrdom.

 15

Maria Tomasula, statement in the wall text for the exhibition, “Encanto: Contemporary Still Life by Maria Tomasula,” at the Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum, Chicago, 1999. 16 Tomasula, “Word for Word.” 17 Ibid.



8

Figure 1-4 Saints

Figure 1-5 Our Lady of Guadalupe



Chapter One

Chronology of Life and Art

9

Maria did well at school, but the expectation was her to work at the family restaurant after graduating from high school. She had aspirations to become an artist, so she briefly enrolled at the American Academy of Art in Chicago in 1978, but also obligingly worked as a cashier and waitress at El Taco Real at this time. But she read profusely as well, keeping up with her intellectual life. While serving at the restaurant, she noticed a young man who would always read while eating alone. Steve Tomasula, who came from a working-class family of East European descent in Hammond, had a profound thirst for reading and writing, which was intriguing to Maria. They started conversing about books and soon began to date. In 1981, after receiving her parents’ blessings, they married and left their hometowns. Thus ended the first phase of her life that was defined by her Mexican heritage and religious influences, which would have lifelong impacts, her new life beginning with her marriage and departure from the neighborhoods of her birth and upbringing in Indiana. New worlds and opportunities came to Maria starting from 1981. The couple traveled to Bahrain to teach English for a year and then they settled in Chicago as Steve entered the graduate program in Creative Writing at the University of Illinois. To support them, Maria started to work at UIC. As an employee at the institution, she was allowed to take courses there for free. The few art courses she took whetted her appetite for further learning and training, and she committed more fully to her studies by earning a Bachelor of Fine Arts in 1987 with a specialty in painting. The campus life, far removed from that of her upbringing, was rich with intellectual discourses that were heady and not always applicable. She read about Modernism and its advocacy of individualism and progressive development, as well as Postmodernism with all its theoretical discursive engagements. She however never fully bought into any positions, even as she learned about them with fascination. She resisted the direction of the art department at UIC, which championed Conceptualism and Minimalism at the time. They were the antithesis of the ornate, emotional style of art on which she had weaned and toward which she still had such penchant. The figurative paintings that she produced were unperceptively criticized for holding on to a so-called “dead” tradition. At the time in the mid to late 1980s, Neo-Expressionism was reaching its peak. Although Maria appreciated the sensuousness of those paintings, she rejected their overwrought sense of artistic ego attached to them.18 She continued to

 18

She was particularly baffled by the notion of the individual brush marks that spoke of the essence and identity of the painter. See Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.”



10

Chapter One

construct solid, identifiable forms that were created through established illusionistic techniques of modeling and spatial perspective. When she entered Northwestern University graduate school in 1987, she was surprised to find that illusionistic figurative painting was not regarded as anachronistic in the studios led by professors like Phillip Chen. She painted cut-off semi-nude figures with bright accessories that beneath the eroticism, glamour, and sense of decadence pointed to a sense of despair, discord, and isolation. The prevalent underlying theme of anguish actually stemmed from the Mexican Catholic focus on suffering that she never abandoned, despite her adoption of Western art subject matter and techniques. Over the years, Maria learned to successfully interweave her cultural heritage with the Western traditions of painting. But her belief system was evolving. Now much versed in contemporary literature and philosophy, she began to question the Catholic teachings with which she had grown up and became more immersed in the philosophical questions about human existence in general. She also developed her own philosophy of art, which she saw as more than merely a vehicle of representation and communication, but a substantiation that contains its own thoughts and emotions in its very physicality. While she was no longer discouraged from painting figures using traditional methods, however, she now faced interpretational challenges. Viewers focused on the specifics of the depicted individual figures, yet the artist aimed to engage expansive themes of life and existence. Maria began to seek out different ways of communicating her thoughts visually after leaving graduate school in 1989. While managing her artistic and professional responsibilities, Maria also faced a major hurdle in her private life. All throughout her school years, she and Steve had tried to conceive but endured three miscarriages, which completely drained her physically and emotionally. Only after graduation, when they had both finally surrendered to the possibility of infertility, did Maria finally conceive and give birth to their daughter Alba in 1991. Shortly after the family moved back to Indiana, a second daughter, Ava, arrived in 1994. In 1991, she exchanged the human figures in her works with fruits and flowers. Despite this shift of apparent subject, the symbolic content still transmitted the same ideas and concerns. As Tomasula explained: “I was trying to talk about human commonalities, but there’s just no way to be universal when gender, race, age and class are so written on our bodies. I felt almost forced, in a way, to paint metaphorically. So I started using objects from the natural world—like bugs and flowers—as stand-ins for



Chronology of Life and Art

11

the human figure.”19 The decision to replace human figures with flowers, insects, fruits, and other inanimate materials was gratifying to the artist who could twist, bind, poke, and perform all kinds of actions on the still life items without constraints. Her appointment as Assistant Professor of Art at University of Notre Dame in 1994 marked the beginning of stability for Maria and Steve, who also eventually gained professorship at the university, in the English department. The move to South Bend came with financial and emotional security as well, particularly after the family purchased a permanent home with a garden where Maria could grow flowers and vegetables. She, however, constantly struggled to make time for her art, as she was busy taking care of her family and the house as well as teaching and attending to administrative responsibilities at the university. Despite being sleepdeprived, she painted in the early hours, persistently pursuing her experiments in the use of light, value, composition, and motifs. Each of her paintings usually took months to complete, as she used tiny brushes to layer paint over and over to create smooth, luminous surfaces. Between painting projects, she produced graphite drawings after nature and from her imagination, working out her initial ideas and visual formation. By the time she relocated to South Bend, she had dispensed with the conventional cotton canvas as the base for her paintings. She wanted a truly flat surface that would accept an even layer of paint, but applying gesso to cotton almost always leaves the weave in view. In the early 1990s, she started using the traditional European method of boiling rabbit skin glue and applying it to linen in order to shrink the canvas to a tight and even veneer. The process is laborious, requiring weeks to prepare each surface. In 1996, she switched to back to acrylic gesso, which is faster, but now on wooden panels, allowing her to tap the board without any bounce, so the surface can be left fully blended and smooth. Even though she had utilized both linen and wood as the base for several years, she began using panel exclusively in 2004 and has been using it as her primary material ever since (Fig. 1-6). The artist’s pursuit of a truly even layer of paint was driven not solely by her insights into visual effects, but also her desire to remove all individual marks of the hand. As the artist shared, “I gradually adopted a mark that’s the opposite of the sort used by the abstract expressionists, that is, a mark that’s virtually nonexistent…I stipple to try to erase any visible trace of my hand, thereby symbolically

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Tomasula, “Word for Word.”

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Chapter One

dispersing ‘myself’ as I paint.”20 The methodology has political implications in its endorsement of a shared sense of presence as opposed to the American ideology of individualism.

Figure 1-6 Tomasula painting, September 29, 2017

While the artist delved into the technical aspects of her art making, she concurrently advanced certain selective emblems that registered specific notions. All of her major subjects were established by 2003 and recurred throughout her works of the subsequent years, albeit in modified forms. Their appearances vary, but the same underlying existential ruminations about suffering, embodiment, life, and death girdle and dictate the iconography of the paintings. Maria is now Professor of Art and Director of the Graduate Studies of her department at the University of Notre Dame. Her most recent highlight, she has stated, was the trip to Ireland in the summer of 2019 to teach at an affiliated institution of her university. While her children have

 20



Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.”

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grown up and left for graduate school and work, Maria’s daily life still seems to be largely devoted to both school and family. In 2013, her mother fell ill with Alzheimer’s, and as her father insists on taking the role of the primary caretaker, her parental situation has become worrisome. So she visits them in Hammond as often as she can. And she continues to strive to find time to paint, having to consciously carve out space for herself. She is always inspired by nature, drawing flowers and other organic specimens that she grew, discovered or acquired. Most recently, her efforts have focused on transmitting her understanding of the core New Materialistic belief in the interconnectivity of all matter, human or nonhuman, through her works of art. The evolution of her style and motifs has not taken a linear path, but rather has unfurled in overlapping layers, some disappearing as others resurface after an absence of months or years. The development of her oeuvre can generally be divided into four phases. The years 1985 to 1991 mark the period of her early figural paintings from her graduate portfolio and her practice in the ensuing years. In the second period, from 1991 to 1995, her subject matter switched to still life, but while broadening the range of forms, values, and compositions at hand. The years from 1996 to 2015 represent a phase of consistency where the artist settles into certain apparatus and mechanisms and refines them, making them staples and trademarks of her art. Lastly, the recent works, from 2016 to the present, exhibit the traits of more complex, convoluted compositions. These stages will now be investigated, highlighting the prominent features of each period using specific examples. During her college and graduate years, Maria focused on figural representations. She worked from live models, limning close-up images of almost nude middle-aged figures with glaring accessories such as glossy gloves, shiny earrings and bracelets, and flamboyant waistbands or corsets (Figs. 1-7, 8, 9, 10). These props evoke the burlesque with its embellishments that simultaneously heighten and cheapen the theatrics of eroticism. Perhaps an affinity exists, as Steve has noted, between these works and those of Phyllis Bramson, her mentor at UIC.21 Bramson is well known for her flowing, colorful expressionist delineations of nude figures engaged in erotic activities. Her works, however, tend towards the playful and at times comical, while Maria’s paintings are solemn and introspective. A man and a woman turn their backs to each other, displaying no exhilaration about their sexual engagement that happened or will happen,

 21



Tomasula, interview.

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Chapter One

and have their eyes closed, seemingly immersed in their individual thoughts. There is an attempt at spark and glamour, but all seems to have failed, leaving them somber and depressed. Do these works reflect Maria’s feeling at the time, facing multiple letdowns after each hopeful pregnancy? The artist may have derived inspiration from her personal life, but her works achieve a form of universality in their conception and implication. Her titles intimate something deeper, even biblical, in nature: For Everything, Against Nothing, and Fruit of Knowledge. Expulsion of 1988 (Fig. 1-10), for instance, clearly refers to Adam and Eve; yet the characters, in this interpretation, are tempted by pears, not apples. Despite the modern secular look, the images evoke age-old Catholic lessons about self-gratification, despair, and suffering. The ornate adornments may have been inspired by her early observations of the intricate Baroque decorations; for instance, the delicate golden arm and foot bracelets on the woman in Fruit of Knowledge of 1989 (Fig. 1-9) are reminiscent of the shiny textural golden filigree in Our Lady of Guadalupe (Fig. 1-5).

Figure 1-7 Tomasula, Against Nothing, 1988



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Figure 1-8 Tomasula, For Everything, 1988

The precise rendering of the figures and ornaments as well as the unusual perspective into the scenes may have been influenced by Phillip Chen, her teacher at Northwestern University. Prof. Chen was famous at the time for his prints of architectural settings viewed at unusual angles and in close-up. Maria experimented with similar vantage points, zooming in on the figures from the frontal, lateral, and superior perspectives. Such points of view destroy the customary safe distancing that the viewers tend to expect, bringing them uncomfortably close to the erotic narration and its unappealing protagonists, causing provocation and even disgust. As the artist remembers physically reacting to the religious images of her past, she too desires to create art that invites immediate sensorial reaction. Such scintillating effect is apparent in all of her art works from this time to the present.



16

Chapter One

Figure 1-9 Tomasula, Fruit of Knowledge, 1989

Figure 1-10 Tomasula, The Expulsion, 1988



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The angled zoom-in effect is also applied in her drawings of this period, which constitute her earliest still lifes. These graphite delineations, like the paintings, are constructed to present the still life elements close-up and cut off, as in Bloom of 1985 (Fig. 1-11) which manifests a strawberry with cream inside to the far left. The continued presence of religion is manifested here in the upper right through the partial view of Christ on the cross, a standard feature in the Mexican American homes of her childhood. The feel of home is even more prominent in From Cuca of 1989 (Fig. 1-12), which displays chocolate-dipped cookies wrapped inside white linen, gifted by Cuca (the nickname of Maria’s maternal grandmother).22 Familiarity with the Mexican hearth is represented through the picture of the Sacred Heart in the upper left, a very popular image in the homes and churches of her childhood. Maria prompted those direct references to her former milieu exclusively in her still life drawings at the time.

Figure 1-11 Tomasula, Bloom, 1985

 22

“Cuca” is the diminutive of Refugio and the name of her grandmother was Maria del Refugio.



18

Chapter One

Figure 1-12 Tomasula, From Cuca, 1989

After graduation, Maria began to eschew the burlesque attributes and focused on individuals lost in deep thought. Rhythm of 1990 (Pl. 1) depicts an aged man standing vulnerably naked while taking his own pulse, as a mysterious angelic figure, emerging out of the camouflage of the neon textured swath, attempts to intercede and soothe him. There is a more conscientious control and alignment of the compositional elements, positioning them more within the frame and along the geometrical divisions. The use of intense colors also receives far greater emphasis with the extensive display of the vibrant curtains at the top and on the side. These are the two most notable characteristics that would become the trademarks of the artist from this point on: bright saturated colors and fastidiously organized compositions. At this stage, the artist introduced strong value contrast, as in Penitent II of 1991 (Fig. 1-13). Another middle-aged naked man emerges into light from darkness, as if he is baring his soul for an audience. The Baroque tenebrism is a painterly technique she learned to apply in school, but she



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had been exposed to this effect long before. She understood the mysterious, spiritual ambience that it could induce, from the churches she attended: In those dusky, cavernous settings, with their huge, tilted, iron racks of candles casting the only light, with the smell of incense, the carved and glimmering gilded altar, the flowers, the velvet curtains parting to reveal statues of beseeching figures that threw towering shadows, and all those painted eyes cast upwards, it seemed that one’s senses were a kind of gift given to navigate through a world where a lot is hidden, un-seeable, and unfathomable.23

The manipulation of the range of values became very significant to the artist, as she used it to create a striking atmosphere and connote a sense of embodiment in her subjects.

Figure 1-13 Tomasula, Penitent II, 1991

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Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.”

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Chapter One

Figure 1-14 Tomasula, Romanus, 1991

Figure 1-15 Tomasula, Sustenance, 1991

As noted above, 1991 was the year she replaced the human figure with still life objects, marking the start of a transitional period in which her works evolved toward her fully developed formation. In this second phase, she explored various options for her still life, experimenting with different mediums, lights, shadows, sizing, and placements of the elements. Overall, the paintings of this phase are characterized by a simple composition of a few articles against a close backdrop. She first worked on the staging, cloaking the entire back wall with a dramatic theatrical curtain with creases and stark value contrast that evoke seventeenth-century Baroque paintings as well as the actual drapes that she witnessed in the churches covering the art works or drawn to the side to unveil them. Such ostentatious display of curtains is evident in Romanus of 1991 (Fig. 1-14), with fluctuations between highlights and shadows, almost mimicking the



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flicker of candle light. Interestingly, the fabric dominates this picture with the still life object of a Roman crown relegated far to the bottom right. The diadem seems an afterthought, as the painting garners more attention to the value-changing circular and vertical folds of the colorful, textured cloths. In Sustenance of 1991 (Fig. 1-15), a raven, noticeable only by the bright yellow bread in its mouth, flies down from the top left against a dark silky blue curtain with stark spotlight on the lower right. The drapery covers the entire vertical length of the long canvas. Clearly the raven, derived from the biblical story of Elijah, is the narrative’s focus, yet the fabric of the backdrop is more visually prominent.

Figure 1-16 Tomasula, Bearer, 1993



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Chapter One

Figure 1-17 Tomasula, Divina, 1995

After the artist leverages the back scenery, she then proceeds to amplify the still life items, capturing them up close in the center forefront and highlighted. Frequently the artist brandishes a piece of fruit still on the original tree branch or unveils an entire flower along with its roots. A case of the latter is Bearer of 1993 (Fig. 1-16), which reveals an amaryllis that is encircled and held up by strings that are nailed to the walls. It also exhibits a different smaller flower attached to its stem by means of a string again. This painting features some of the visual attributes that will become standard in her art: a centered subject in an oval spotlight, strings and nails that restrain and suspend, and an assemblage of unrelated components that together form one unit. Hit by a light from the front left, the plants cast long, dark shadows against the wall to the right, a theatrical device that is prevalent in the works of this second phase of her development. The play of values is pronounced in this stage as well, with divergent results ranging from the use of an oval spotlight against a dark backdrop to the overwhelming tenebrism that engulfs even the items most centrally placed. Another type materializes at this time, as in Divina of 1995 (Fig. 1-17), where a strict artificial separation of light and shadow is apparent, with the



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prevailing darkness of the backdrop not encompassing the fruit in the front, which bathes in full light. Unlike the nails and strings in the previous works that perform functional roles of suspending, holding, and tying organic materials together, here the purpose of the long pins on top of this half-cut cantaloupe is symbolic. Using fruits and flowers to suggest bodies allowed the artist to visualize various kinds of vulnerability and experiences including suffering by cutting, nailing, and twisting the forms.

Figure 1-18 Tomasula, Mother’s Well, 1994



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Chapter One

Figure 1-19 Tomasula, Rhythm, 1998

The curtains appear less frequently and are used more as a backdrop to supplement the still life object in the front or as an additive dramatic appurtenance that opens to showcase the main protagonist. Mother’s Well of 1994 (Fig. 1-18) is unusual in that the red coverings are forced to open by means of nails that uncloak a skin-colored wall with bulging drops of water dispersed across it. This is painted on linen, which she used for several years for its taught surface. The sexual connotation of this painting is apparent, but the emphatic nails that implicate pain and expose the tears behind the luscious fabric speak of a mother’s inner pain. Could this be related to the artist’s struggle to conceive and the miscarriages she had to endure? The nails are no longer incorporated merely for practical purposes, but stand as symbols of affliction—a consistent theme across her works. Metaphorically illustrating the mother as the source of life and equating motherhood with suffering, the artist communicates a dual message, a strategy she employs in many works. She frequently beautifies entities in pain to signify both the negative and positive aspects of life, in



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her own words: “the penalties of life, as well as its invitations.”24 In addition to nails, strings, pins, and water drops or tears are all staples in her art. Overall, small motifs are transformed into pivotal acute emblems during this transitional period between 1991 and 1995. After experimenting with different media, value contrasts, and compositions as well as innovating some crucial symbolic devices, the artist entered a period of maturity starting from 1996 when she switched to the wooden panel, which satisfied her need for a completely even surface and which she has used ever since. The wooden panel also made her far more conscious of the painterly process that she manipulates in order to accomplish her creative visions. From 1996 to 2015, her compositions become sophisticated with unusual juxtapositions and unexpected intertwining of elements. Stylistically, the shapes are more precise, and the colors more saturated and luminescent than before. An example is Rhythm of 1998 (Fig. 1-19), which displays a radiant organic crown. As the artist explains, this is an imaged twisting of segments from several lady’s slipper orchids, with the interlocking of seven fuchsia labella forming the middle ring, and strings of long side petals attached to the circle to form the outer ring, all pierced through and tied as a unit. The palette is much brighter with glowing hues, and shadows relegated to the sides of the objects rather than dominating the picture. Although Tomasula continues to apply tenebrism in certain works, the shadows tend to remain in the back, with minimal dark touches on the fronts of objects, which are now in such an effulgent spotlight that they project sharply and contrastingly against the backdrop. During this period, her essential approach is refined and consolidated: an unnatural arrangement of mostly organic but also artificial substances, tightly delineated with crisply detailed surfaces of intense hues left by undetectable innumerable taps of her brush, drawing immediate attention due to the brilliant light illuminating the main subjects. The stage curtain subsides and appears only occasionally, whether closed or opened, as in Skindeep of 1999 (Pl. 5), which exhibits a brighter, neon blue drapery that contains lighter shadows within it, compared to the drapery of earlier phases. It opens to unveil a skinned pear in direct light, casting deep shadows on the wall, but only subtle touches of shades on the fruit. In the subsequent works, the cast shadows become gradually lighter as well. The drama of the work does not depend solely on the value contrast, but also, or perhaps more so, on the intensity of the colors and the

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Tomasula, wall text of “Encanto.”

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Chapter One

dynamic alignment of the articles. The meticulous surface realism with tactile details is the signature mark of the artist, who additionally magnetizes the items with fierce colors that ultimately make the picture attractive despite of the disturbing implication. Skindeep discloses long pins piercing the vulnerable flesh of the fruit. The shiny red balls at the end of the pins mimic tiny blobs of blood, and the droplets of water that slide across the pear resemble tears, as if they were shed by the pear in response to the pain of the penetration. The wall exposes burn marks and scratches everywhere, further accentuating the content of agony. This work and many others with tortured organic materials are obviously derived from the operatic church images of saints in martyrdom, but feature fruits and flowers instead of holy figures. Suffering is the primary and consistent topic of the artist, running through her oeuvre, but it is always accompanied by a sense of vitality and sensory opulence. The interconnection among material entities, another essential concept of the artist that she initially explored during her second phase, was cultivated further at this time, transpiring the bundling of dissimilar flowers to include nonorganic materials as well. The agglomeration also gradually transforms from forceful conjoining to seamless integration as a means of engendering new hybrids. While there is a decrease in the use of curtains and shadows, and an increase in the inclusion of nails and striking colors, a few more preeminent motifs are utilized between 1996 and 2000 that are added to the lexicon of signs employed by the artist. They include dolls, gloves, butterflies, bones, hearts, and beads. Although these are new subjects in her art, their influence traces back to her early years. The symbolic construction of the still life materializes in full at this time, however, references to the human form are not entirely eradicated. The artist frequently incorporates an entire doll or a doll’s hand or a glove to point to the human presence and human essence of the still life. The doll imagery may have emerged from the toy figurines of her daughters, made of various materials ranging from plastic, wood, and bones to flower stalks. And depending on the matter and method of assemblage, the shapes diverge from a rounder and smoothly carved bark structure as in Lot of 1997 (Pl. 2) to a stick figure composed of bones and thread as in Plumb of Memory of 2000 (Fig. 1-20). Both figures are linked to the surrounding flowers through a network of strings that fastens all the elements to the wall, insinuating bondage.



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Figure 1-20 Tomasula, Plumb of Memory, 2000

The doll’s hand/glove series began in 1998, with paintings such as Recognition (Fig. 1-21), where two gloved hands appear below an array of slightly blemished flowers with bits of brown rots on their petals. As represented by the lightening patterned highlights on the curtains, the raised hands are in the process of charging the dying organic lot with new energy, transforming the decay into ornamentation that shines like jewels. The gloves originate from the lurid figural paintings of 1985 to 1987 (Figs. 1-7, 8, 9, 10), where the semi-nude characters sport flamboyant gloves and jewelry. This is one of the earliest of the series, where a hand or glove seems to ignite and energize surrounding organic elements. The meanings of the glove/hand series will be tackled in subsequent chapters.



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Chapter One

Figure 1-21 Tomasula, Recognition, 1998

Tomasula occasionally renders animals such as a bird or a fish, but the most frequently portrayed creature is the butterfly, which is often, not surprisingly, associated with flowers, sometimes completely blending in among the plants. The visual reference to these insects may have been inspired by her garden, but its symbolic connotation derives from the old Christian tradition of signifying resurrection. Instead of flying, however, these insects are nailed to the wall or pierced and suspended in the air by strings, as in Held of 2002 (Pl. 16). They appear to be alive, but are actually dead. They recall a collector’s box, where the brittle specimens are impaled with insect pins through the thorax to prevent wing damage



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and for preservation. The themes of suffering, bondage, resurrection, and glorification, as connoted through the bright light and saturated color scheme, are all interfused, as are in many other works. The doll, glove, butterfly, and flower are prevalent vehicles of expression for the artist who constantly engenders new ways of refashioning their attributes. It is, no doubt, largely due to her very imaginative combination of items that many have applied the term “Magic Realism” to her art.25 Some critics align her works with Surrealism, to explain the preternatural aspect of the paintings.26 The uncanny peculiarity of Tomasula’s art is bolstered by the inclusion of the internal segments of living beings such as bones and organs, particularly the heart. Her depictions of bones, often based on animal remains, and the heart originate from Catholic imageries, alluding to the relics of the saints that the churches honored. Attainment of 2000 (Fig. 122) displays a geometric structure of intricately interwoven bones behind a floral arrangement. Close inspection reveals a mass of fine strings that bind all the individual bone parts together and are nailed to the wall to hold them upright. The intimate relationship between life and death is communicated through an unusually playful orchestration of the living and the no longer living. The human heart in the mold of the religious Sacred Heart is the central focus of All I Know of 2000 (Pl. 6). Hooks, employed first in this painting, pierce the heart and are tied to strings laced through colored beads to suspend the organ against the backdrop. Dramatic curtains are pulled back to unmask yet another wall with burn spots and stretch marks, in addition to the water droplets or tears that suggest the torment of the Savior. The glitzy beads beside the hooks recall the accessories of her early burlesque figure paintings. These decorations do not embellish the ghastly organ but highlight the immediacy of the piercing. Hooks, beads, and jewelry take part as prominent visual repertoire since 2000 to enhance the sensorial experience as well as the signification of the images.

 25

For instance, Caro, “Maria Tomasula’s Magic Realist Paintings of Figures and Still Lifes,” Hi-Fructose Magazine: The New Contemporary Art Magazine, January 4, 2016. https://hifructose.com/tag/maria-tomasula. 26 Ken Johnson, “Maria Tomasula. ‘Second Nature’,” The New York Times, March 14, 2003, Art Review section.



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Chapter One

Figure 1-22 Tomasula, Attainment, 2000

The perplexing association of disjointed elements reached a new level in 2001 with an experimental painting titled All in All (Fig. 1-23), where the animal parts are fused with a fruit. This is the first radical concoction of this kind on the part of the artist. Although she had conjoined disparate flowers and has converged unrelated materials tightly together by means of nails and strings before, she went a step further in this painting by integrating them genetically to catalyze a new hybrid creation. The crossbred flowers are not as disturbing as this fictional creature which is made up of a head and neck of a red bird, an opened apple on a tree branch, and yellow butterfly wings, hanging by the robes of different thickness coming from the top and the sides. The themes of suffering and bondage still prevail, insinuated through the intrusion of the long decorative pin that pierces into the head of the bird and exits out of the apple. The hybridity, however, advances a new content. This is the genesis of her recent paintings that emphasize the fluidity of all beings and their



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connectivity. This is also a seminal work that attests to the prodigious imagination of the artist, who starts to invent her own creatures. She always starts with real tangible substances, studying plants from her garden and other distinctive items, in order to observe and accurately portray them in her art. She then, utilizes her inventiveness to situate these realistically rendered objects in unexpected positions and arrangements. In this work, she intensifies the process, as she refashions separate animal parts and fruit of differing colors and shapes by merging them into a novel formation.

Figure 1-23 Tomasula, All in All, 2001



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Another groundbreaking painting that steers in a new direction is Held (Funnel) of 2003 (Pl. 17). This is another example of the doll’s hand/glove series, but it registers materials previously not depicted. Against a marblelike backdrop, the shiny glove gestures toward a bundle of items comprised of the usual plants, insects, and bones, but also new items such as a pheasant, a conch, an artichoke, and a faceted white oval at the top left. Although ostensibly haphazard, the components have been carefully selected and placed in particular ways to create a triangular formation above the hand. All works by the artist are always highly contrived. The profusion of clustered ingredients forming a geometric configuration, as evident in this work, is the basis for a set of compositions that tightly clutter and overlap the objects within a limited space, produced between 2006 and 2010. By 2004, Tomasula had long overcome the early traumas and challenges levelled against her figurative paintings and thus could comfortably return to the figure. At this point of her career, the human body, however, is shown from a distance or in deep shadows, making it obscure or blended with other objects around it or its surroundings. In Lacuna of 2004 (Pl. 19), the human body is an absence and the flowers nearby delineate its silhouette. The figure, though seemingly in front of the flowers, is actually a vacuum that continues the night sky with its dispersed stars in the background. The full human body is resumed only in 2004, never upstaging the still life, which remains center stage and serves as the primary agent of representation. From 2006 to 2010 another type of composition was developed. The artist densely compacted entities of familiarity and unfamiliarity in her works, much more than in its predecessor, Held of 2003 (Pl. 17). The multiple constituents are convened to generate motion, also far more than their prototype, in a vertical or circular alignment (Pl. 25, 27-31, 33, figs. 4-2, 4-8). Rapture of 2006 (Pl. 25), for instance, traces a spiral shape that encloses and leads the distinct articles of bones, flowers, and fruits to an endless void in the center. The still life objects are no longer transfixed against the wall by nails and strings, but unfold fully animated and in commotion. A spiritual force activates the materials, leading to a heightened sense of rapture. This is the topical essence of the series.



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Figure 1-24 Tomasula, Corona, 2011

The heart imagery leads to the depiction of other human organs as well as fragmented body parts of aquatic animals from 2010 to 2012. Corona of 2011 (Fig. 1-24) shows a highly smoothened brain that is deeply perforated by a thick pin to stabilize the attached golden floral crown inlaid with translucent beads and pearls just above it. As in many of her other works, pain and beauty are both invoked here, with the additional element of disgust due to the grotesque organ, which stands in high contrast to the spectacular accoutrement. A curled octopus leg in It Happened One Night of 2010 (Fig. 1-25) is also expensively adorned with a vibrant royal blue skirt, gold ball legs, and a purple glass tiara, amplified by a divine mandorla that encircles the entire configuration. While sea animals appear in European still lifes as food, the segmented organic renditions defy traditional categorization. Bones, organs, and curtailed animal parts are all examples of the abject that, as explicated by Julia Kristeva, have further meanings and implications. These paintings demonstrate the continuous but also diverted journey of the artist to and from her earlier established subjects.



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Chapter One

Figure 1-25 Tomasula, It Happened One Night, 2010

From 2013, the paintings sport denser compositions with more inclusion of elements or the elevation of the color palette across the whole picture plane. Cat’s Cradle of 2013 (Fig. 1-26) charts the familiar formation of a lily branch grafted onto an iris stem with its bulb exposed, all of which are precisely positioned by means of hooks, strings, and nails. Yet the flamboyant stained wall with its varied gradations of pinks and purples draws immediate attention, vying with the flowers as the main focus of the painting. Contemporaneously, dolls are ever more present and even take precedence, as in Everpresence of 2014 (Pl. 37). The mass of faces and arms are fastened to the wall by nails, from which strings extend and end with hooks that pierce the glowing purple mass of cloth that mimics a skirt and uncloaks a snug bunch of sundry legs hanging underneath. The specified layout with floral resemblance broadcasts a cogent effort to unite all the dolls of different skin colors and hairs into a single functioning body.



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Figure 1-26 Tomasula, Cat’s Cradle, 2013

The connectivity of all beings, human and non-human, expands as the primary and central theme in her fourth phase, from 2016 to the present. The hybridity of the 2001 All in All (Fig. 1-23) is the antecedent of recent works, fashioning a new creature out of the admixture of multiple entities. Star Eater of 2017 (Pl. 45), for instance, is the result of morphogenesis, consisting of an ominous orchid, from which butterfly wings and glass beads hang, and is crowned by a consort of alternating identical bones and jewel scarab beetles. Though the ingredients are harmless passive flowers and dead animals, together as a conjoined new creature, it looks imposing, threatening, and activated, ready to blast toward the sky to eat the stars. This imagery is related to the artist’s interest in New Materialism, particularly the notions of entanglement and becoming. Her compositions had already been progressing toward compactness with less and less negative space, but starting in 2016 due to the increased



36

Chapter One

integration of a wide range of articles, many of the works appear loaded and convoluted. The latest example is Anatomy Lesson of 2019 (Fig. 127), which encloses notable recurring subjects of the artist: skulls, bones, flowers, and some of the items of the 2010-16 spiritual series, particularly figs and mushrooms, which occur frequently in her art of the last few years. It even reverberates back to her Mexican heritage, evoking the Aztec calendar stone that embeds priestly semblance directly above and below the skull, traced by the specific placement of the floral pieces. The remains of a skeleton connote a sacrifice that is needed in order to bring new life, which the profuse spread of fresh plants dispersed all across the panel both represents and embodies.

Figure 1-27 Tomasula, Anatomy Lesson, 2019



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Her mature works since 1996 meditate on the themes of suffering, life, death, embodiment, and interconnection, which derive from her upbringing, training, and reading. Classified under the captions of Mexican Catholicism, Neo-Baroque Syncretism, Nature as Concept, Embedded Feminism, and New Materialism, these works will be sorted and examined topically in order to reveal the full range of influences on her art, including religious, cultural, art historical, philosophical, and gender. The diverse ideas that shaped the artist frame the complexity of her works, as will be explored in the following chapters.





CHAPTER TWO MEXICAN CATHOLICISM

I came to consciousness in a world of extended families, a place full of a multitude of saints, spirits and forces; we talked to, and ritually remembered, the dead, as an extension of our love for them. There was God and La Virgen de Guadalupe, and so many others, unseen but ever present.1

Tomasula was raised in the Catholic faith and grew up among spirits at church as well as at home. As she describes it, her maternal grandmother was “extremely religious,” and acted as the enforcer of the Catholic beliefs in the family. Her paternal grandmother, on the other hand, constantly talked to her late husband, fostering communication with the dead, which has long been an indigenous habitude, as an accepted daily norm at home. This was typical in traditional Mexican communities where the European religion commingled with some of the Native American customs. Such association was demonstrable even in the Catholic practices that Mexicans followed, as they evidenced sources from both the Iberian and Mesoamerican past.2 This was the brand of Catholicism that Tomasula was accustomed to and molded her identity in her formative years. As most Mexican Americans grew up in the Spanish-speaking Catholic church, it is no surprise to find images of Catholic saints and symbols prevalent in the contemporary works by Mexican American artists.3 Arturo

 1

Maria Tomasula, “More than a Feeling: Painting with a Distributed Sense of Agency,” a paper delivered on November 14, 2017, at the Institute for Latino Studies, University of Notre Dame, n.p. See Appendix. 2 See Yolanda Broyles-González, “Indianizing Catholicism. Chicana/India/ Mexicana Indigenous Spiritual Practices in Our Image.” In Chicana Traditions. Continuity and Change, eds. Norma Cantú and Olga Nájera (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2002), 117-132. 3 Debra Blake states that “religion is not only deeply interconnected with culture but often is an integral element of U.S. Mexican identity,” see Blake, Chicana Sexuality and Gender. Cultural Refiguring in Literature, Oral History and Art (Durham: Duke University Press, 2008), 103. On Mexican American Catholicism,



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Lindsay states that spirituality is “the single most important factor in the collective cultural identity of Latinos, and it is an overriding theme that resonates in the work of Latino artists in the postmodern era.”4 Particularly common are the customized pictorial depictions of the popular Mexican Virgin Guadalupe and innovative altar-based sculptures and installations. Tomasula credits her religious upbringing and Catholic art as the seminal wellspring of her entire oeuvre, as testified by the many religious titles, especially in the early phase of her career from 1991 to 1995: Ascension, Bearer (Fig. 1-16), Beatitude, Divina (Fig. 1-17), Eye of God (Fig. 2-6), Martyr, Milagro, and Rite. The Catholic content, however, is not immediately apparent due to the still life subjects. Our Lady of Guadalupe of 2009 (Fig. 5-2) is an isolated case in conception and style, as it was commissioned specifically to illustrate the Mexican Virgin.5 Her deftly manipulated still life paintings, however, link directly to Catholicism, as they are founded on predominant religious subjects and themes, which will be explored in this chapter. While her transition from figurative to still life was completed by 1991, there was one year the artist resurrected the human body, albeit referenced through silhouette or diminutive form. Among the series of human shapes the artist delineated in 2004, two of them were obviously religious, representing Christ in her own unique way. Fault Line of 2004 (Fig. 2-1) unveils a dark nude male who is tied with white ropes around various body segments that strangle and fetter him, but also simultaneously lift him up towards heaven beyond the clouds. The ropes, which most always signify bondage in Tomasula’s art, here connote freedom and life as well, as they loosely flow with stately curves and

 see Timothy Matovina and Gary Riebe-Estrella, eds., Horizons of the Sacred. Mexican Traditions in U.S. Catholicism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2002); Gastón Espinosa and Mario García, Mexican American Religions. Spirituality, Activism, and Culture (Durham: Duke University Press, 2008). 4 Arturo Lindsay, “Mestizaje and the Postmodern Latino Aesthetic.” In Ceremony of Spirit: Nature and Memory in Contemporary Latino Art, ed. Amalia MesaBaines, exh. cat. (San Francisco: The Mexican Museum, 1993), 42. See also Amalia Mesa-Baines, Ceremony of Memory. New Expressions in Spirituality Among Contemporary Hispanic Artists, exh. cat. (Santa Fe: Center for Contemporary Arts, 1988). Despite its prominence, the subject is largely overlooked by the scholarly community, according to Laura Pérez, Art, The Politics of Spiritual and Aesthetic Altarities (Durham: Duke University Press, 2007), 2. 5 It was commissioned by the University of Notre Dame to be installed at its campus church, Basilica of the Sacred Heart in 2009.



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create airy floral designs at the end. The body is essentially bound to these blossom motifs which evoke fertility. Regeneration is also inferred by the floating silver balls that strangely reflect two alien-like luminous white eyes that, from a distance, resemble butterflies. Although newly interpreted by the artist, this is essentially the biblical scene of Jesus’s crucifixion, the seismic event that rocked the Jewish establishment and eventually the entire world beyond the Middle East. Hence, this “fault line” brought divisions that even led to many wars in the history of Christendom. The themes of suffering, death, and resurrection are the central messages of the oeuvre of the artist, whether religiously contextualized or not.

Figure 2-1 Tomasula, Fault Line, 2004



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Figure 2-2 Tomasula, Delirium, 2004

Delirium of 2004 (Fig. 2-2) immediately recalls the scene of Christ’s baptism with the Holy Spirit descending like a dove, an indisputable symbol here, accompanied by the powdered luminescent light balls descending from heaven. There are, however, some odd inclusions: the dove’s tail penetrates the mouth of Christ, as if to nourish, and his body betrays strain and stress, with its skin peeled, exposing veins, muscles and bones, real and imaginary, much like the martyred body of St. Bartholomew. Instead of Baptism, this could be the Passion of Christ with the dove instead of descending, actually rising out of the mouth of Christ,



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denoting his spirit giving up and transitioning to heaven. Either way or both, what receives emphasis is his tribulation, directly traced on his body. More than anything else, suffering was an inevitable topic for the artist, who grew up with full awareness of her Mexican American heritage with its “history of a suffering people” and was visually weaned on endless images of saints in martyrdom in her surroundings. In the artist’s words, “I’ve inherited from Catholicism an understanding of worldly being as absolutely centered on embodiment, and on what’s been called the needs of our species-being, on the terrible capacities of bodies to suffer and the attendant ethical responsibility that suffering makes on us to work towards ending it.”6 Those mental and physical afflictions were embodied in overt visual presentations of the saints who were depicted in an extravagant Baroque manner, foremost found in Mexican American Catholic churches following the Latin American tradition. The artist still vividly remembers those images, which never left her and have been the most crucial influence on her art. They were typically captured spiritually entrenched whilst in physical agony. She recounts, “you name it: chopped off, tormented, skinned and flayed; people with their eyes on plates…. Here were people engaged in acts of atrocity, or in ecstasy, or suffering horribly—everything was happening all at once.”7 “Skinned and flayed” is St. Bartholomew, “their eyes on plates” refers to St. Lucy, and an example of “chopped off” would be St. Agatha, whose breasts were removed. The artist shares that their “extreme physical states—almost ritualized sacrifice—were merged with extreme spiritual states”8 and thereby these works “conflate conflicting sensations into a single state; for example, physical pain and spiritual transcendence.”9 These martyrs of course exemplify faith unto death, following in the footsteps of Christ, and travail that ultimately leads to salvation.

 6

Tomasula, “More than a Feeling,” Appendix. 7 Maria Tomasula and Julie Farstad, “Word for Word: Artists and Their Influences Trade Tape,” Mouthtomouth (Fall 2002). http://mouthtomouthmag.com. William Miller writes, “There are few things that are more unnerving and disgust evoking than our partibility. Consider the horror motif of severed hands, ears, heads and gouged eyes,” in The Anatomy of Disgust (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997), 27. 8 Quoted by Jim Houghton, in “Tomasula: Exotic Works That Often Puzzle,” The South Bend Tribune, July 26, 1998, E6. 9 Maria Tomasula’s statement on the wall text for the exhibition, “Encanto: Contemporary Still Life by Maria Tomasula,” at the Mexican Fine Arts Center Museum, Chicago, 1999.



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Furthermore, the artist remarks, “Latino culture differs greatly from the general North American culture. It places emphasis upon suffering yet sees there is beauty and pleasure in life. Latino culture gives a more complete picture.”10 Such antithetical forces inherent in the culture were most vividly materialized in the very saintly images, which “were painted or carved so beautifully, with all that rosy flesh ascending into heaven.”11 They are usually rendered appealingly idealized with attractive faces and bodily structures with meek demeanor and peaceful composure, despite being subjected to misery. Such accounts of saints with conflicting dual aspects were ubiquitous in the Latino neighborhoods, as these images propagated beyond the ecclesiastical setting through the wide distribution of inexpensive devotional reproductions such as prayer cards.12 Even though they are kitschy and sentimental, they too encapsulate the duality of idealism and barbarity. The artist, reared in this visual world, also endeavors to capture such opposing sensations at once in her art. Suffering is periodically conveyed through rudimentary dolls bound by strings as in Lot of 1997 (Fig. 2-3, Pl. 2). Aside from Mary, Christ, and possibly Adam and Eve in Expulsion of 1988 (Fig. 1-10), this is the only other biblical character that Tomasula depicted. She actually thought of Lot’s wife, while painting this, in consideration of their tragic fate. The couple endured the traumas of rejection, invasion, loss of their worldly status, death and destruction, as inferred through the restraint of all the components by pins and strings. The glorious display of floral pieces may point to their lust for life and wealth being interrupted and compromised. Their choices and desires at the end were immaterial, since they were under a greater force and destination, with the consequences of their timely exit from Sodom leading to new tribal groups called the Moabites and Ammonites. This is one of the early still life pieces where flowers, although visually appealing and vying for attention, serve conceptually as a subsidiary or complement to the other elements. Over the years, a greater number of flowers takes center stage, assuming increasingly dominant roles in her art.

 10

Houghton, “Tomasula,” E1. 11 Tomasula, “Word for Word.” 12 See Barbara Calamari and Sandra DiPasqua, Holy Cards (New York: Abrams, 2004; also Calamari and DiPasqua, Patron Saints (New York: Abrams, 2007).



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Figure 2-3 Tomasula, Lot, 1997

As mentioned, Tomasula specifically claims that her “bugs and flowers” are “stand-ins for the human figure.”13 The searing memory of the art works of martyrs is the primary source of her symbolic presentation, which substitutes the saints with flowers, bugs, and other still life objects. She recreates those religious images ingeniously through her still lifes, even retaining the disparity of projecting attractive subjects in an uncongenial context of violence. Typically the flowers, insects, birds, and fruits at first glance seem ravishingly delightful; however, on closer inspection, they divulge disturbing evidence of torture inflicted on them; thus they metaphorically evoke the martyrdom of saints. Tribulation is indeed a prescription for sainthood, a required ritual to reach sanctity, as

 13



Tomasula, “Word for Word.”

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alluded to in Rite of 1998 (Pl. 3), where a fully opened tulip is affixed against by wall by means of a nail on each petal. To accentuate the torture, each stamen is tied to a string that stretches to a different direction, locked in that position by another set of nails driven into the other end of the strings. In almost all of her paintings, flowers are the elements most notably pinched, pierced, and stretched by metal pins, hooks and strings.

Figure 2-4 Tomasula, Recure, 2002

What seems natural at first is also actually fastidiously manipulated. Recure of 2002 (Fig. 2-4, Pl. 9), for instance, presents a luscious purplishwhite iris in bloom, magnified by the spotlight effect against a dark backdrop. Details, however, disclose a highly damaged flower that has been “recured,” that is, repaired and restored to health. Originally torn to pieces, it was sewn back together, and is now held up by metal hooks that



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are tied to strings that come from the top and sides. The little water droplets on the petals signify both tears shed out of pain as well as rain drops to nourish the plant. Although visually alluring in effect, the process of re-construction makes evident the torment that the flower endured and continues to endure, as the piercing metal hooks and stretching strings insinuate. Yet the flower perseveres and rises up, displaying its glorious stitches, ultimately exuding a sense of dignity and power. This flower echoes the paradoxically idealized images of saints who display portions of their bodies torn out or afflicted with severe pain. Although the artist selects a particular flower based on its visual appeal, the religious meaning of the flower is inescapable and pertinent here: the iris in medieval and Renaissance art denotes the Passion and Resurrection of Christ, whose purity and royalty are signified by the colors white and purple respectively. Frequently referred to as “sword lily,” iris is also used to allude to the profound sorrows of Mary—foremost during Christ’s Passion—that is graphically illustrated in the pictorial account with tangible swords piercing Mary’s heart. Paintings of “Our Lady of Sorrows” were immensely popular in Spanish colonies in America, leading to the widespread sales of holy prayer cards of Mary with seven penetrating swords referring to the seven unbearable grievous moments in her life. The butterfly, the most frequent insect in Tomasula’s art, is a wellknown symbol of resurrection. In Pull of 2001 (Pl. 8), an ordinary scene of butterflies swirling around a delicious flower is transformed into a total artifice mimicking those natural effects: a cut love-in-a-mist stem is suspended in the air by a string from the top between two dead butterflies and severed individual wings of the insects that also droop down through the strings, attached to hooks that penetrate them. The dangling red glass balls distributed across the canvas insinuate blood, and the water drops across the magnificently rich blue backdrop connote tears. The torturous content is further communicated through the convoluted, twisted stigmas of the flower and its seemingly disorderly massive petals, accentuated by their dark shadows, known to be more attractive from afar than up-close. What projects as an enticing display of substances of vibrance and fertility, magnified by glowing colors and shining light, is certifiably an image of death and of pure theatrical manipulation. Nevertheless the ritual of death and resurrection is invoked in the very process: a cut flower and captured butterflies are imbued with second life via this careful staging that allows them to live permanently in this pictorial mode. The “pull” of all the individual articles implies constant stress on them, but also a vigorous attempt to raise them up and resurrect them. It imparts death and sadness,



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but also life and glory—all at the same time. Incidentally, though the fennel leaves supposedly denote sorrow as they wither quickly, they have been used for culinary and medicinal purposes in the past.

Figure 2-5 Tomasula, The Fabulous Confession II, 2004

Aside from insects, the artist occasionally paints animals, of which birds are the most prominent. While the easily recognizable dove, symbolizing the Holy Spirit, in The Fabulous Confession II of 2004 (Fig. 2-5) triumphantly engenders life, as represented by the floral arrangement emerging from its mouth, birds are more often depicted as dead in Tomasula’s paintings. Like the tortured flowers, a hummingbird in Birth of My Silence of 2002 (Pl. 11) is constrained by strings that tie selected



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body portions and enclose its body, and are nailed against the brightly illuminated orangish-red wall. This motif derives from an earlier painting, Eye of God of 1995 (Fig. 2-6), which also shows a dead hummingbird tied by strings, but hanging upside-down. The hummingbird originates from the Americas, and although tiny, it is a vivacious, active and noisy bird. It is

Figure 2-6 Tomasula, Ojo de Dios (Eye of God), 1995

considered a power animal in Mesoamerican myth, for instance representing Huitzilopochtli, the god of the sun and war in the Aztec tradition. It is also an emblem of life and resurrection, as it has the ability to enter and rise at will from torpor, a hibernation-like state. Hence this is the American version of the dove—definitely a spirit bird of power, death,



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and life. Here the hummingbird known for its constant chirping and speedy fluttering of its wings is silenced, as made clear by the strings knotted around its beak and the ends of its wings. The willing silence, as implied in the title, evokes Christ in Passion, who did not respond to the false accusations when interrogated by the Pharisees. Surrounding the bird are intermittently placed tear or water drops, creating a dotted pattern that expands centrifugally. These are tears shed for this martyred creature as well as water drops flowing from the dead body to spawn new life. Unlike Eye of God, which, despite the bold title that implicates the hummingbird as the eye of God, renders the bird lifeless, Birth of My Silence ironically insinuates life and power, as the bird is positioned apparently as if rising upwards despite its expiration, an interpretation further suggested by the warm luminescent orange-red backdrop that speaks to its inherent, unrestrainable strength.

Figure 2-7 Tomasula, Saint’s Logic, 1996



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As the artist reiterates another instance where “the fruit and flowers are stand-ins for the body, for the human,” fruits are also used to emblematize martyrdom.14 The analogy is more literally illustrated in an early painting entitled Saint’s Logic of 1995 (Fig. 2-7), where a tiny metal saint is tied to a branch of neatly aligned blueberries with their branches all nailed to the wall. The artist’s deliberate equation of the saint’s torment with the organic life in interruption and in constraint is connoted through the strings and nails. Despite the inhibition and torture, glory and hope are invoked through the shining golden backdrop that is unveiled by the deep blue curtains on the sides. What is the logic of the saint who endures severe persecution? His afterlife is the hope that sustains him throughout his temporal travail.

Figure 2-8 Tomasula, Halo, 2000

 14



Houghton, “Tomasula,” E6.

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A saint is also illustratively referenced in Halo of 2000 (Fig. 2-8), where the piece of meat is staged upright to resemble a standing human body. The head portion is tied to a halo of two dark tree branches conjoined to form a ring, which is punctured by long pins that extend out at regular intervals, inducing an outward movement. Hanging from the pins are strategically located alternating blue and yellow perforated butterflies, symmetrically affixed fuchsias, three tiny periwinkles and dispersed miniscule glass balls in colors of blue, purple, white, red and yellow. Like the works discussed above, this painting too deceptively envisions seemingly live organic configurations spurting out of the halo and around the meat-figure. The butterflies, however, are all dead; the cut flowers will soon expire and the meat will eventually decay. Captured and momentarily injected with a sense of vitality, the figure nonetheless invokes death and agony: the sharp tips of the pins are all directed at the head and the entire body, which reveals massive traces of stressed veins and is strenuously roped together by a red string that shackles the figure as a whole. Moisture drops on the meat, again, insinuate tear drops. Clearly this still life connotes a martyr in the process of enduring severe tribulations, who will assuredly enter a blessed new life. All Tomasula’s still lifes contain a halo effect, even when they contain no round items as in the exceptional Halo. The divine nature of the disguised still life symbols of martyrdom is typically inferred by the dramatic spotlight effect. Directing the light at the main subject implies the sacred presence of God completely engulfing the martyr, much like the heavenly vision that consumed St. Stephen at the moment of his stoning. Sometimes a concentrated beam captures just the central image as in Recure (Fig. 2-4, Pl. 9) against a pitch-black backdrop. More often, though, the radiance gleams over a larger area, morphed into an enlarged oval glare that contains all of the essential components as well as the back wall as in Pull (Pl. 8), frequently leaving only the four corners of the picture in darkness. Typically the subjects are centrally positioned, geometrically enclosed within a circular or triangular structural format, then visually accentuated by the unnatural high-voltage spotlight. This light seems supernatural, elevating the tormented still life items to the level of the divine, otherworldly level. The sum of her church experience is illustrated in her painting titled Cathedral of 2009 (Pl. 32), which too casts a beam of light on the hanging, longitudinally cut fig against the pitch-black backdrop. The exposed inner part of the fruit is thoroughly penetrated by two long pins that crisscross at its central biological core. The pins aim to interrupt the inflorescence of



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male and female flowers inside from reproduction, but to no avail, as the clusters of green bubbles that insinuate new life burst out right outside of the syconium and are about to expand. They seem to have emerged from the fig and are in the process of dispersing in all directions, just as the diaphanous fine strings that are exercised to restrict and lift the fruit ultimately seem to indicate motion all around the subject. Despite the apparent clash of conflicting forces, this fruit-flower is alluring due to its use of brilliant hues, enchanting circular shapes, and the concentrated glow. Yet the arresting mannerism does not gloss over or evade the focal theme of this emblem. Even without the pins, a stark sense of suffering is connoted through the deep maroon hollow that mimics a wound and the interior mini-flowers resembling tear drops, communicating pain and suffering. Simultaneously the reference to blood and water, the fundamental necessities of life, suggests fertility. The meaning of new life through death is clear, recalling the martyred saints in spiritual ecstasy and relaying the core Christian message of Christ’s Passion leading to the salvation and attainment of glorious afterlife for its adherents. Tomasula’s still lifes, however, tend to involve multiple layers of meaning. On one level, the tortured still lifes allude to the martyred saints; on another level, they unveil a grander signification by serving as embodiments of broader concepts. As the artist stated, our very existence is intimately intertwined with suffering and there is a moral obligation to end it. Although Tomasula’s works are not overtly political, in her own indirect symbolic way, she is ushering awareness to widespread travails everywhere in the world, as it affects even a negligible flower. Despite twenty-first century comforts and efforts to avoid misery at all costs, all levels of pain persist everywhere. Suffering is an integral factor of being human, whether one is a saint or not. One’s existence and the concomitant attributes associated with life, such as distress and anguish are inseparable, as illustrated in her paintings through the strings that pull, tie, and bind the prominent still life objects, which are stand-ins for humans. The artist has been keenly aware of this reality through the absorption of Catholicism as well as Mexican American heritage, which bears traces of tribal warfare, colonization, forced assimilation, labor injustice, and racial prejudices. To be a Mexican Catholic is to both embrace this history and contend with it. Tomasula’s way is not activism, but enlightenment through sensation. She does not, however, belabor solely on adversities, but infuses an uplifting quality into her images. The tortured flowers, butterflies, birds, and fruits are aggrandized by the visual effects of color, value contrast, and tactility. Foremost, they have a halo effect. The flowers and other still life objects, substituting for the saints on one level, ultimately speak for all humanity,



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especially their suffering, but also divulge the divine essence innately in their bodily presence. Saint or not, Mexican American or not, all beings— even in their most deprived and grievous moments—are dignified individuals with divine power within them. This is demonstrated by the sumptuous delineation of mundane flowers, however damaged, torn or pierced. They are the very embodiment of being, suffering, and sacredness.

Figure 2-9 Mano Poderosa or Las Cinco Personas,19th century

Along with the subjects discussed so far, three other motifs are prevalent in Tomasula’s art that have Catholic origins as well. These are hand/glove, heart, and bones, which unlike the flowers are not metaphors, but rather direct extractions from established religious sources that are transported into fantastic still life settings and concoctions. The hand series derived from “La Mano Poderosa” (The Powerful Hand), also called



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“The Five Persons.”15 This motif was probably based on the Tree of Jesse that emphasizes the royal lineage of Jesus, as the prominent central hand of God supports a miniature figure at the end of each digit—Joseph, Mary, Mary’s parents Joachim and Anna, and the infant Jesus—, resembling finger puppets (Fig. 2-9). Although developed in Europe, it became extremely popular in Mexico. They are painted on altars, votive candles and holy cards with intercessory prayers. In a number of medieval manuscript illuminations, the hand of God emerges at the top beneath a cloud directed toward the protagonists to signify communication or divine intervention. An isolated hand also finds precedent in Native American traditions serving as a protective talisman.16 The hand of La Mano Poderosa belongs to the omnipotent God, but simultaneously refers to the suffering of Jesus, as shown with a wound with blood gushing out. Some works include seven lambs at the bottom drinking the blood; others show putti or angels; while still others show additional saints on the side. But the right hand with the incision remains the same, and the five figures are also consistent, except that the child Jesus in some works is situated on top of the middle finger, while others position him on the thumb. This is the ultimate power image with God the Creator and Jesus the Savior along with the four ancestor saints of Jesus interceding for the believers who invoke this image to pray for protection and healing. Tomasula produced a series of still life with a prominent glove or a cropped doll’s hand (Pls. 4, 7, 13-15, 17, 41, 47, 49; Figs. 1-21; 5-1) derived from La Mano Poderosa. By Hands Unknown of 2000 (Fig. 2-10, Pl. 7) showcases a long silky red glove that is pinned to the wall with a nail in each finger. Enclosing the wrinkly shiny glove are five big varying flowers, each of which in turn is surrounded by butterflies of varied types and shapes, and accessorized by smaller white flowers nearby. Empowered by the intense colors, particularly by the luminous magenta background, the painting is very seductive in its visual appeal. Yet the martyr motif is retained, as all the constituents have been pinned to the wall with nails and strings stretching

 15

Joseph Chorpenning, “La Mano Poderosa or Los Cinco Señores,” Mexican Devotional Retablos from the Peters Collection (Philadelphia: Saint Joseph’s University Press, 1994), 82-85; Jacinto Quirarte, “Los Cinco Señores and La Mano Poderosa: An Iconographic Study.” In Art and Faith in Mexico. The NineteenthCentury Retablo Tradition, eds. Elizabeth Zarur and Charles Lovell (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2001), 79-87. 16 Besides the mica hands of the Hopewell tribe, there are different variations of the Healer’s Hand in the Native American tradition. The protective hand is also found around the world; the most famous is the Hamsa hand of the Middle East.



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from the hand to hold the encircling items in check. This is Tomasula’s reformulation of La Mano Poderosa with the hand that evokes the Passion accompanied by five saintly flowers, representing the powerful Christ who brings life, regeneration, and healing through his sacrifice. The artist explains her intention for this work: “What I wanted to do in this painting was to conjure up the idea of a creator, but one whose form is hidden, or sheathed.”17 The power of the creator who can generate life is conferred on the arresting glove that seems to majestically rise to cause the bloom and animation to the surrounding organic materials.

Figure 2-10 Tomasula, By Hands Unknown, 2000

 17

Maria Tomasula’s statement in “Tomasula, Maria by Hands Unknown, 2000,” in the online educational resource, “ArtSmart: Indiana.” www.artsmartindiana.org/artwork/tomasula-maria-by-hands-unknown-2000.



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Figure 2-11 Tomasula, Held (Funnel), 2003

The accentuation of creation is also noted in Held (Funnel) of 2003 (Fig. 2-11, Pl. 17), where the controlling strings that coalesce all of the items including flowers, fruits, insects, bones, conch, pheasant, and artichoke into a triangular enclosure are barely visible, placing more emphasis on the dramatic ascension of the components against the baroque curtains. As the shiny gloved hand twirls, it appears to have magically induced all of these fresh and clean articles to rise out of its palm. It also motions its fingers to lift the elements and direct them to the heavens in a very orderly, symmetrical fashion. Clearly, the hand controls the entire assembly, imbuing life and energy, causing animation and dynamism in the individual objects.



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While affliction receives less emphasis in some panels, it is still undoubtedly an integral factor of the glove/doll hand series, much like the crucified hand of La Mano Poderosa, despite the foremost attention to its ability to generate new life. Just as with life, suffering is an inseparable constituent of power and creation. In Mesoamerican tradition, fertility and blessings from the gods were always preceded by human sacrifices. In Catholicism, Christ had to endure Passion in order to demonstrate his power to overcome death and pave the way to salvation for his followers. The martyr-power-creation theme is also denoted in Web of 2002 (Pl. 15). At first, the painting looks like a gloved hand holding a branch with flowers and butterflies, but close inspection reveals an intricate network of strings that certifiably come down from the top and position the individual flowers and insects precisely and symmetrically in a curved alignment. While the fuchsias hang down at the end, as in real life, the other flowers and butterflies must have been pinned to the wall to achieve such a perfect arch. The overlapping fine threads bring discomfort and insinuate pain, as they act like thorns piercing through and tying the organic items down to create this potpourri. The martyr theme is evident, as is the very process and activation of creation, made emphatic through the hand that can pull or release the string that binds the whole arrangement. This is the allpowerful sturdy hand of God that controls and can bring death or life to all living entities. The filaments of the web fasten the articles to the wall, thereby signifying bondage and restraint, yet also enabling the creation of the floral crown. The divine presence amidst travail is alluded to by the visible inclusion of the holy hand as well as the large oval light again. Visually the artist transformed the still life of ordinary inanimate materials into an eye-catching site of voyeurism through the intensification of the chroma and the additive embellishments, while conceptually she nailed a number of traditional Catholic themes and captured the essence of the prevailing ideas in her unique, imaginative way. One of the eminent emblems of persecution in Catholicism is the Sacred Heart, which depicts the heart of the suffering Jesus. The artist focused on this subject and depicted many renditions of the Heart since 1997. In What I Know (Fig. 2l2), the Sacred Heart of Christ is fixated against the red wall with the enclosing nails, surrounded by circles of bladderwrack, a seaweed with air in the leaves, also precisely positioned with nails. The freshness of the heart and the plant is suggested by the water drops about to drip down. The visceral heart with all the minute details arouses a sense of horror, since it had to be eviscerated from the body. The more realistic the image of the heart, the greater the sense of revulsion, but conversely the greater



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the sense of appreciation for the actual physical torture that Christ endured on the cross.

Figure 2-12 Tomasula, What I Know, 1997

Although the cult of the Sacred Heart is known to have been initiated by Saint Marguerite-Marie Alacoque of France in the seventeenth century, the vision of the very Heart occurred as early as the eleventh century to several individual nuns.18 Their revelations were almost identical. Christ

 18

For the history of the Sacred Heart, see Olivier Debroise, Elisabeth Sussman and Matthew Teitelbaum, El Corazón Sangrante. The Bleeding Heart, exh. cat. (Boston: The Institute of Contemporary Art, 1990), 13-21; Jean Bainvel, Devotion



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appears before a devout nun and offers his heart to her, either by allowing access through his pierced side or by literally pulling it out of his body. The action connoted a personal experience of Christ’s Passion, much like the famed stigmatization of St. Francis. During the visionary moment, a number of the nuns responded by eviscerating their own hearts as a means of affirming their bond with Christ. Some of them were bestowed with miraculous powers after the experience, being able to heal and alleviate pain in others. They apprehended the implication of the Heart that intimately related his love to his Passion and thus responded through their own pain or by attending to others in affliction. All the documentations of the visions subscribe to vivid and detailed physical description of his beating, bloody heart. The church was initially skeptical of these visions of the Heart by the nuns, considering them to be a female folk phenomenon and called it the “mysticism of the disgusting” and “Cult of the Guts.”19 Yet the nuns prevailed, drawing growing numbers of supporters that eventually permitted them to organize a movement devoted to the heart of Jesus. The devotion gained such popularity among the masses that the church finally had to concede, and in 1856 the papacy officially recognized the observation as the Sacred Heart with a designated annual feast day in honor of the Heart.



The Sacred Heart epitomizes Christ himself, notably as the Man of Sorrows, eternally enduring the Passion out of love. For its advocates, it signifies the heart’s connection to and complete union with the Savior in more tangible terms. The Heart serves as a conduit for them to experience the spiritual in a real, visceral, and agonizing way. With its increasing popularity and demand, the Heart was made more accessible through visualization, as it was illustrated in numerous church arts and popular holy cards.20 It is typically depicted either visibly exposed before the body of Christ or by itself (Fig. 2-13). The visceral components of the heart, however, are understated and replaced with an aesthetic delineation of an intact heart shape that is encircled by the crown of thorns and has a small cross with fire bursting out at the top. Often rays of light shine from the Heart, which is also seen at times pierced by a lance. Many versions manifest an incision on the Heart with blood dripping. A similar heart was also applied to the image of the Virgin Mary to reflect her own pain and

 to the Sacred Heart. The Doctrine and Its History (London: Burns Oates and Washbourne Ltd, 1924). 19 Debroise, Sussman and Teitelbaum, El Corazón Sangrante, 17. 20 See David Morgan, The Sacred Heart of Jesus. The Visual Evolution of a Devotion (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2008).



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grief. Over the years, the motif evolved into a flat reductive heart shape that in modern times is used to reference love in the secular realm.

Figure 2-13 Sacred Heart, prayer card

When the cult of the Sacred Heart was adopted in the New World, it found an antecedent in the sacrifice of the living heart in the indigenous tradition.21 In the latter, the age-old ritual of bloodletting was gradually replaced by full human sacrifice and then conscribed exclusively into an offering of a pulsating heart, freshly cut from a living victim and

 21

In fact, the “exceptional success” of the Sacred Heart in America is attributed to the long practice of the heart sacrifice in the indigenous cultures; see Debroise, Sussman and Teitelbaum, El Corazón Sangrante, 21.



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showcased before a large audience as the ultimate sacrifice to the gods, who will be pleased and grant life to the people in return. Like the European Sacred Heart, the Mesoamerican heart signified the ultimate gift through sacrifice and death, in order to procure life. Arising from the indigenous tradition of presenting the visceral heart before an audience, the Sacred Heart in Latin America tends to reveal the organ’s ghastly physical reality. Tomasula likewise tends to offer a graphic illustration of the heart with meticulous medical details. The artist studied a real pig’s heart, which is supposed to be the closest to the human one, obtained from a slaughterhouse, in order to achieve accuracy in her painting. Indeed, she reveals details of the open valve, veins, arteries, and muscles (Fig. 2-12, Pl. 6). In contrast to those placid, kitschy renderings of the Sacred Heart in popular art, her versions, however magically staged and adorned, truly stand for what it really is: a visceral throbbing vital organ. Her paintings embody the seminal point of palpable abject excruciation effectuating glorious salvation through the revelation of the gruesome reality of the heart that is framed in magnificent ways. Thus the Sacred Heart ironically invokes the utmost spiritual by means of its base human physicality. The Doctrine of Affections of 2002 (Fig. 2-14, Pl. 12) is another realistic and tangible illustration of the heart. However grotesque the organ, the presentation is sublime in its illusion and effect: the highlighted Sacred Heart in the center against a saturated green backdrop is glorified by means of the surrounding shining colored glass beads that are magnetically and centripetally drawn to the heart as if in worship. As usual, torment coincides with beauty, as the big green hooks pierce the heart in order to suspend it in air by strings pulled from the sides. While some beads hang from the ceiling, others appear to be like needle pins thrown at the heart. The Heart is the object of worship, agony, and love, as the title spells out. It epitomizes Christ’s martyrdom, but torture is quietly insinuated. Pain is not loudly and disgustingly conveyed, but subtly communicated. The heart just removed from the body is fresh but lives for just a short while. Here it is suspended between life and death in this indefinable space.



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Figure 2-14 Tomasula, The Doctrine of Affections, 2002

The heart in Meridian of 2005 (Fig. 2-15, Pl. 23) is suspended in the air without any hooks or strings this time, and displayed in graphic detail that borders on causing revulsion. It is in front of an illusionistic curtain that alternates between light and dark. Surrounding the heart is a profusion of ghostly decorative lines that lend themselves to a delicate arrangement of bloomed flowers, leaves, and stalks, drawn on the picture plane that conflicts with the illusionistic spatial depth of the curtain folds. Much like the glass pins of the previous image, the golden lines enclosing the heart sumptuously redress the repulsive organ, trying to convert it into an article of beauty. The title has several meanings. The longitudinal folds of the curtain and the vertical alignment of the decorations seem to locate and pin down the heart, much like the actual meridians that were created to determine and establish positions on earth’s surface. The shiny, pulsating heart, however, is elusive, as it is dislocated from a body and floating in



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air. In acupuncture, meridians are pathways of energy flows in the body that essentially dictate its health and vitality. The heart appears to have caused the emergence of the florid exuberance with apparent fruits of a pearl, precious stones, and glass beads growing out of it that spell fertility. The heart, whether Christian or indigenous, is the source of new life.

Figure 2-15 Tomasula, Meridian, 2005

All of Tomasula’s paintings deal with the intrinsic relationship between life and death. In Christianity, death is of course merely a transition to a greater life of joyful eternity. Such linear life-death-life progression, however, is not traceable and the distinction between the different realms is not clear in Tomasula’s art. The stages are more



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jumbled and fused. The apparently living vibrant flowers have actually been fixed up: one is sewn and lifted up by strings (Fig. 2-4), and another is held up by a green metal stand with a hand discreetly supporting it from behind a mass of clothes (Fig. 6-8). While the cut flowers may be in the process of expiring, the butterflies, though they look alive and flying, have long been lifeless and mounted to the wall (Pl. 7-8, 15). The obviously dead bones, on the other hand, peculiarly insinuate life: multiple bones are deliberately and carefully arranged to resemble a living tree with symmetrical lateral branches, that is magnified by the backdrop of the vibrant rich orange brocade, in As No Gives Way to Yes of 2002 (Pl. 13). The end of this bone-tree is touched by the index finger of a broken doll’s arm, evoking the La Mano Poderosa theme; however, this time, the hand brings vitality to bones instead of organic items. Another set of particularly shaped bones is assembled to delineate the form of an intricate flower in Thrall of 2007 (Pl. 26). The oval silhouettes fashioning the centrifugal petals and the intersecting decorative pearly bubbles that connote pollen all seem to originate from the rapturous face sculptured in the center. The line between life and death is not clearly demarcated and is ambiguous in many of the artist’s works. The interconnection between life and death is most urgently visualized through the inclusion of the skulls of humans and animals in Tomasula’s art. Different bones emerge in various still life paintings since 2000, but the skull takes prominence in a series of works from 2006 to 2010, where it partakes in a compositional shape consisting of tightly conjoined fruits, flowers and other elements that induces a sense of movement (Pls. 25, 2731, 33, Figs. 4-2, 4-8). Usually Tomasula’s still life ingredients are stationed in the center and against an immediate backdrop, creating a mood of silence and stillness. This series, however, manifests a circular or triangular format and insinuates dynamism on the part of the materials illustrated. In Catholic churches, bones and skulls of saints are preserved as relics, venerated for indexing notable saints as well as their healing powers. If the entire skeleton of the saint is retained, it is sometimes bedecked with jewels, dressed in garments and other expensive decorations.22 Sculptural images of saints were also adorned with garlands of flowers and leaves on

 22

For images of the most elaborately decorated skeletons of saints, see Paul Koudounaris, Heavenly Bodies. Cult Treasures and Spectacular Saints from the Catacombs (New York: Thames and Hudson, 2013).



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feast days in Europe.23 Such celebration of a saint-skull is indulged in Royalty of 2008 (Fig. 2-16, Pl. 30). The suspended skull with perfectly aligned teeth is crowned with a wreath of fresh fruits, vegetables, flowers, two fish and two octopus tentacles, which are symmetrically arranged, but seem to be fully animated and in mid-motion. The strings, which strenuously pull and restrain objects in many of Tomasula’s works, here, add energetic flair to the crown with all their circular motions and spiral ends. Even the little dots on the periphery impart life, suggesting a sense of burst of movement and expansion from the delicious paraphernalia. But the flowers will fade and the food will rot. This beauty is temporal, as viewers are emphatically reminded by the central focus of the painting: the skull. Though scrupulously polished, this is after all from the skeletal remains of a once-living person.

Figure 2-16 Tomasula, Royalty, 2008

 23

Alan Chong and Wouter Klock, Still-Life Paintings from the Netherlands 15501720, exh. cat. (Amsterdam: Rijksmuseum, 1999), 163.



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The skull played a crucial role in the history of Mesoamerica as well. There were two tangible evidences of the use and display of skulls. When the Spaniards invaded Tenochtitlan, they found racks of numerous skulls in temple sites that ostentatiously displayed sacrificial victims. Human sacrifice has been an integral part of indigenous Mesoamerican culture, where, following the examples of gods who sacrificed themselves in order to create human life, the leaders continually offered human sacrifices in the quest for unabated fertility. Additionally, highly decorated selective skulls were also found in sacred locations, probably of noble origin, which were safeguarded and presumed to be tangible manifestations of Aztec gods.24 Tomasula’s Royalty may reveal the latter, as many kings in Mesoamerican tribes deemed themselves gods and hence were worshiped during and after life. This image, therefore, points to both European Catholic and Mesoamerican religious customs, especially in the way it reveres leaders with saintly or divine powers, inferred by the wellmaintained nature of the remains and the adornment of delightful flowers and delectable fresh food. Besides the skulls referencing god-like or godly individuals, they point to the preeminent engagement with death in both cultures. For indigenous Mesoamericans, there was no clear line between life and death. The end of physical life, they believed, meant the start of another in a different realm. In fact, there are extensive literature, archeological studies and artworks that describe the journey of the afterlife through nine challenging levels. The focus of the Catholic church on death and the afterlife is flaunted through the endless images of saints whose martyrdom guarantees salvation and heaven. Such concurrence of two cultural heritages is referred to as syncretism, which is a term used in religious studies and social sciences to denote a complete fusion of divergent cultures that leads to a new dynamic expression.25 Not the forced acculturation of one into another, but a full integration of cultural customs of equal standing. Among the collaborations between European Catholic and Mesoamerican

 24

The sacrificial victims were not all slaves and captured prisoners. Some were honorable men, who were chosen to represent certain deities, enacting the sacrificial acts of the gods. The heads of these ‘deity impersonators’ were also included on the skull racks, see Frances Berdan, Aztec Archaeology and Ethnohistory (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014), 241. 25 See Sidney Greenfield and André Droogers, Reinventing Religions. Syncretism and Transformation in Africa and the Americas (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001).



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traditions, syncretism is best represented in the emergence of Día de los Muertos, the Day of the Dead. Besides the preoccupation with suffering and death, what truly characterizes Mexican Catholicism is the infusion of populism that celebrates faith in life beyond the institutional walls.26 While there is respect for church doctrines and services, the public expression of faith outside of the liturgical sphere and order is widespread among Mexican American believers. Following the example of Cesar Chavez, many take their faith into the political arena, merging their beliefs with activism. Popular among Mexican American Catholics is curanderismo, the syncretic divine healing practices that combined Latin American folk medicine with Catholic mysticism, widely exercised outside of the church. Popular Catholicism is of course made conspicuous in daily life by the abundant religious images in all places, public and private. Growing up, Tomasula too was surrounded by prints and mass-produced sculptures of holy figures. She is also familiar with holy cards, which popularized the images of Christ, saints, La Mano Poderosa and the Sacred Heart. It was also a common practice among Mexican and Mexican American Catholics to offer self-drawn or commissioned art works that visually narrate their individual faith journey to church. By means of retablos (paintings), exvotos (small tin paintings), and milagros (objects), regular folks expressed their faith, especially their gratitude for a specific enactment such as healing to a particular saint, through these visual offerings.27 Milagro, which translates as miracle, appears in a number of Tomasula’s paintings, especially in the form of tiny tin legs and arms, the most popular offerings, that evidenced requests or answered prayers of healing on those anatomical regions. Although her work of 1996 titled Rezo (Fig. 2-17), which means prayer, looks fantastic, the painting recalls how devout believers would bring their milagros of body parts to church and pin them close to one another on the image of a saint or on the fabric drapery over a sculptured saint. Only Tomasula’s saint is of course constructed of flowers and plants.

 26

See Matovina and Riebe-Estrella, Horizons of the Sacred. 27 See Jorge Durand and Douglas Massey, Miracle on the Border: Retablos of Mexican Migrants to the U.S. (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1995); Martha Egan, Milagros: Votive Offerings from the America (Santa Fe: Museum of New Mexico, 1991); Eileen Oktavec, Answered Prayers. Miracles and Milagros along the Border (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1995).



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Figure 2-17 Tomasula, Rezo, 1996

The worship of God continued at home, made tangible and visually accessible through the establishment of home altars, found in many residences of people of Mexican descent.28 Typically these altars bear pictures of saints to whom dedications and invocations are made, along

 28

See Marie Cash, ed., Living Shrines: Home Altars of New Mexico, exh. cat. (Santa Fe: Museum of New Mexico, 1998); Kay Turner, Beautiful Necessity. The Art and Meaning of Women’s Altars (London: Thames and Hudson, 1999).



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with votive candles and flowers.29 Since these are private altars, however, anything that has meaning to the individuals can be placed on the table: religious signs like the cross, the rosary, images of loved ones, and elements that bring memories particularly of interventions on the part of the divine. As much as these are modes of expressions of individual faith, they serve as visual conduits for interaction between believers and the divine.30 Tomasula, who witnessed her grandmother’s daily devotion before her personal altar, provides interesting titles to some of her paintings: As No Gives Way to Yes. (Pl. 13), Never Let Me Go (Pl. 29) and Please Don’t Go (Pl. 33). The paintings appear to serve as a site of dialogue, in the same manner as the Mexican home altars. Her paintings from 2006 to 2010 (Pls. 25, 27-31, 33, Figs. 4-2, 4-8) especially evoke the altar tradition. Tomasula is among many contemporary Mexican American artists such as Amalia Mesa-Bains who drew inspiration from home altars and produced their own altar-based art.31 But she veers away from the “domesticana” that replicates an ordinary domestic setting through the assemblage of grunge everyday materials, and stays with tightly controlled compositions with noteworthy refinement of execution.32 The most popular public communal participatory events in Mexico and subsequently in Mexican American neighborhoods are the Via Crucis (Way of the Cross) procession and the commemoration of the dead on Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead).33 These events are related to the church calendar and holy days, yet much of the action takes place outside of the church. Via Crucis is basically the enactment of the Fourteen Stations of the Cross, but Mexican believers traditionally perform the events in the streets, inviting onlookers to participate in the procession to the cross. The Mexican Día de los Muertos, which has become the subject of much research and publication, is actually observed over two days: November

 29

Maria Tomasula was very familiar with this tradition. She remembers countless Latino homes that “have a little area of the house set up with beautiful hanging cloth, a crucifix, candles, and photographs of the family,” Houghton, “Tomasula,” E6. 30 Kay Turner states that the home altar is “a meeting place where invisible powers are given material form.” Turner, Beautiful Necessity, 30. 31 See Meyer, Laura, ed., Amalia Mesa-Bains. Geography of Memory, exh. cat. (Fresno: Fresno Art Museum, 2011). 32 Amalia Mesa-Bains, “Domesticana: The Sensibility of Chicana Rasquachismo.” In Chicana Feminisms: A Critical Reader, ed. Gabriela Arredondo (Durham: Duke University Press, 2003), 298-315. 33 Roberto Goizueta, “The Symbolic World of Mexican American Religion.” In Horizons of the Sacred, eds. Matovina and Riebe-Estrella, 128.



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1st is All Saints’ Day and November 2nd is All Souls’ Day, which are official liturgical days of the Catholic church that honor all the saints and all the deceased believers.34 Prevalent rituals associated with these days that are conducted in Mexico, however, are not official and point to European folk tradition and indigenous practices of Mesoamerica. While the church offers mass and encourages prayers for the dead, especially for those in purgatory to hasten their journey to heaven, the common people spend almost all day washing and decorating tombs, uphold nocturnal vigils in honor of the dead and, most importantly, prepare elaborate altars for the dead called ofrendas (Fig. 2-18). These home altars are created to communicate with saints and the loved ones who have passed. This syncretism is the result of the union of Catholic devotion to the saints and Mesoamerican worship of the dead, which some Jesuit priests have condemned but others have embraced, reasoning that Catholicism has transformed the indigenous practices, furthering its cause among the natives. The Day of the Dead, on the other hand, is not a mere commemoration to honor the dead, as the participants believe that the dead actually come back to their homes and enjoy the offerings of food and their favorite articles on the altars prepared for them. The dead cannot eat the food, but they can smell it; so great energy and efforts are expended on the altar offerings, planned and arranged for weeks in advance as an expression of love and respect for the deceased relatives. A shabby altar not only saddens the elders, but may also bring misfortune to the family. If there is no altar at all, that is even worse. Most people, however, prepare the altars with glad hearts, desiring to express their devotion to their loved ones. These altars, therefore, serve as a site of interaction. Petals of marigold are strewn along the street to lead the dead to their houses and the altars are decorated attractively to please the dead. While the Catholic remembrance of the dead was a sad affair, officially mourning and interceding for the deceased’s speedy transference to heaven, the indigenous custom was a happy one in which people were reunited with their loved ones from the other world. Hence, additional celebratory

 34

For the origin and meaning of the event, see Hugo Nutini, Todos Santos in Rural Tlaxcala. A Syncretic, Expressive, and Symbolic Analysis of the Cult of the Dead (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988). For an overview of the practice, particularly in the urban settings, see Elizabeth Carmichael and Chloe Sayer, The Skeleton at the Feast: The Day of the Dead in Mexico (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2003). On the recent evolvement of the phenomenon, see Stanley Brandes, Skulls to the Living, Bread to the Dead: The Day of the Dead in Mexico and Beyond (Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2006).



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activities such as dancing and processions gradually became integral parts of the Día de los Muertos in urban areas.

Figure 2-18 Ofrenda

Altar offerings for the dead are not exclusive to Mexican culture, but the item that appears frequently on the altars and originally was found only in Mexico is the skull, calavera, which is understood as the official sign of the Day of the Dead.35 People wear skeleton masks for the dance and the

 35

For the origin of the calavera, see Brandes, Skulls to the Living, Bread to the Dead, 43-66. Skeleton images were not traditionally part of the altars, since they



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procession, and skull pastries are abundantly offered along with skull toys for children. The image of the skull has been attributed to the popular prints of José Guadalupe Posada, who made images of the living skeleton ubiquitous in Mexican popular culture. They are many theories about the wide acceptance of skull images in Mexican culture, including the supposedly Mexican defiance of death, as exemplified by the eating of sugar skulls with no qualms. The constant presence of the skull, once again, intimates the close tie between life and death, to the point that death is conceived as an integral and inevitable constituent of life, not to be avoided or feared. Still life elements of Royalty (Fig. 2-16) are rearranged in Please Don’t Go of 2010 (Fig. 2-19, Pl. 33). The skull is now a portion of the wreath of paraphernalia that opens up to forge a swirling spiral shape that is composed of far more elements: the same apples, pears, plums, and papaya as in Royalty, but additionally flowers and plants, animal heads, sculpted faces, food and inanimate materials. The focus is more on the cornucopia than on the skull that recalls the ofrenda of the Mexican tradition. Notice that the objects are not tied down by strings, pins, or nails in this series, as they are offerings made for the dead to take and consume. Although Please Don’t Go does not look like an altar, which typically has materials laid out on a table, it still evokes the idea of an ofrenda, as the scene implies being charged with some spiritual force that enables all the ingredients to move in an energetic swirl, which may signal acceptance by the dead who are well pleased by the oblation. Never Let Me Go (Pl. 29) and a number of other altar-based paintings by the artist feature similar dynamic swirls filled with varied articles, all suggesting the same communion of the dead and living through the vehicle of the physical substance of the dedication. One particular version is titled Rapture (Pl. 25) that insinuates offered items being devoured by the dead, as they are in fast motion toward the dark infinity, and simultaneously imparts spiritual ecstasy on the part of all the partakers, being high on such affectionate, supernatural encounter. The immediacy of the offerings and the spiritual

 are not items of offering, but with the popularity and association with the Day of the Dead, they are now included in the form of pastry and decoration. There was a Mayan tradition of keeping “bundles” of the ancestors in home shrines and niches, which is still observed in remote villages of northern central Mexico. The bundles enclosed objects closely associated with the dead as well as the actual bones of the deceased, exhumed from the tombs a few years after their death; see Miguel AstorAguilera, The Maya World of Communicating Objects: Quadripartite Crosses, Trees and Stones (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 2010), 160.



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potency are realized by the sumptuous, voyeuristic, illusionistic technique of the artist that makes all of the objects and action appear viable and real, despite the fantastic nature of the art work. The spiritual is completely embodied in the material.

Figure 2-19 Tomasula, Please Don’t Go, 2010

Please Don’t Go (Fig. 2-19) notably includes child references, such as the head of a putto, a blue ribbon and gigantic lollipops, which allude to another significant component of the Día de los Muertos phenomenon. Traditionally Mexicans set another day, October 31, in memory of dead children.36 The premature death of little ones is especially heartbreaking

 36

Carmichael and Sayer, The Skeleton at the Feast, 54-55. This is, of course, another example of syncretism, as the event converges with All Hallow’s Eve (Halloween), which has its own syncretic roots of conflating a Celtic pagan ritual with the Catholic observance. The three-day dedication to the dead from October 31 to November 2 is referred to as Allhallowtide in the church tradition.



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for their parents, so a separate day was assigned to remember them with constructed altars filled with items that their children loved. The separate dedication to the children comes from the traditional Mesoamerican belief that children do not have to undergo the typical arduous journey in the afterlife, but proceed directly to a special place, which too coincides with the Catholic belief that children bypass purgatory and immediately enter heaven upon death. Those dead children are remembered, invited to revisit their family, and offered delights.

Figure 2-20 Tomasula, Intercession, 2008

Another series of works related to Día de los Muertos ofrenda is the still lifes with hanging objects. Luminesce of 2007 (Pl. 27) reveals a skull



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of an animal instead of a human amongst the typical fruits, flowers and other tangible objects, all dangling down from the ceiling. This can be read as part of a Día de los Muertos ofrenda, which typically featured an arched canopy stationed above an altar, composed of flowers and other embellishments, to beautify the altar (Fig. 2-18). The hanging pieces of fragile crystal or glass also parallel the delicate cut-out tissue paper decorations that often adorn canopies of ofrendas in Mexico. The hexagon of asymmetrically arranged assortment of colorful fresh plants and fruits along with some questionable inclusions as decoration is a delight to the viewers, enticing them to savor the items with their eyes, just as the dead are invited to relish though hollow black sockets. The dead and the living are again in contact, conversing by partaking in the delicious offerings. The communication is substantiated through the title of another canopy offerings, Intercession of 2008 (Fig. 2-20, Pl. 31), which returns to the symmetrical distribution of vibrant flowers and fruits with misty drops that keep them fresh and moist, offered to the spirits as a form of entreaty. The examples of circular motion (Fig. 2-16), the dynamic swirl (Fig. 2-19), the hanging line of translucent glass pieces (Pls. 27-28), and this array of highlighted mist spots all infuse a sense of mysticism into the very material presentation of the ofrendas. They herald the spiritual dimension of the still lifes. The Día de los Muertos became prominent in America over the last three decades as Mexican Americans found a cultural and political voice through the event. As many studies have shown, the sense of being undervalued and overlooked in society necessitated Mexican Americans to attend to this practice in order to retrace their origin and gain a sense of pride through enactment of the tradition.37 Día de los Muertos is now celebrated annually throughout the U.S. beyond Latin American circles, through a wide range of activities for both adults and children offered by diverse institutions. The subject was showcased most recently to the worldwide audience through the two successful animated films, The Book of Life of 2014 and Coco of 2017. Many activists use this occasion to speak for or protest against political issues, such as immigration reform. The Day of the Dead is now an essential means to validate the unique identity and voice of Mexican Americans in the States.

 37

See Regina Marchi, Day of the Dead in the U.S.A. The Migration and Transformation of a Cultural Phenomenon (Piscataway, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2009).



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For Tomasula, reference to the Day of the Dead was less of a political statement than an expression of her being. Her family observed Catholic rituals and holy days as well as believed in the presence of dead relatives in their midst. She grew up in a traditional Mexican American home with altars dedicated to Catholic saints and to deceased relatives. This confluence of European Catholic traditions and Mesoamerican customs was the reality of daily existence among Mexican and Mexican American Catholics. The artist visually communicated this Mexican American Catholic experience, which shaped and constituted her identity, but in a manner that is entirely her own. Her creations are a natural output of her life, coming from a culture of syncretism of diverse practices that converged to give birth to a new form. The paintings of Tomasula are genuine expressions of her experience and identity as a Mexican American. Her works, though they do not resemble typical Hispanic art, are thoroughly ethnic in origin, thought, and expression.



Plate 1 Tomasula, Rhythm, 1990, oil on canvas, 72 x 48"

Plate 2 Tomasula, Lot, 1997, oil on panel, 10 x 8"

Plate 3 Tomasula, Rite, 1998, oil on panel, 16 x 12"

Plate 4 Tomasula, My Alba, 1998, oil on panel, 42 x 42"

Plate 5 Tomasula, Skindeep, 1999, oil on panel, 18 x 12"

Plate 6 Tomasula, All I Know, 2000, oil on linen, 67½ x 43½"

Plate 7 Tomasula, By Hands Unknown, 2000, oil on panel, 42 x 42"

Plate 8 Tomasula, Pull, 2001, oil on panel, 10 x 8"

Plate 9 Tomasula, Recure, 2002, oil on panel, 16 x 14"

Plate 10 Tomasula, Two, 2002, oil on panel, 18 x 12"

Plate 11 Tomasula, Birth of My Silence, 2002, oil on panel, 10 x 8"

Plate 12 Tomasula, The Doctrine of Affections, 2002, oil on panel, 24 x 20"

Plate 13 Tomasula, As No Gives Way to Yes, 2002, oil on panel, 10 x 8"

Plate 14 Tomasula, Reach, 2002, oil on panel, 14 x 12"

Plate 15 Tomasula, Web, 2002, oil on panel, 42 x 30"

Plate 16 Tomasula, Held, 2002, oil on panel, 16 x 14"

Plate 17 Tomasula, Held (Funnel), 2003, oil on linen, 48 x 36"

Plate 18 Tomasula, Claim, 2004, oil on panel, 14 x 11"

Plate 19 Tomasula, Lacuna, 2004, oil on panel, 48 x 36"

Plate 20 Tomasula, The Structure of Coincidence, 2004, oil on panel, 14 x 11"

Plate 21 Tomasula, Music of Chance, 2004, oil on panel, 24 x 18"

Plate 22 Tomasula, Signs of Intruders, 2004, oil on panel, 20 x 16”

Plate 23 Tomasula, Meridian, 2005, oil on panel, 36 x 24"

Plate 24 Tomasula, Music of Chance II, 2005, oil on panel, 36 x 36"

Plate 25 Tomasula, Rapture, 2006, oil on panel, 24 x 18"

Plate 26 Tomasula, Thrall, 2007, oil on panel, 16 x 16"

Plate 27 Tomasula, Luminesce, 2007, oil on panel, 36 x 24"

Plate 28 Tomasula, Cantata, 2007, oil on panel, 42 x 36"

Plate 29 Tomasula, Never Let Me Go, 2007, oil on panel, 42 x 42"

Plate 30 Tomasula, Royalty, 2008, oil on panel, 32 x 36"

Plate 31 Tomasula, Intercession, 2008, oil on panel, 20 x 16"

Plate 32 Tomasula, Cathedral, 2009, oil on panel, 4 x 4"

Plate 33 Tomasula, Please Don’t Go, 2010, oil on panel, 42 x 42"

Plate 34 Tomasula, Ground of Being, 2010, oil on panel, 12 x 9"

Plate 35 Tomasula, Second Nature, 2011, oil on panel, 5 x 5"

Plate 36 Tomasula, Settlement, 2012, oil on panel, 24 x 18"

Plate 37 Tomasula, Everpresence, 2014, oil on panel, 48 x 42"

Plate 38 Tomasula, The Complete Yes, 2015, oil on panel, 36 x 32"

Plate 39 Tomasula, When I Was You, 2014, oil on panel, 42 x 42"

Plate 40 Tomasula, Murmur, 2016, oil on panel, 20 x 16"

Plate 41 Tomasula, Refrain, 2017, oil on panel, 24 x 18"

Plate 42 Tomasula, Mothership, 2017, oil on panel, 20 x 16"

Plate 43 Tomasula, When I Knew You, 2017, oil on panel, 24 x 18"

Plate 44 Tomasula, Call Me by Your Name, 2017, oil on panel, 24 x 18"

Plate 45 Tomasula, Star Eater, 2017, oil on panel, 20 x 16"

Plate 46 Tomasula, Echo, 2016-8, oil on panel, 20 x 16"

Plate 47 Tomasula, River, 2017-8, oil on panel, 36 x 24"

Plate 48 Tomasula, All the Breath We Can Hold, 2018, oil on panel, 36 x 24"

Plate 49 Tomasula, Reach, 2018, oil on panel, 36 x 32"

Plate 50 Tomasula, I Can Feel It, 2018, oil on panel, 36 x 32"



CHAPTER THREE NEO-BAROQUE SYNCRETISM

Perhaps due to the renewed interest and commitment to preserving nature, fueled by climate activism, still life is currently facing a resurgence in the art world.1 Defying the conventional take on the still life as a lightweight genre of trivial objects that is acquired to decorate the home, a growing number of artists have tackled the subject with intensity, imbuing it with serious content, as attested to by many recent exhibitions.2 Influenced by Robert Mapplethorpe’s seminal flower photographs, contemporary photographers have rendered variant representations by manipulating technology to magnify the beauty and to heighten the eroticism connoted through the close-up of the organic shapes. Like the European precedents, the majority of current works on flowers also imparts an urgent sense of mortality. Tomasula’s still life too is indebted to the continental tradition. This chapter provides an art historical account of her art, tracing her motifs and themes to the established still life types of the past. It concludes by rehashing her Mexican Catholic influences, as expanded upon in the previous chapter, in respect to the still life conventions that are embedded in Tomasula’s art, to understand the full synthesis of these two sources and Tomasula’s unique contribution to the history of still life painting. Still life, though existent since the ancient times, remained on the sidelines until the late sixteenth century when it emerged as an independent genre in Europe and surged as a subject of high demand and significance during the seventeenth century, contending with other formerly established thematic topics in art.3 The Flemish and Dutch most

 1

The most compelling publication on the subject is Michael Petry’s Nature Morte. Contemporary Artists Reinvigorate the Still-Life Tradition (New York: Thames & Hudson, 2013). 2 Margit Rowell, Objects of Desire. The Modern Still Life, exh. cat. (New York: Museum of Modern Art, 1997); Toni Stooss, ed., Flowers and Mushrooms, exh. cat. (Salzburg: Museum der Moderne, 2013). 3 For an overview, see Sybille Ebert-Schifferer, Still Life. A History (New York: Abrams, 1998).



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notably specialized in this subject at this time, catering to the rising affluence of the middle class who delighted in the intriguing, realistic pictorial display of detailed food and utensils on a dining table, game animals in the kitchen, and complex arrangement of flowers.4 Following the prevalent Baroque trend that dramatizes scenes of figures and actions with intensified hues, stark value contrast and bedazzling spotlight, the still life painters of the seventeenth and early eighteenth century introduced these features to their works as well, transforming the mundane, inanimate articles into vibrant, radiant objects that immediately drew attention and interest. For instance, Rachel Ruysch, who was one of the highest paid flower painters around 1700, typically alchemized passive flowers into snappy little bundles buzzing with activity, as in her Still Life of Flowers on a Marble Table Top of 1716 (Fig. 3-1), through the infusion of the Baroque theatrical stage lighting, intense colors, tenebrism, and diagonal alignment that activate the painting as a whole. Tomasula studied such still life paintings in college and graduate school, but had already absorbed the Baroque style through the church arts in her youth. Although they were not the best examples of the period, their effects nevertheless were formative: “Even though most of them would probably be considered kitsch, or second-rate at best. But I love all that Spanish Baroque stuff, even in its folk-art incarnations.”5 Despite their mediocrity, the artist considered them “gorgeous, incredible” art that indulged the senses, as “they were distinctly unrestrained in every way: in what they depicted, in the bravura of the brushwork, in the amount of ornamentation on every conceivable surface.”6 Fueled by the indigenous legacy of colorful embellishments and graphic delineations, the New Baroque art of the New Spain was even more intense in expression and ornate in design than its European antecedent.7 These overt and extravagant decorations of Latin American origin were transferred to the Mexican churches in the United States. Any deficiency in skill and

 4

Ingvar Bergström, Dutch Still-Life Painting in the Seventeenth Century. Trans. Christina Hedström and Gerald Taylor (New York: Hacker Art Books, 1983); Alan Chong and Wouter Klock, Still-Life Paintings from the Netherlands 1550-1720, exh. cat. (Amsterdam: Rijksmuseum, 1999). 5 Maria Tomasula and Julie Farstad, “Word for Word: Artists and Their Influences Trade Tape,” Mouthtomouth (Fall 2002). http://mouthtomouthmag.com. 6 Ibid. 7 See Leopoldo Méndez and Marianne Yampolsky, eds., The Ephemeral and the Eternal of Mexican Folk Art, 2 vols. (Mexico: Fondo Editorial de la Plástica Mexicana, 1971), 2:437-51.



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accuracy was compensated by the sumptuous presentation, showing no restraint in expression, movement or color, all of which had clearly mesmerized the artist.

Figure 3-1 Ruysch, Still Life of Flowers on a Marble Tabletop, 1716

Tomasula’s art definitely has alignment with the seventeenth-century Baroque. To procure a uniformity of the desired color effect across the entire surface, she customarily paints the background color first, even if pitch-black, then overlays it with a range of pigments to build the images. This results in emulating the Baroque effect of creating an illusion of objects dramatically emerging out of a lustrous deep color field. The artist also frequently employs other Baroque devices such as tenebrism, diagonal axis, and highly saturated pigments. Literal theatrical mechanisms are also deployed such as retracted dramatic curtains and refulgent stage lighting that casts deep shadows, most notably in the early



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phase of her career. Lacuna of 1995 (Fig. 3-2) is one such example with the red drapes drawn to the sides to reveal a tree branch with a ripe pear and a rotten pear that cast ominous shadows against the backdrop. Due to the dramatic presentation, these passive offshoots, leaves, and fruits along with their shadows appear like active characters in a play that is about to unfold before an audience. Interestingly, the Baroque adaptation is not anachronistic, since the interest in this seventeenth- and early eighteenthcentury style, particularly that of Caravaggio, enjoyed a resurgence in the late twentieth century as the Neo-Baroque.8 Since the turn of the century, there have been numerous exhibitions that have showcased a wide spectrum of art works reviving the Baroque.9 There is a huge following among Latinx artists, who like Tomasula, grew up with Baroque derivatives and interpreted them in their own idioms. The majority of Mexican American art works, under the bracket of “Latino Neobaroque,” typically manifests a busy composition that focuses on popular culture or folk art.10 Although Tomasula’s art shares the dramatic disposition, it is far removed from “rasquachismo,” which not only deals with quotidian subjects and mass culture, but also is presented in a coarse, unrefined manner.11 Also while her art can be categorized as Neo-Baroque due to its operatic stage effects, its evident self-control is antithetical to the “excess” and “instability” that the current Neo-Baroque tends to exude and celebrate.

 8

Mieke Bal, Quoting Caravaggio. Contemporary Art, Preposterous History (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1999); Omar Calabrese, Neo-Baroque. A Sign of the Times. Trans. Charles Lambert (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992). 9 Catherine Crowston, Josée Drouin-Brisebols and Jonathan Shaughnessy, Misled by Nature. Contemporary Art and the Baroque, exh. cat. (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 2013); Micaela Giovannotti and Joyce Korotkin, Neo-Baroque! exh. cat. (Milan: Charta, 2005). 10 Elizabeth Armstrong and Victor Zamudio-Taylor, Ultrabaroque. Aspects of Post Latin American Art, exh. cat. (San Diego: Museum of Contemporary Art, 2000); Monika Kaup, Neobaroque in the Americas. Alternative Modernities in Literature, Visual Art, and Film (Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2012); Nicholas Spadaccini and Luis Martin-Estudillo, eds., Hispanic Baroques. Reading Cultures in Context (Nashville: Vanderbilt University Press, 2005). 11 Tomás Ybarra-Frausto, “Rasquachismo: A Chicano Sensibility.” In Richard Castillo, Teresa McKenna, and Yvonne Yarbo-Bejarano, Chicano Art: Resistance and Affirmation, 1965-1985, exh. cat. (Los Angeles: Wight Art Gallery, 1990), 155-162.



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Figure 3-2 Tomasula, Lacuna, 1995

The highly contrived composition with immaculate delineation of still life items recalls even earlier European art. Lot of 1997 (Pl. 2) resembles a medieval Flemish manuscript illumination that is bordered by large realistic flowers. Her technique evokes the fifteenth-century Flemish masters who painstakingly applied tiny oil brush marks to wooden panels to create tactile illusions in all the articles with heightened hues and shines. Since 1996 she has been painting mostly on wooden panels, which are completely flat and thus absorb paints evenly across the surface. Determined to erase the individual brush marks and consolidate the fastidious realist details, the artist also started using miniature brushes that she endlessly dabs on the panel. This method leaves no traces of the gestural movement of the brush. The artist has performed this procedure for more than three decades, resulting in permanent muscle pains in her right shoulder. She also wears a pair of magnifying glasses when she paints to ensure the smooth blending of the paints and to affirm consistent laminar surface coverage (Fig. 1-6). The artist is definitely a perfectionist



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who will go to extreme means to refine her technique and complete her manner of working to her satisfaction. Her perfectionism is evident in each work, which displays immense sense of control and manipulation in every aspect from the selection of shapes to the physical process of multiple applications of paint that ultimately produces the final gloss on the surface. This fastidiousness aligns her with the great painters of the past, who dedicated themselves to their craft and expended all physical efforts to meet their goals. Her favorite artist is Francisco de Zurbarán, the Spanish seventeenth-century artist who produced religious as well as still life paintings.12 His Still Life with Lemons, Oranges and a Rose of 1633 (Fig. 3-3) is relatively sparse with each utensil stationed at equal intervals as calculated by the artist. The tight control of this manufactured presentation is further evidenced by the enriched treatment of each component that shines radiantly with focused but lustrously diffused light across its surface. The mundane objects emerge as sacred vessels in a quiet drama. Tomasula’s art periodically leans toward dense compositions with large quantities of fruits and flowers, as in the series of 2006-2010 and in recent years, more often, though, her works are on the quiet end, producing an almost silent theatre and inducing a sense of devotion much like those by Zurbarán.

Figure 3-3 Zurbarán, Still Life with Lemons, Oranges and a Rose, 1633

 12

See William Jordan and Peter Cherry, Spanish Still Life from Velásquez to Goya, exh. cat. (London: The National Gallery, 1995) 102-105.



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While the dramatization in Tomasula’s art originated from her experience in church, the still life subjects came from her studies of European models. In fact, Tomasula relied on different European types and motifs to build her own fantasy creations. She reinvented the preexisting formulas to render images that both quoted the past themes and relayed new messages as well. Various examples of flower, kitchen, game, meal and table still lifes, which were established as distinct, separate genres in the late sixteenth and seventeenth century, will be compared to her works in order to confirm the connection as well as her ability to recreate them anew. Incidentally, many of the still life painters of this era employed oil on wooden panel, like Tomasula, resulting in the finely spread glossy tactile surfaces.

Figure 3-4 Tomasula, Bouquet, 2000



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One of the most conventional flower still lifes by Tomasula is Bouquet of 2000 (Fig. 3-4), which resembles a typical baroque flower still life with the stems gathered at the bottom and flowers sprawling diagonally in all directions at the top, brightly lit against a pitch-black backdrop. This painting also evokes the eighteenth-century collages of Mary Delany, who cut out colored papers into tiny segments, which she glued against a black board to create very precise, scientifically accurate illustrations of flowers.13 The level of detail is the same, but the resultant effect is different, since close examination of the Bouquet reveals that the flowers are suspended in the air by means of strings. The employment of strings to connote strain and stress as well as to magically suspend the flowers in air is almost formulaic, recurring frequently in the artist’s oeuvre. Even the most conservative arrangement of flowers is reimagined in an unconventional manner, particularly with peculiar positioning, associations, and juxtapositions that betray the signature marks of the artist. The most esteemed still life painter of the Dutch Golden Age was Jan Davidsz de Heem, who produced many different configurations of materials including suspended flowers as in Festoon of Fruit and Flowers of 1660-70 (Fig. 3-5).14 It is unclear how this massive assemblage of fruits and flowers is held together and connected to the blue ribbon that is tied to a ring at the top. Flowers are especially difficult subjects to paint, since they wither quickly. Hence De Heem, Ruysch, and all other still life painters depended on live flowers and fruits as much as their own prior sketches and published scientific illustrations of the specimens.15 The composition of variegated flowers, which bloom in different seasons, testifies to the innovative capabilities of the artist, who synthetized diverse visual sources to create a believably real assortment at hand. De Heem probably had an actual blue ribbon tied to a ring that was fixed to the ceiling as well as individual fruits and flowers brought to the studio, but not all of them propped up and staged precisely in this current manner. He used his imagination to create this dynamic hanging of the entire collection. The approach and process of still life painting have not changed much over the years, except for the integration of technology. Tomasula,

 13

See Ruth Hayden, ed., Mrs. Delany’s Flower Collages (New York: Pierpont Morgan Library, 1986). 14 Julie Hochstrasser, Still Life and Trade in the Dutch Golden Age (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007), 2. 15 Paul Taylor, Dutch Flower Painting 1600-1720 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1995), 118; Ebert-Schifferer, Still Life, 84.



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who is an avid gardener, grows and cuts her own flowers from her plot in addition to acquiring specific types for her painting. She draws directly from the fresh flowers, but also photographs them to capture their vitality, since her laborious painting technique usually takes many months. She also finds images by searching databases to supplement her designs, which she usually delineates as a small sketch on paper with an overall layout, while keeping the details worked out in her head. The piecemeal preparatory work and infusion of imagination to concoct intriguing still lifes are the same, whether in the seventeenth or the twenty-first century, except that in the former, creativity was in the service of optical realism, aiming to make the image appear as close as possible to real life. Tomasula does not disguise her ingenuity, as her hyperreal objects are assembled in contradictorily unrealistic, fantasy settings.

Figure 3-5 De Heem, Festoon of Fruit and Flowers, 1660-70



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Still life paintings of the past have always been celebrated for the illusionism that the artists were able to achieve through their knowledge, study, and skills to replicate life. Nature still lifes were considered as valuable scientific illustrations for horticultural interests and medicinal purposes.16 In addition, they functioned as coded disguised symbolism that relayed overarching themes and subjects, particularly in seventeenth-century Holland.17 There have been debates about what these floral arrangements were supposed to communicate, as intended by the artists and understood by the public at the time.18 Most assume that the flower still lifes represent “vanitas,” the religiously derived concept that points to the vanity of worldly possessions and pleasures, since they are as transient and short-lived as the beauty of cut flowers.19 Such a reminder is most often conveyed in the floral pieces by means of a spoiler of otherwise a glorious bloom of luscious flowers.20 The insect is very noticeable on the fluffy white hibiscus that is highlighted and near the center in De Heem’s painting (Fig. 3-5). This motif is also evident in the Ruysch’s Still Life of Flowers on a Marble Tabletop (Fig. 3-1) with the big black fly set on the yellowish-white rose in the middle of the canvas. These intruders destroy the perfect presentation of the flowers, reminding viewers of the impending decay and thus the temporal nature of the beauty at hand. Other art historians have argued that these profuse representations of flowers attest to the vast improvement in the horticulture as well as the sudden influx of imports of different species of flowers through commercialization that brought wealth first to the Southern Netherlands in the late sixteenth century and then to the Northern Netherlands in the seventeenth century.21 The flowers were not inexpensive; procuring a wide variety of exquisite and exotic flowers was a luxury. Hence the ownership and display of such an array of flowers meant wealth.22 The pictorial preservation of these ephemeral material substances was as much a

 16

Hans-Michael Herzog, ed., The Art of the Flowers. The Floral Still Life from the 17th to the 20th century, exh. cat. (Bielefeld: Kunsthalle Bielefeld, 1996), 16-17. 17 The most intriguing iconographic study of this subject is Norman Bryson, Looking at the Overlooked. Four Essays on Still Life Painting (London: Reaktion Books, 1990). 18 Paul Taylor, Dutch Flower Painting 1600-1720, 54-55. 19 The term originates from the Book of Ecclesiastes that declares all earthly pursuits as empty and meaningless, ultimately pointing to God as the raison d’être. 20 Norbert Schneider, Still Life Painting in the Early Modern Period (Köln: Taschen, 2003), 122. 21 Paul Taylor, Dutch Flower Painting 1600-1720, 1-2. 22 Bryson, Looking at the Overlooked, 104. For the cost analysis of the most expensive flowers at the time, see Paul Taylor, Dutch Flower Painting 1600-1720, 6-8.



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documentation of product acquisition as a celebration of the beauty of all these now available floral existences, contradicting the dire vanitas warning. Tomasula’s flower paintings embody the past ideals: they are scientifically accurate, yet contain a portentous message about death while nonetheless celebrating beauty and life. They are characteristically shown almost always with no blemish and no disrupting insects, and look wondrously alive, but logic tells us that these will all wither soon, leaving unattractive leftovers that will dispel the enjoyment. Claim of 2004 (Pl. 18) is a typical flower still life by the artist, with a ravishing stargazer lily in bloom tied to the strings that come down from a crown-shaped end of a pendant. Water drops fall from above to refresh and sustain the flower. The fragile reality of the flower is disclosed by the thin strings that can be easily cut by a mere snap which will promptly drop the flower. Death is right at the door, since this is a cut flower that can only last one full day before it starts withering. That fact, however, does not hinder the viewers from enjoying the immediate beauty of the flower, which is further accentuated by the halo of illuminating light around the flower against a rich blue backdrop. The artist shared that she studied images of deep space and seas to emulate the transcendent spatial effect. This magnificent sight of a divine life is transfixed on the panel to celebrate its material reality. The antithetical themes of life and death are conjoined in the presentation much like the vanitas flower still lifes of the past. The artist’s objective to relate flowers to humans also finds its origin in European still life. Flowers were conventionally added to figural paintings as decoration or subsidiary elements, prior to receiving full focus and emergence as an independent subject in the seventeenth century. Throughout the medieval and Renaissance periods, flowers generally exemplified the beauty of God’s creation, while selective individual flowers were employed to signify virtues and attributes of religious figures. White lilies, red/pink roses, and purple irises were most commonly applied for the Virgin Mary to denote her virginity, purity, divinity and suffering. Such devotional paintings with floral symbolism continued in the seventeenth century, notably by Jan Brueghel the Elder, who developed and popularized a new genre of garland painting. By his time, flower still life was a specialized field and since Brueghel was a flower painter, he frequently collaborated with figure painters to produce religious portrayals of saints encircled by clusters of flowers. Peter Paul Rubens, for instance, painted the figures of Madonna and Child with Angels in a Garland of Flowers of 1617 (Fig. 3-6). Brueghel’s massive garland of



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Figure 3-6 Bruegel and Rubens, Madonna and Child with Angels in a Garland of Flowers, 1617

Figure 3-7 De Heem, Chalice and Host with Garlands, 1648



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a wide range of flowers in this painting, however, is not a mere sideline and holds its own, contending for viewers’ attention. Among the many flowers, the white lilies on the right are emphasized most, noting the specific emblematic use of flowers still at hand, even as the bunch as a whole transmits a general message of blessedness and God’s munificence.23 As demand for flower still lifes increased in the Netherlands, the garland paintings underwent transformation with flowers taking greater precedence and eventually dispensing with the figural representation altogether. In Chalice and Host with Garlands of 1648 (Fig. 3-7), De Heem, who had a propensity to mix flowers with fruits, which stand for the sweetness of Christ and reference paradise, drapes the chalice and the mysteriously freestanding host (symbolizing transubstantiation) above it in a niche with scrumptious vegetation. Agricultural products in particular signify God’s provision and blessing, pointing to the painting’s ultimate meaning that Jesus’s sacrifice is the supreme benediction and gift from God.24 While there were few earlier exceptions, such as Hans Memling’s Flower Still Life of 1490, floral still life gradually completely overtook such signification by 1700, insinuating figures and ideas directly by means of the flowers themselves. The most famous examples of the modern era are the sunflower images by Vincent van Gogh, who used them as an ulterior symbolization of himself. Tomasula has demonstrated the figure-flower connection through Lacuna (Pl. 19), where the figure is an integral part of the aggregation of flowers, which includes a salient orchid and various types of lilies and tulips. Closer examination reveals that the plants actually caused the human configuration to exist, as the silhouette of the body has only emerged as a result of the clever placement of the irregularly shaped flowers. The linkage between the two entities is more emphatically materialized in The Structure of Coincidence of 2004 (Fig. 3-8, Pl. 20), where the multicolored flowers, consisting mostly of gerberas and anemones, are pinned and tied by strings to construct the human form. This originated from her earlier Nature’s Mantle of 1996, where flowers are pinned to a doll to drape her; but now the floral mass does more than cloak, as it defines the entire body, composing all the parts, including the

 23

Susan Merriam, Seventeenth-Century Flemish Garland Paintings. Still Life, Vision, and the Devotional Image (Burlington: Ashgate, 2012), 24. 24 Chong and Klock, Still-Life Paintings from the Netherlands 1550-1720, 115.



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face.25 The artist’s consistent reference to divine martyrdom is evident through the allusion of instruments of pain as well as the halo effect that illuminates the dispersed hazy white dots, which become solidified as transparent water droplets when they land on the body-flower. Such fusion of flowers and human body was found foremost in the past in the enigmatic paintings by Giuseppe Arcimboldo that seem comical out of context but were intended as a stark commentary.26 Spring of 1563 (Fig. 39), for example, delineates the profile of Emperor Maximilian II purposefully with flowers and leaves to celebrate his reign, in recognition of the abundant bounty that had been reaped as a result of his prudent administration, much like the inclusion of Gaia, the earth goddess, with the imagery of grain and livestock in the relief of Ara Pacis to commemorate the great leadership of Augustus Caesar.

Figure 3-8 Tomasula, The Structure of Coincidence, 2004

 25

The idea of pinning the flowers on a doll may have come from the tradition of pinning milagros on the clothing of a sculptural image of a saint, as depicted in Rezo of 1996 (fig. 2-17). 26 Sylvia Ferino-Pagden, ed., Arcimboldo 1526-1593, exh. cat. (Vienna: Kunsthistorisches Museum, 2008).



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Figure 3-9 Arcimboldo, Spring, 1563

Tomasula’s human-flowers pictures are more complex, but the collaboration of the two originates from a long European convention. In the cases of Lacuna and The Structure of Coincidence, she employs clusters of organic substances to construct a human body, but she also frequently applies singular still life segments, such as the meat in Halo (Fig. 2-8), to intimate a human figure. Additionally, she conspicuously inserts doll parts amidst the flora, as in Nature’s Mantle and Lot (Pl. 2), to insinuate the human presence. Even if there are no traces of humans, she intended all of her still life paintings to reveal and reflect upon human condition and position. The still lifes of produce, whether raw or cooked, also rises out of the Christian context.27 Developed in the late sixteenth century by Antwerp artists Pieter Aertsen and Joachim Beuckelaer, the market and kitchen scenes that display an overwhelming array of vegetables, fruits, meats, and game are pretentiously labelled with a biblical caption, as Beuckelaer’s

 27



Ebert-Schifferer, Still Life, 38-43.

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Well Stocked Kitchen with Jesus in the House of Martha and Mary of 1566 (Fig. 3-10). The Christian framework, apparent through the narrative unfolding in the back center near the vanishing point, appears to be a mere excuse to explore a genre scene of servants in the foreground, preparing a lavish meal for a feast in a rich home. Like the flowers, such a vast compiling of food sources, all on slightly slanted plates to show them more fully to the audience, was a testament to the sudden availability of all these consumable goods through better farming and imports to the Low Countries.28 Common folks, however, were unable to afford meats or special fruits and vegetables, such as artichokes. Except for ordinary birds, game animals were reserved for the nobility, who commanded the exclusive right to hunt animals such as deer and rabbits.29 Pheasants and turkeys, a recent import from Central America, were considered delicacies, hanging here to make them more flavorful and ready to be plucked and roasted by the cooks on the left. The painting is ultimately a show-off, a visual feast celebrating the abundance of material resources and edible goods in a wealthy household. In another of Beuckelaer’s paintings (Fig. 3-11), the servants and cooks are dispensed with entirely, leaving full attention on the lavish assortment of produce and meat framed by a hanging partridge on the left and a pheasant on the right. Its title, however, Kitchen Scene with Christ at Emmaus of 1560-65, directs the viewers to the top right, where the religious figures are barely visible. Paintings such as these were interpreted from the Christian perspective at the time as emphasizing spiritual salvation over immediate worldly pleasures; in fact, warning against material indulgence such as food consumption. Whether intended as a sermon of restraint or an incongruously boastful statement of opulence, the picture again attests to the vast availability of farm products and game animals as never experienced before in this region and beyond.

 28

Chong and Klock, Still-Life Paintings from the Netherlands 1550-1720, 19; Nobert Schneider, Still Life Painting in the Early Modern Period, 25-29. On the origins of the most popular imported items, see Hochstrasser, Still Life and Trade in the Dutch Golden Age, 61-204. 29 Jochen Sander, ed., The Magic of Things. Still-Life Painting 1500-1800, exh. cat. (Frankfurt: Städel, 2008), 215-221.



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Figure 3-10 Beuckelaer, Well Stocked Kitchen with Jesus in the House of Martha and Mary, 1566

Figure 3-11 Beuckelaer, Kitchen Scene with Christ at Emmaus, 1560-5



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Figure 3-12 Tomasula, Luminesce, 2007

Tomasula produced one painting with similar clustering of food sources in 2003 and then a series of depictions with a similar amassing of produces between 2006 and 2010. In Held of 2003 (Pl. 17), as usual, objects are in the air, among which are an artichoke and a pheasant, the prominently featured edible commodities in Flemish and Dutch still lifes. The aggregates are tighter in the series of 2006-2010 (Pl. 25, 27-29, 31, 33, Figs. 4-2, 4-8), comparable to those European kitchen spectacles of the past that showcased the wealth of food ingredients. Like their predecessors, Tomasula’s paintings seem to celebrate the diversity and availability of the sumptuous edibles. In reality, food items would not be mixed and piled up in such a limited space, then or now, especially in such a wealthy home, where most of the basement space would have been reserved for a spacious kitchen quarter. Hence, just like the flower still lifes, these food still lifes of the past were assembled and arranged based



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on the imagination of the artist, much like the renderings of Tomasula, whose paintings, however, dispense with the mimicry of an existing or a potentially real setup. The fantastic hanging display of Cantata (Pl. 28) consists of apples, pears, cherries, apricots, red plums, eggplants, red onions, frog legs, and a piece of meat. Luminesce (Fig. 3-12, Pl. 27) reveals an opened melon, an opened fig, blue plums, peaches, grapes, cherries, red peppers and a piece of meat. Although the constructions are innovative, all the types of natural products can be traced back to the food still lifes of the seventeenth century. Luminesce also prominently projects a book, which recalls another distinct genre: the book still life, which was established in response to the sudden increase in and height of book production in the Netherlands in the sixteenth century.30

Figure 3-13 Cotán, Quince, Cabbage, Melon and Cucumber, 1602

 30



Nobert Schneider, Still Life Painting in the Early Modern Period, 187-193.

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As seen in Beuckelaer’s works, meats and game animals were customarily mounted to the wall, but produce was rarely hung, depicted so infrequently in the Netherlands, as in De Heem’s Festoon of Fruit and Flowers (Fig. 3-5), which manifests fruits as an integral part of the floral arrangement. Such manner of food presentation, however, was the norm for Juan Sánchez Cotán, who was one of the earliest painters of independent still life in Spain.31 Preceding Zubarán’s still life, Cotán’s paintings equally unmask restraint in its setting of few objects that are set against a bare stone niche, into which the sunlight intrudes, creating stark highlights and shadows within the space (Fig. 3-13). The hanging of the produce was for the purpose of airing, and the placement in the stone enclosure aimed to keep them cool, all to delay spoilage.32 The scarcity of the food elements in the paintings of Cotán and Zurbarán (Fig. 3-3), compared to the spectacle of overflowing offerings in the Low Countries still lifes, has been noted as a factual representation of small production and limited selection of farm products in Spain, a country that was not as prosperous as the Netherlands at the time.33 The objective of Cotán, who was deeply religious, however, was not to decry the limited availability of produce, but to reveal the divine within the ordinary.34 The palpable luminescence, the absolute stillness, and the fastidious positioning of the individual pieces all betray a careful and conscious deliberation that transforms the mundane vegetables into sacred objects, worthy of full attention and study. Tomasula’s hanging food depictions, such as Cantata and Luminesce, appear to have integrated components from both regions, manifesting a profuse display of materials while imbuing them with a spiritual quality that is intimated by the meticulous shine, misty drops, and dynamism through the vertical suspension. Prized game animals such as rabbits and deer are frequently shown with their eyes open as in Still Life with Fruit, Vegetables and Dead Game of 1635-7 by Frans Snyders (Fig. 3-14), another pioneer of independent still life subjects, particularly game still life. In addition to the extravaganza of fruits and vegetables, which includes the precious artichoke, there are dead birds, a head of a wild boar, and a full body of a deer on the right. Although seemingly a contradiction of terms, since still life designates inanimate objects (in French, it’s “nature morte”: dead

 31

Jordan and Cherry, Spanish Still Life from Velásquez to Goya, 27-35. 32 Ibid, 29; William Jordan, Spanish Still Life in the Golden Age 1600-1650, exh. cat. (Fort Worth: Kimball Art Museum, 1985), 50. 33 Bryson, Looking at the Overlooked, 66. 34 In 1603, the artist enters a Carthusian monastery and becomes a lay monk.



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nature), many game still life artists inserted live animals among the dead to play with the conceptual antithesis between the living and the dead.35 Here, despite the opened eye, the deer is dead, while the cat lurks underneath and a parrot on the far left guards the food against such potential thieves. Delineations of living parrots, butterflies, and dogs were intercalated into still lifes to demonstrate the range of skills and subjects of the artists, but also to serve as positive religious symbols; whereas insects, particularly flies, and reptiles such as frogs and snakes, had negative significations.36

Figure 3-14 Snyders, Still Life with Fruit, Vegetables and Dead Game, 1635-7

Tomasula’s swirl still lifes, Never Let Me Go (Fig. 3-15, Pl. 29) and Please Don’t Go (Pl. 33), exhibit edible as well as inedible animals, intermixed. Please Don’t Go discloses fish and a blue crab, which can make a nice meal, but also some surprises in the corners: colorful feathers

 35

Nobert Schneider, Still Life Painting in the Early Modern Period, 52. 36 Ibid, 195-196.



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of a parrot in the upper right, a green head of a parrot and a hamster peeping in the upper left, and a smaller brownish-orange parrot on the lower left. Never Let Me Go displays a crab leg, a round cut of meat, and a profile view of a deer with an opened eye on the lower left, with a brown chicken and a small yellow parrot on the right. All of these animals can be found in the seventeenth-century kitchen still lifes. This painting also ushers a sense of wilderness—with the contorted snake on the right and mushrooms in the middle—that recalls another distinct genre: forest still life, which was not widespread but still was tackled by a steady number of artists.37

Figure 3-15 Tomasula, Never Let Me Go, 2007

An example is Still Life with Wild Flowers of 1670-79 (Fig. 3-16) by Abraham Mignon, the primary practitioner of forest still life. Although in the wild forest, human hands clearly arranged the assembly of varied flowers, which are placed behind a rock and against a tree that appear to have attracted a whole slew of small animals, including birds, insects, mouse, snail, lizard, frog, and snake. Butterflies and birds stand for souls,

 37



Sander, The Magic of Things, 291-4.

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while the others represent the intrusion of base instincts, as illustrated by the impending fight about to transpire between the snake and the lizard in the front. The purpose of the painting is twofold: while illustrating the spiritual battle between good and evil, it also underscores the imagination and ability of the artist to concoct an intriguing account with believable natural species, even when categorically contrived.

Figure 3-16 Mignon, Still Life with Wild Flowers, 1670-9

The same sense of play between nature and culture operates in the detectable manipulation of objects in all of Tomasula’s paintings, but is additionally made more apparent with the arresting fusion of nature and man-made materials in the 2006-10 series. This group of paintings was addressed in the last chapter as owing its origin to the Día de los Muertos ofrenda, which embedded the spiritual in the very material substances. It therefore equally references the European still life of the past as well as the Mexican ofrenda practices.



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Figure 3-17 Van Dijck, Still Life with Fruit, Nuts and Cheese, 1613

The customary, ostensible display of food and objects on the table of ofrenda finds its European counterpart in the pictorial convention of the meal still life, which was virtually invented and was in high demand in the Netherlands during the seventeenth century.38 Instead of the kitchen, it is now in the dining room, where food is laid out on a table in a wealthy home. Floris van Dijck’s Still Life with Fruit, Nuts and Cheese of 1613 (Fig. 3-17) parades a dessert table, as fruits and cheese were considered desserts at the time. Berkemeyer and pewter plates were relatively inexpensive, but porcelain bowls and ornate cutlery were costly. What ultimately elevates this entire table is the hand-woven decorative white napkin and orange table cover that speak to the wealth of this household. Such damask linen or silk with raised floral and leaf decorations that can be detected only in bright light was time-consuming and challenging to construct, and thus was sold for a very high price.39 Such damask cloth effect is seen in a number of paintings by Tomasula, including As No Gives Way to Yes (Pl. 13), which blazes an orange weaved backdrop that makes the cropped doll hand and the symmetrically arranged animal bones

 38

Quentin Bulevot, Slow Food. Dutch and Flemish Meal Still Life 1600-1640, exh. cat. (The Hague: Mauritshuis, 2017). 39 Ibid, 72.



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appear luxurious and inviting.40 Certainly, that was the very intent of the original damask tablecloth, to transform mundane objects into precious and desirable substances. Again, works like van Dijck’s can be read in two ways: as religious symbols with wine, bread, grapes, and walnuts, all pointing to Christ’s suffering and the Eucharist as well as forthright pleasurable objects to gaze at and delight in. Although the scene appears to be a slice of life, with an apple cut and pealed, and nuts opened and partly consumed, the entire laid table still life was yet another stage work on the part of the artist to convert a dull dessert table into an opportunity for charm and wonder.

Figure 3-18 Beert, Dishes with Oysters, Fruit and Wine, 1620-5

The artificial portrayal is true for all laid table still life including the misleadingly labeled “ontbijtje,“ breakfast still life, such as Osias Beert’s Dishes with Oysters, Fruit and Wine of 1620-5 (Fig. 3-18), that offers pastries, confectionaries, jatjem, chestnuts, and oysters. Featuring also fish and crab, sometimes with drinks, such tables serve as a snack bar, available to the rich to consume light food between meals, whether morning or afternoon. Notable in this painting are the ceramic dishes

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See also Tomasula’s Reach of 2002 (Pl. 14).

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imported from China and the blown glasses, which were costly at the time. On the table are some exotic shells brought from far and disparate parts of the world, placed here for decoration and to denote wealth.41 Variant exquisite shells, likewise, are salient in Tomasula’s paintings, such as in Held (Pl. 17). Oysters, which are prominently featured in Beert’s painting and frequently captured by the most famed ontbijtje painters Pieter Claesz and William Heda, were not expensive, but were considered a special treat in the seventeenth century. Tomasula‘s Ground of Being of 2010 (Pl. 34) literally highlights and elevates the precious oysters to the heavenly sphere. While shines and glazes are characteristic of all seventeenth century meal still lifes as well as the works of Tomasula, the notable translucency of the glasses in Beert’s still life is mimicked in the translucent crown floating above the oysters in Tomasula’s work as well as the glass balls and misty drops that appear throughout her paintings. They all add to the immediate appeal of the materials at hand, even as they may purport a spiritual content.

Figure 3-19 Van der Ast, Fruit Still Life with Shells and Tulips, 1620

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Bergström, Dutch Still-Life Painting in the Seventeenth Century, 70.

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Many meal tables are unveiled apparently in the aftermath of consumption with some of the food partially eaten, glasses upturned, and tablecloths wrinkled, transmitting a univocal statement of vanitas. Fruits, like flowers, are also shown slightly spoiled, such as the apple on the far right in van Dijck’s Still Life with Fruit, Nuts and Cheese (Fig. 3-17), or interrupted by a black fly, such as the yellow quince in Balthasar van der Ast’s Fruit Still Life with Shells and Tulips, 1620 (Fig. 3-19). The colorful array of diverse fruits, placed on the expensive dish and spread across the bright orange tablecloth along with exotic shells and a tulip is certainly inviting, but the invasion of distinct insects dampens the appetite and speaks for the temporality of the appeal of the edibles. While Tomasula more often presents the fruits with no blemish, she makes one exception with a singular fruit: pear. The majority of pears are shown spoiled in her paintings, as in Trace of 1997 (Fig. 3-20) and Settlement of 2012 (Pl. 36). The former pictorializes the process of decay, as rotten gooey liquid gushes out, while attempts are made to sustain the pear’s vitality by tying it around with strings which are fastened to a hook on the wall to help lift and keep it aloft. The neon pink wall is glaringly attractive and repulsive at the same time, ominously connoting the encroachment of death. In the latter, pears, though bruised and confined, are stacked to erect a tower that ends in a pearly crown at the top. The net of strings that commences from the crown and bundles the pears suggests bondage, illustrating how the drive for material gains and high status ultimately enslaves to those desires, to the point of ruin, as shown by the damaged fruits. This is the most overt vanitas picture in Tomasula’s oeuvre, magnifying the vanity of worldly pursuits that are short-lived like the rotten pears. Like the artist’s other still life emblems, the animated pears, albeit defective, stand for the human condition and aspiration. The play on the historical subject and theme is also evident in Corona of 2002 (Fig. 3-21), where an unpeeled, desiccated, caramelized pear with water drops sits on top of a luxurious red cushion with flies forming a corona, the crown-like formation, atop. Despite the divine light effect, crown, and the decorative accoutrement, this pear does not look delectable and the flies, however reconceived to implicate the divine, still repulse. The pear paintings, though reformulated in creative new ways, are the most conservative in content, demonstratively recalling the seventeenth-century vanitas still life.



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Figure 3-20 Tomasula, Trace, 1997

Figure 3-21 Tomasula, Corona, 2002



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Whereas the food items, however scrumptious, are stationary and passive in the works of the past, they seem alive and active in Tomasula’s paintings, taking center stage and even mimicking human beings with their peculiar positioning and attachments. Even the titles often suggest a live being in action. Despite the reference to impending, inevitable death, the items are always fiercely vibrant. Tomasula reinvents all the past formulas to create fantasy still lifes where the objects appear dynamic. All her works have precedent in the earlier European pictorial tradition, but the artist never adopts the rubrics as they exist, but utilize them only to concoct her own versions.

Figure 3-22 De Gheyn II, Vanitas Still Life, 1603



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Figure 3-23 Claesz, Vanitas, 1656

While the flower and food still lifes may be ambiguous or dual in their purpose to advance disguised symbols, to transmit a moralizing lesson and/or to commit to a pure material display of opulence, the overtones of vanitas paintings with skulls are inevitably instructive. Bone fragments of animals may be the result of leftovers from a meal, but the human skull obviously belongs neither to the kitchen scene nor the meal table setting. Referred to as memento mori (meaning “remember death”), it is a patently deliberate inclusion to render the vanitas theme unequivocal. The ominous skull in Jacques de Gheyn II’s Vanitas Still Life of 1603 (Fig. 3-22) is protuberantly displayed among other elements that denote impermanence: flowers in the metallic cup on the left, smoke from a burned candle inside an identical cup on the right, and a huge bubble above, which no doubt will burst momentarily. The skull reminds viewers of the futility of worldly beauty, pleasure, and wealth, connoted through the coins on the table. Claesz’s Vanitas of 1656 (Fig. 3-23) is also clear in message, as all the enclosed materials, though seemingly haphazardly and randomly placed, speak the same language. The decrepit skull along with a long bone that is stationed above books, noting the vanity of knowledge, is surrounded by other vanitas symbols: snuffled candle again, opened watch, hourglass, and upturned roemer with the glass top resembling a



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bubble. Music, identified by the musical notes in the book, is also supposed to communicate the evanescence of all existence.42 Tomasula too tackles the memento mori theme in a number of paintings such as The Memory Palace of 2011 (Fig. 3-24), where the distasteful skull, though that of a cat, and bones are starkly contrasted with the halo of shiny pearls of variant sizes and folded silky blue clothes beneath. The vanity of worldly pursuits, exemplified by the valuables, is relayed through the inexorable symbol of death. The pearls in this context also evoke the transience of bubbles, as do the innumerable glass beads and droplets of mist that appear throughout Tomasula’s art. The skull in Royalty (Fig. 3-25, Pl. 30) emphatically reminds the viewer of the brevity of the gorgeous wreath composed of delicious fruits and food items of sausage, fish and octopus. However embellished with fresh flowers and jewels, and celebrated with thin curled streamer and dot confetti, the entire sight will eventually collapse with all organic items rotting and emitting putrid odor, entering the netherworld of the skull. In Please Don’t Go (Pl. 33), the highlighted skull positioned at the lower left balances and stands in opposition to the spotlighted sculptural head of a putto, placed at the upper right. These two inanimate faces watch the active swirl of organic and inorganic articles, awaiting the cessation of movement, the gradual decay, and eventual expiration of all the items. The artist expands the mortuary repertoire by painting a range of other internal body parts such as the brain, heart, and intestine, which obviously depart from the European still life stock, yet preserve and actually manifest the vanitas theme even more conspicuously. These are all organic components taken out of living beings, thereby implicating death. However polished and accessorized, the interior parts especially those of a human cause revulsion and discomfort. The rendering of internal organs and bones, as discussed, stems from both European and Mesoamerican religious devotions and rituals. The skull imagery amidst food and floral arrangements, in particular, as noted, derives from Día de los Muertos ofrenda. This cultural phenomenon of syncretism, witnessing the merger of European and indigenous customs, now additionally has been syncretized with the artistic heritage of still life in the works of Tomasula.

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Ebert-Schifferer, Still Life, 137.

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Figure 3-24 Tomasula, The Memory Palace, 2011

Figure 3-25 Tomasula, Royalty, 2008



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In the last chapter, we have examined the adoption of social and religious syncretism in Tomasula’s art through the influence of Mexican Catholicism that infused indigenous habitude into European Catholic traditions. While this was an integral part of her upbringing and experience that she naturally transfused into her work, this additional artistic assimilation of the still life legacy was more conscious, if not deliberate, resulting from her thorough education in her college and graduate years. The artist did not purposely embark on this course to synthetize different customs, but as she fully absorbed the seventeenth-century still life practices, as made amply evident in this chapter, she grafted the art historical lineage into the depiction of existing syncretic cultural phenomena, thereby creating a pictorial syncretism. That is, she did not merely illustrate syncretism, but actually developed a syncretic art. The skull in Royalty (Fig. 3-25), as mentioned, can represent both a relic of a Catholic saint and the remains of Mesoamerican royalty, preserved to be worshiped. The wreath that alludes to the ritual of decorating sculptural figures of saints in Europe during the feast days also echoes the artistic heritage of garland still life, which was discussed above. But the association of flowers and fruits with the skull is preeminently a reference to the more flamboyant and ubiquitous ofrenda of the syncretic Día de los Muertos observation and, equally, the prominent European vanitas still life convention with the emphatic memento mori. The artist did not amalgamate all of these cultural, religious, and artistic trends piecemeal, but comprehensively integrated them, so that the work can be read completely in alternative ways at the same time. For instance, someone familiar with European art history would apprehend it as a magical version of the vanitas still life, whereas someone more accustomed to Latin American culture would read it as a pictorial reinvention of the ofrenda. On the other hand, the two divergent visual cultures converge in the apparent preoccupation with death: still life inherently communicates, and the age-old Mesoamerican beliefs reiterate the fragility of the line dividing life from death. There are plenty of contemporary art works that incorporate past images and concepts, but syncretism is not a fragmented quotation of the past. It is a complete fusion of disparate cultures that leads to a new dynamic expression—not a hodgepodge of various influences from different traditions, but a plenary convergence of divergent cultural practices. The process of syncretization is explained as “analogous with those optical illusions in which the image is at one and the same an old hag and a beautiful young girl and also simultaneously the combination of



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both of these figures.”43 Although the terms, “syncretism” and “hybridity,” have been used almost interchangeably, a distinction exists between them. A hybrid connotes the process of mixing and usually features some residual tension between divergent cultures, whereas syncretism occurs in the aftermath of the fusion, where the two legacies have merged entirely, resolving any conflict.44 Variant sources are usually mixed piecemeal in hybrid art. For instance, in the series of hybrid Neo-Baroque portraits by Kehinde Wiley, contrasting anachronistic elements are discernible: contemporary African Americans are set against dense ornate floral patterns that mimic a range of sources from rich Baroque brocade to nineteenth-century Arts and Crafts wallpaper designs. These two are combined to make a political statement, but they can be visually and conceptually separated. Many prominent Latinx artists such as Yreina Cervántez, Nephtali de Leon, Esther Hernández, and Yolanda López too have intermixed indigenous imageries with Catholic and western icons, but likewise in a segmented fashion. Alma Gómez’s Religious Syncreticism: Coatlicue, Guadalupe and Angela of 1998, for instance, reveals the head of a contemporary woman, Angela, fused into the head of the famous Aztec Coatlicue sculpture, which constitutes the upper body, which, in turn, rests on the garment and moon of the famed Virgin Guadalupe painting. In syncretic art, on the other hand, distinguishable visual cultural customs are simultaneously represented throughout the entire work. Interestingly, while they are conflated to construct a new art, they still retain their original identities. The busy swirl and tightly amassed hanging still life series of 20062010 (Pls. 25, 27-29, 31, 33) have been examined in light of the Día de los Muertos ofrenda in the last chapter. The articles, which actively partake in the dynamics of the paintings, can indeed be viewed as offerings to the dead. They can synchronously be interpreted as the artist’s fantastic appropriation of the European kitchen and table still lifes with the components displayed as a warning against consumption, or to show off the goods of wealthy homes or both. These can be viewed exclusively as reimagined Mexican custom, but also solely as a revision of seventeenthcentury European artistic tradition. They share the commonality in concentrating on the individual items which are richly and meticulously

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Sidney Greenfield and André Droogers, Reinventing Religions. Syncretism and Transformation in Africa and the Americas (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001) 44. 44 Syncretism, in fact, “reconciles the contradictions in the process of achieving cohesion,” ibid, 30. 



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delineated in intense colors and highlights, enabling them to stand as independent objects that communicate directly to the onlookers whether of the past or present, dead or alive. The artist has created syncretic paintings that point to both heritages separately and contemporaneously all at once. On the other hand, despite the palimpsest of the legacies, her still lifes are absolutely innovative in appearance, mode, and function, such that they cannot be mistaken as traditional works. Hence, she created a syncretic art that conflates past influences to generate new visual expression. As she incorporated existing visual motifs, she has implicated the same themes and messages in her art, but also added new signification, which will be addressed topically in the subsequent chapters. Tomasula created unique still lifes with sumptuous images of flowers, fruits, vegetables, animals, food items, table objects, and bones. They are rendered in perfection, built on layers of paint that allow the elements to shine and project, aided by the Baroque tenebrism and halo spotlight effect as well as other embellishing additions such as curtains, clothes, water droplets, and jewels. These artistic choices are aligned with the current Neo-Baroque aesthetics that focus on drama and dynamism. In terms of content, the artist has highly relied on her Mexican Catholic heritage, as demonstrated in the previous chapter. The artist has also studied and adopted subjects and themes of seventeenth-century European still life. Her still lifes, therefore, coextensively represent spiritual embodiment and communication, vanitas and material opulence, connoting simultaneously the earthly and the otherworldly—all corroborating the complex, intertwined relationship between life and death. As she is true to her upbringing and training, she interfused the two lineages in a way that allows concurrent disclosure of each trend separately as well as together. She has not just addressed and visualized religious and cultural syncretism, but also created an artistic syncretism in her own right.





CHAPTER FOUR NATURE AS CONCEPT

I’m trying, instead, to give visual form to a sense of the inseparability of object/matter and ideas…I want to think about how the discursive and material are integrated and I want to figure out how to make pictures that visually articulate that…We are all of us, concepts and matter, deeply entangled with each other.1

Maria Tomasula is clearly indebted to her origins, heritage, upbringing, and training—all of which played a formative role in her identity and her art. As examined in the previous two chapters, her still lifes are visually stunning, immediately drawing attention to the tactile sumptuousness of the details; however, they also embody ideas. The paintings contain layers of content, betraying ideology and beliefs derived from the past as well as relatable to contemporary discourses. Over the years, the artist infused additional meanings into the works that were conceived and developed from her experiences and readings. This chapter explores the philosophical thoughts and the concepts associated with nature that the artist ruminated upon and visually communicates through her art. Aside from those emotionally trying years of miscarriages and infertility, Tomasula shares that her life overall has been steady and rather ordinary, consisting mostly of work, reading, painting, and gardening while tending to the daily chores of cooking and cleaning at her house.2 Even when growing up, despite disruptive displacements due to her father’s changing jobs, she always felt secure due to the consistent and undiminishing love and support from her family, especially her maternal grandmother. Having come from such a caring family, she values her own immediate family of her husband and two daughters as one of her highest priorities. She has produced paintings dedicated to each member of her

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Maria Tomasula, “More than a Feeling: Painting with a Distributed Sense of Agency,” a paper delivered on November 14, 2017, at the Institute for Latino Studies, University of Notre Dame, n.p. See Appendix. 2 Maria Tomasula, interview by the author on September 29, 2017, audio.



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family. While these paintings make some personal references, they do not depart from the rest of her still life subjects that engage broader themes and issues of life, death, and suffering. As the artist shares, “I want to talk about universals, but on an individual scale,” all of the works, however specific their conceptual point of origin or inspiration, ultimately deal with encompassing topics and beliefs that are comprehensive in scale and philosophical in depth.3 Lot (Pl. 2), which has been discussed earlier, is dedicated to her husband Steve. The intricate network of strings that binds and connects all the objects may reflect Steve’s intellectual involvement in multiple genres of writing that also incorporate media, technology, art, and music to form multidimensional fictional narrative expressions. In the end, however, the painting speaks to universal constriction, as humanity, exemplified by the faceless doll, is severely restrained by the enclosing, interpenetrating elements—natural and artificial—that determine its fate and condition. My Alba (Fig. 4-1, Pl. 4), painted in 1998, is named after her older daughter. Tomasula reflected on the birth of her daughter at the time and the universality of birth, albeit miniscule, still an “iteration” of continuous evolution.4 The trunks represent history, while the grafted branches stand for biology, sociology, and culture. The central branch pierces through the delicate silky red glove, insinuating the forces thrusting upon and entangling the creation of the new child, thus claiming Alba as a product of all these intersecting and overarching influences. The perforation of the palm also evokes religious themes—stigmata and La Mano Poderosa— that relay messages of suffering, salvation, and power. New life necessitates pain and labor. The beauty engendered by creation is thus intimately intertwined with suffering. Typical of all Tomasula’s still lifes, this painting has multiple meanings. There is no sugarcoating or facile emblematizing in regards to the specific individuals or themes, however close to heart, as her paintings always deal with comprehensive and profound questions about life and existence.

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Maria Tomasula, quoted by Jim Houghton, “Tomasula: Exotic works that often puzzle,” The South Bend Tribune, July 2, 1998, E6. 4 Tomasula, interview.



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Figure 4-1 Tomasula, My Alba, 1998

Figure 4-2 Tomasula, My Ava, 2007



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In the same vein is the painting dedicated to her younger daughter titled My Ava of 2007 (Fig. 4-2), which partially reveals her face in the top right corner among the paraphernalia of offerings of fruit, flowers, butterflies, and few inanimate objects, graced by refined crystal cut-outs at the edge, all hanging from above. Ava is part of the fresh products of life that evidently have not been tied down with strings and nails; even the butterflies, for once, are not pierced and fixated to the wall. On the other hand, as butterflies appear sitting or flying above flowers and produce in other altar-based huddles (Pls. 27-28, 33) as well, they are essentially part of the entire package of delicious offerings made to please the dead. As precious as Ava is as an individual being, she constitutes an integrated segment of a mass of inclusive materials that connote the living as well as the dead. Her life bears significance singularly as well as collectively in this world. Alba’s and Ava’s faces have been incorporated in a few other works, including Our Lady of Guadalupe (Fig. 5-2) and When I Knew You of 2017 (Pl. 43), but they never elucidate anything peculiar to them.5 The paintings refer to their lives in a broader context that encroaches upon issues pertaining to heritage, significance, and meaning of existence in the cosmic scale that speak for all humanity. Tomasula explains, “life in general is so dense and complex, and selfcontradictory. The only way I can figure out to talk about a sensation, idea, feeling, or reaction—a sense of being in the world—is to not ignore each element in it, to try to collapse into one image a thing and its opposite.”6 There is not one simple definition of life or any parts of it, and thus its complexity is communicated through layered symbolization that is often built on the theme of duality. Her paintings typically contain antithetical ideas fused into one image, she explains, denying complete identification with just one or the other, but conveying both at once, in one look. A later painting titled Mothership of 2017 (Pl. 42) indeed captures the duality of motherhood that is beatific, but also exacting.7 Here, a magnificent haloed tiger lily is suspended in air, hovering over the little flowers that have been

 5

Departing from these symbolic and partial representations, Tomasula recently (2020) painted a portrait titled Alba Coronado that poses Alba with a solar crown, surrounded by luscious flowers. Despite of the figuration, the painting is in line with all the earlier works in connoting universal themes. 6 Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.” Appendix. 7 Tomasula’s early work, Mother’s Well of 1994 (Fig. 1-18), too transmits dual meanings about motherhood.



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tied to the stamens. The light and water drops disclose the lily as the source of nourishment for the little ones. Along with the feeling of dependence, there is also a sense of fear, as the upside-down petals that are about to flex and move seem somewhat menacing. The connection between them is firm yet also tenuous, as the strings are tightly fastened, but look fragile and easily breakable. The mother flower can readily crush or dispense with the little ones. This is not a commentary on Tomasula’s relationship with her daughters (to the contrary, they have very close, affectionate relations), but more of a general revelation about motherhood with its joys and challenges, and the influential position of the mother who can both nurture and abuse her own children. Tomasula, as stated, will not idealize or whitewash any subjects; all concerns of life are tackled realistically, albeit encapsulated in fantastic forms and settings.

Figure 4-3 Tomasula, Immigrant, 1993



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Although the artist keeps abreast of current events, she does not address them in any specific manner, since her paintings are essentially ontological in nature and intent. There are, however, a few paintings that directly engage worldly affairs. Immigrant of 1993 (Fig. 4-3) addresses the ongoing immigration debate in the country with an orchid pinned against a dissimilar flower, an iris, to form a unit. It imparts both negative and positive connotations: transplanting oneself is arduous, whether permitted or not, yet this artificial course of action leads to the fruition of a renewed community of diversity. This painting, on the other hand, looks no different from other medleys of disparate flowers that likewise project dual antithetical sentiments all at once. A painting that emerged particularly as a response to current events was The Fabulous Confession I of 2004 (Fig. 4-4). This was conceived in the midst of the ongoing reportage on countless number of Catholic priests’ abuse of minors since the news first broke out in 2002. The hypocritical priest is rendered here in the form of a serpent, the archetype symbol of evil, coiled on a luxurious cushion and is communicating with God, who is unveiled as a focused bright light at the top. His spiritual proclivity is made apparent through the wings attached by pins to the sides and the lifted head directed straight toward the heavenly realm. Will his lofty confession, tangibly revealed as black dots coming out of his mouth, be accepted by God and is he ultimately going to be condoned? Tomasula is not here to judge or condemn. Like the mother, the priest occupies a position of authority, able to uplift as well as abuse children. The ambiguity is further noted in the symbolic employment of the snake, which surfaces in a number of paintings by Tomasula. Snake, in the Mesoamerican tradition, is associated with several powerful deities; the winged snake represents Quetzalcoatl, which translates as “feathered serpent.” This wind God, who is perceived as a source of fertility, particularly in arid lands, traverses between the spiritual and the earthly realms. Bridging the two worlds is insinuated in this painting, as the snake rises toward the light—this is an unrelated narrative and a content that clearly departs from the first interpretation of this painting.



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Figure 4-4 Tomasula, The Fabulous Confession I, 2004

Another ambiguous painting is Signs of Intruders of 2004 (Pl. 22), which implies physical assault, as conveyed by the forceful interlocking of a blue crane’s head with an opened cantaloupe that has green butterfly wings and is attached to a red serpent’s body. Such blatant genetic editing and blending disclose unnatural outer intervention and triggers a sense of alarm and distress. Yet this painting is also conceived to impart the New Materialist belief in the interconnectivity of all material beings and their inseparability, which will be discussed in Chapter Six. Another work with implications of violence is Looking for a Common Language of 2004 (Fig. 4-5), which renders the pearly red dots this time not as glass balls, but as blood that gushes out of an opened heart in the middle and splatters across the encircled roses. Is this a call for communication rather than the



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violence that brings such destruction in the world among different nations, ethnic groups, and tribes? Perhaps it suggests that suffering as the ultimate universal language that binds all of humanity, since it is so prevalent everywhere around the world. Just as the components of every image are deliberately selected, juxtaposed, and positioned to yield an effect that appeals to the senses as well as communicate a content that speaks to the mind, the titles are likewise carefully chosen to reinforce this dual sensorial-cerebral reception. The paintings do not need the words to stand as compleat pieces, but titles often bring clues as to the content of the works.

Figure 4-5 Tomasula, Looking for a Common Language, 2004

While these paintings address worldly issues, all of Tomasula’s works are essentially forged with the quest to answer questions about existence through the exploration of nature. And even as her oeuvre embodies or



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associates with human and culture, the immediate appeal of her art works foremost resides in the expressive instruments themselves, which are the natural elements. While flowers and skulls are used as disguised symbols to speak of Catholic saints, Mesoamerican tradition, European still life themes, and ultimately a new pictorial syncretism from the fusion of those past references, the still life articles also serve as self-referential agents of their own standing. The artist fastidiously attends to every minute detail of the natural subjects, not just to replicate their appearance but also to animate them with a pulsating sensation. Due to the dramatic theatrical presentation, the natural items project starkly against the dark or intense color background, appearing to be “materialized” rather than made, according to the artist, to affirm and insist on their physical presence and their innate vivacity.8 The intense colors, divine nimbus, and tactile details all proclaim life within nature. And that life has meaning and implication. As the artist stated, in the very material visualization of the subjects are concepts inherently ingrained in the images that are communicated through the means and ends of the picture making. We will now explore those ideas that are imbued in the material representation of the natural forces. While the cut flowers in the conventional still life are usually placed in a jug to disguise the damage and prolong their lives through water, the severance is made very apparent in most of Tomasula’s still lifes by the cut ends of the suspended flowers usually exposed in the air. In essence, the cropped flowers bring attention to the brevity of life to the forefront and raise ontological questions about existence. What is a flower and what constitutes its existence? Tomasula has speculated on such philosophical matters for years, unconsciously relaying her mental leanings directly through her paint and delineation of the natural elements. She later discovered her raw cogitation verbalized in the writings of two philosophers—Baruch Spinoza (1632-1677) and Gilles Deleuze (19251995). Tomasula has long been reared in the idea of material embodiment of living substance through her Catholic upbringing that underscored the spiritual habitation of the sanctuary, the images of saints, and ritualistic experiences. It taught her that “both my embodied self and the material world it existed in, was a phenomenon of depthless mystery, all matter was

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Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.” This idea of materialization could also have been inspired by her early memories of her father’s dark room, where she witnessed how photographic images emerge through the chemical process.



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enchanted, that is, animated by a sort of agency that everything possessed: people of course, but also animals, nature and all the stuff of the world.”9 Her conviction in spiritual embodiment evolved into a broader understanding of an encompassing force in all physical entities. Tomasula believes in a being that exists in all of creations. This view is in complete agreement with Spinoza’s monism, which, contesting Cartesian duality, avows no separation between the mind and the body, and further, proclaims the immanent existence of God, residing in all forms of life.10 This seventeenth-century Dutch philosopher of Jewish descent caused great uproar through his declaration that God is synonymous with nature. The equation of God with nature dispenses with the anthropomorphism of God and accepts him as an inherent force that permeates all matter. Spinoza’s universal conception of God finds a parallel in ancient religious beliefs and forms the basis for the later pantheistic movement. This tenet is well suited to Tomasula’s paintings, which evoke a strong spiritual presence in the very physical manifestation of the natural objects. Spinoza employed systematic reasoning, supposedly geometric in method, to propound his theories in his famed publication, Ethics. He first explains God as a substance, the only, absolute, perfect, universal, infinite being that causes all existence: “whatever is, is in God, and nothing can be or be conceived without God.”11 This God is not the transcendental God of the Judeo-Christian tradition, but an immanent God of self-existence. Spinoza equates this self-caused entity with nature, frequently writing “God or nature,” as if there is no difference between them. All attributes of God are therefore revealed in nature, including his intellect, which is the cause of all things, designated as modes. Most interestingly, Spinoza defines God as a “pure act,” that is not an inert, completed being, but an entity of dynamism, as mirrored in nature. All modes are acts of God that

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Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.” 10 On his writing, see Jonathan Bennett, A Study of Spinoza’s Ethics (Indianapolis: Hackett Publishing, 1984); Edwin Curley, ed., A Spinoza Reader. The Ethics and Other Works. Trans. Edwin Curley (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1994); Robert Shahan and John Biro, Spinoza: New Perspectives (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1978). On Monism, see Philip Goff, ed. Spinoza on Monism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012). 11 Baruch Spinoza, Ethics, Part I, Proposition 15. See Edwin Curley, ed., The Collected Works of Spinoza, 2 vols. Trans. Edwin Curley (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1985), 1: 420.



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“happen only through the laws of God’s infinite nature,” and follow “from the necessity of his essence.”12 The “indwelling” of God in nature, or the plenary equation of God with nature, is visually manifest in the still lifes of Tomasula. Natural elements are painted to appear taut and vibrant with dashing details and invigorating colors that speak to their élan. In addition, the electrifying concentrated light that simulates a halo not only heightens their vitality, but also openly conveys a sense of divine presence within the articles. While the lightning varies, the majority of her paintings, as stated before, are marked by two types of illumination: either only the subjects are highlighted against a pitch-black backdrop, or there is an oval spotlight that encompasses and surrounds all of the items. Recure (Pl. 9), which was already discussed at length, is an example of the former with the highly luminous flower against a stark dark background. Here, the light seems to emanate from within, inducing a sense of energy and divinity that enlivens and lifts the damaged flower. A resurrecting power is embedded within this fragile entity. The other use of this halo effect, where the oval of light encloses the subject, implicates a supernatural power permeating the entire milieu. Music of Chance of 2004 (Fig. 4-6, Pl. 21) is one such example: here, a hanging bloom composed of petals of different irises displays a range of hues from dark pink to yellow with a touch of white crowning on the edge at the top, mimicking reflected light. The oval halo behind the flower displays the same color transitions from yellowish white to reddish pink, resembling the nimbus around the resurrected Christ in the famous Isenheim altarpiece of 1510-15 by Matthias Grünewald. The illumination does not appear to be a temporal spotlight, but an ever burning sunlight. The sense of eternity is also captured by the very process of painting that has rendered the fragile, transient natural fragments into a steadfast vision of beauty and youth. The confident petals of the iris expand outward, flexing upwards and to the sides, signifying the flower as the very source of life and power. Hence, other plants are grafted onto this lifeline to extract its energy for their own sustenance and survival: a white fuchsia is tied to the end of the cut stem by fine purple strings, and twisted spider lily petals hang from the ends of the iris petals, linked by means of pins. To accentuate the divinity of the iris, lithe branches with tiny leaves encircle and weave a halo outline around the standard of the flower.

 12



Ibid, 424.

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Figure 4-6 Tomasula, Music of Chance, 2004

Along with the sense of mysticism and immortality, an infusion of dynamism and intellect is apparent in Music of Chance, denoting the Spinozian God-nature that is a verb, implying action, and an embedded mind within the physical form, as they are not separate. All the flowers and leaves are in full bloom at the moment, fresh and flourishing, about to flare in all directions. A fine purple thread from above descends and is tied to the core of this floral concoction, allowing the entire assemblage to dangle and even insinuate slight swinging. The vibrant colors and details of the plants add to their vivacity, magnified by the dripping water drops and the dispersing sun dust in the backdrop, upholding them as living, active agents of life. There is also a sense of willfulness to this forceful projection of the iris that reveals an intellect behind the formation of this



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arrangement. The artifice of this airborne, magical flower is made ostensible by the pins and strings that divulge the mechanics of the suspension and the conjoining of elements. All of Tomasula’s still lifes are highly contrived and the evident exposure of the fantastic manipulation of these intricate images evinces the intellect of the artist who conceives, designs, and impregnates the presentations with profound rumination. This operation ultimately points to God at work, as human minds are connected to and mirror God’s intellect, which, according to Spinoza, defines his very essence and perfection. Humans are also modes, thereby part of God or nature. Humans are not exceptional, as they are an integral part of nature and are inseparable from the rest of nature.13 They cannot exist outside of nature and are bound by its universal laws, like any other mode. The human-nature correlation, as discussed previously, is prevalent in Tomasula’s still life, where the natural items stand for themselves, but also symbolize humans at the same time. The artist states, “we need to see nature as having agency, as part of us, and we of it.”14 While the earlier The Structure of Coincidence (Pl. 20) denotes the parity between the two, the recent River of 2017-18 (Pl. 47) literally demonstrates their integration, as a tree trunk transforms into a bronze hand, from which branches grow out and yield succulent blue plums and pink blossoms. This time, the separate components are not coalesced by means of strings, nails, and pins, but they birthed one after another in a chain reaction: the tree begets the hand, which in turn spawns branches. While the painting signifies life, it simultaneously connotes bondage, even without strings, as the segments seem prescribed to particular positions and roles. The idea of captivity is a recurring theme in Tomasula’s still life. My Alba (Fig. 4-1) illustrates how the external elements choreograph a person’s identity and destiny; Mothership (Pl. 42) recalls the exhilarating joys as well as the inescapable burdens associated with raising children. The concept of bondage is most often literally visualized through the use of strings that bind humans and nature in the majority of Tomasula’s paintings. One of the notable examples is Lot (Pl. 2), where the doll, flowers, and fruits are restrained by strings that tie them down, relaying the notion of a greater force governing nature and human. The artist frequently

 13

On Spinoza and nature, see Gal Kober, “For They Do Not Agree in Nature. Spinoza and Deep Ecology,” Ethics and Environment 18, no.1 (Spring 2013): 4365. 14 Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.”



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plays on the words that she specifically chooses to title her works: “Lot” refers to the Biblical character, but also “fate.” The artist states that “we are absolutely constrained in every way imaginable,” and these images uncloak “how forces come together to make us.”15 Her thinking is echoed in the writings of Spinoza, who espouses a deterministic view, disclaiming human will and explaining all modes as fated, decreed by the necessity of divine nature.16 Humans are mistaken to think that they have full freedom to decide and control their lives. As an integral part of God or nature, humans are decidedly bound by the laws of the universal order. Humans wontedly live in the illusion that they can direct their lives and have dominion over nature. According to Spinoza, if they break through this illusion and accept the reality of themselves as an integral part of God or nature, then they can ironically obtain some measure of freedom.17 Human affects, which too follow the force of nature, are divided into “actions” and “passions.” He explains that an “action” is an internal occurrence, which is equal to the mind acting, while a “passion” is an outside causal event that is acted upon humans. The more one is attuned to the inner actions, the less one is affected by the outer influences, and that is the path to freedom. And one can even achieve equanimity, as one constantly relies on steadfast inner strength and is not swayed by the vicissitudes of life. The key for Spinoza is the mind which can acquire what he calls “adequate ideas,” derived through intellectual intuition of the essences that can secure true knowledge of God and restore humans to their proper place in nature.18 The more one acknowledges and lives in the reality of humans as part of the order of nature, the more unhinged one becomes. Full liberation is impossible, since humans are always affected by outside forces, but even partial freedom is desirable, allowing relief from the turmoils of life. Spinoza emphasizes the power of the mind that understands and assumes the natural course of the logical universalism. Tomasula’s paintings inarguably break the illusion of human independence and control by patently visualizing human enchainment and inseparability from God and/or nature. While the still lifes are ostensibly

 15

Maria Tomasula and Julie Farstad, “Word for Word: Artists and Their Influences Trade Tape,” Mouthtomouth (Fall 2002). http://mouthtomouthmag.com. 16 Part I, Proposition 29, see Curley, The Collected Works of Spinoza, 1: 433. 17 Part IV, Appendix, see ibid, 588-94. 18 Part V, Proposition 31-40, ibid, 610-15. Spinoza also refers to this intuition as the “third kind of knowledge,” see ibid, 478. On “logical universalism,” see Robert Shahan and John Biro, Spinoza: New Perspectives.



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fantastic, they certifiably illustrate the reality of life as explicated by Spinoza. Moreover, in spite of the emphasis on bondage, her paintings do not appear tragic. Even with the metaphor of sainthood, as in Recure (Pl. 9), with apparent torture (passions) inflicted upon the subject, glory and salvation are right at the door, as insinuated through the brilliant light and sumptuous representation of the afflicted. From the Spinozian perspective, the indwelling divine presence is the answer to the bondage, particularly the infusion of the intellect, as exemplified by the very mindful delineation and arrangement of the objects in her works. The human mind that selects the natural articles, enacts their entanglement, and induces the new creations is a reflection of God’s mind that is at work and avouches itself as the ultimate cause of all natural formations. The embracement of this knowledge ultimately brings a sense of liberation and relief from the burden of oppression, and even induces joy, according to the propitious, enchanting paintings of the artist. Tomasula is not aiming to visually demonstrate the theories of the seventeenth-century philosopher. She landed on this cerebral platform independently that happens to coincide with that of the writer, who of course proceeds in a deductive manner to systematically lay out his complex arguments. Tomasula is not interested in dwelling on such sophisticated discourse, but truly believes in the universal force intrinsic in nature and in the levelled alignment between nature and human. She has thus instilled her own thoughts into the web of layers of meaning in her art that is established on tradition, yet is also evidently pliable to unconventional ideas. Another philosopher whose thought resonates with her art is Deleuze, the twentieth-century French philosopher, who was influential in a wide range of fields of studies. Interestingly, Deleuze declares allegiance to Spinoza and develops his own theories based on the latter’s exposition, particularly on the immanent existence of being. While Deleuze draws sources from theology and mysticism, he flippantly calls God a lobster, in his typical humorous, enigmatic, circuitous linguistic manner of articulation that is hard to decipher.19 Though his writing can be very

 19

Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus. Trans. Brian Massumi (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1987), 40. On Deleuze’s complicated engagement with religion, see Mary Bryden, ed., Deleuze and Religion (New York: Routledge, 2001); Lindsay Powell-Jones and LeRon Shults, eds., Deleuze and Schizoanalysis of Religion (London: Bloomsbury Academic,



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obtuse, augmented by his own semantics of particular terms and phrases, Deleuze also unmistakably builds his own ontological version of univocity, stressing the connectivity of all matter, human as well as nonhuman. Following Spinoza, he claims that there is no distinction between human and nature, and resolutely advocates homo natura: “the human essence of nature and natural essence of man become one within nature in the form of production.”20 With psychoanalyst and political activist Félix Guattari, Deleuze wrote a number of books that further expand upon the equation of humans and nature as a course of perpetual action, as nature is fundamentally “a process of production.”21 Of all their collaboration, A Thousand Plateaus directly addresses nature the most, using terms such as “plateau,” “rhizome,” and “territorialization,” initiating a new brand of studies called geophilosophy.22 Deleuze and Guattari reframe postmodernism by reintroducing materialism to the discursive practices, particularly the way they foreground the force of nature in this publication. They contend that nature is self-sufficient and self-organizing, requiring no outside source or intervention. Nature (actually, culture too) undergoes distinct processes that they refer to as deterritorialization and reterritorialization, which are organizing operative terms for explicating how the originally prevailing structure of nature has been completely uprooted from its position, but then it reconfigures itself in a new way on the same ground. This enterprise validates the self-organizing capacity inherent in nature. The authors explain that this ongoing act of two processes that can happen

 2016); Joshua Ramey, The Hermetic Deleuze. Philosophy and Spiritual Ordeal (Durham: Duke University Press, 2012). 20 Deleuze expands Nietzsche’s notion of “homo natura” that sees human as an integral part of nature, pointing to a more mutual interaction and equal leveling of the two. Deleuze and Guattari wrote: “Man and nature are one and the same essential reality”; Deleuze and Guattari, Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Trans. Robert Hurley, Helen Lane, and Mark Seem (New York: The Vikings, 1977), 4. 21 Ibid, 3. 22 Deleuze and Guattari also wrote a chapter on geophilosophy in What Is Philosophy? Trans. Hugh Tomlinson and Graham Burchell (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), 85-113; however, it focuses more on philosophy, particularly Greek philosophy. A Thousand Plateaus, on the other hand, focuses on and develops a philosophy of geology and geography. See Mark Bonta and John Protevi, Deleuze and Geophilosophy. A Guide and Glossary (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2004); Bernd Herzogenrath, ed., Deleuze/Gauttari & Ecology (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).



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even simultaneously has also the ability to bring all matter together, organic and non-organic, resulting in an “assemblage” of often unusual pairings that retain their peculiarities. The bricolage thus maintains the heterogeneity of the elements even as it is being molded into a new creation.23 This phenomenon, later deemed as the complexity theory, underscores the dynamic essence of nature (and matter), which is in constant motion and involved in the process of transformation that Deleuze and Guattari call “becoming.”24

Figure 4-7 Tomasula, Sheathe, 1994

 23

Deleuze and Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus, 100. 24 On the application of complexity theory, see Bonta and Protevi, Deleuze and Geophilosophy, 16-21.



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Tomasula’s art reflects some of the core tenets of Deleuze’s ontology. To the artist, nature is foremost about creation. She is most fascinated by nature’s ability to engender new form and life.25 As an illustration of assemblage, Deleuze and Guattari provide the example of an orchid and wasp as a symbiosis, since they preserve their origins even as they transmute into the new unit of a productive machine.26 In an earlier work, Sheathe of 1994 (Fig. 4-7), Tomsula reveals a slipper orchid with its bulb intact emplaced in the neck of a shiny vase. She slightly exaggerated the labellum to resemble male genitalia and simultaneously an insect with long legs represented by the thin long leaves. The flower and the insect are one and the reproductive message is clear. The artist has not painted a wasp, but often delineates butterflies, which constitute an integral part of an inventive floral assembly, as in Web (Pl. 15). More often, portions of disparate flowers are coupled together to create an organic unit as in Music of Chance (fig. 4-6). The artist progressively moves toward a complete melding of unrelated, incongruous organic components, starting with All in All (Fig. 1-23) and Signs of Intruders (Pl. 22), which feature novel concoctions. These are assemblages that exemplify the self-generative power of nature that is able to imbue life into the new formation of multiplicity, despite the evident cuttings and artificial conjoining of the organic segments. Indeed, Signs of Intruders is composed of severed parts from different animals and fruit that should resemble a lifeless taxidermy composite, but instead commands its presence as a new breathing mythical creature that sparkles with energy and vivaciousness. The artist exercises particular stylistic means to illuminate the regenerative power of an assemblage, also referred to as an “emergence.” Like Georgia O’Keeffe, she frequently zooms in on images to expose the reproductive parts of the flowers and selects supposedly erotic subjects, such as orchids, as in Two of 2002 (Pl. 10), and oysters, as in Ground of Being of 2010 (Pl. 34). Her use of Neo-Baroque mannerism also definitely accentuates the organic content. Ultimately, it is her sumptuous accretion of shimmering paints that evokes a heightened sensual effect. She purposefully employs methodical and careful application of paints to induce a “delight of the senses, even of the erotic, of sensation that conjures the tactile quality of material experience.”27 The tangible substance of paint animates the surface and transforms the delineated objects into living subjects with reproductive capacity.

 25

Tomasula, interview. 26 Deleuze and Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus, 10. 27 Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.”



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Figure 4-8 Tomasula, Hold Me, 2007

Another means that alludes to the regenerative power of nature is the compositional lay-out, which too is based on meticulous planning and control, antithetical to the prevalent Neo-Baroque trend. The precise configuration of items that insinuates structure and system echoes the selforganizing capabilities of nature. Although artificially conjugated by the artist, the assembled segments appear to stand on their own and are engaged in the process of forming a new edifice. The much discussed altar-related paintings of 2006-10 all convey a massing of many organic and inorganic objects that are in transition and under construction toward shaping a spiral or triangular formation. For instance, in Please Don’t Go (Pl. 33), altar offerings of diverse fruits, flowers, edible items, stationary decorations, animals, and bones are all tightly clustered and contained



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within a circular formation of the green shrubbery that suggests a whirl. Hold Me of 2007 (Fig. 4-8) exhibits a more prominent helix that is set against a vast empty darkness. The dynamic charge appears to have swept all the divergent objects from their original positions and begun the process of transporting them elsewhere to erect them into a new consolidated shape. The spiral, an ancient symbol of evolution and creation, is a dynamic organic motif that implies continuous change, thereby appropriately symbolizing the unceasing processes of deterritorialization and reterritorialization. The calculated, exact rendering and positioning of the individual materials accentuate their heterogeneity as well as insinuate the motion of re-creating and re-organizing to engender a new assemblage of life.

Figure 4-9 Tomasula, Call Me by Your Name, 2017



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Even the static Call Me by Your Name of 2017 (Fig. 4-9, Pl. 44) demonstrates a sense of restructuring, as the forcibly grafted flowers are at work in blending into the new plant structure to achieve a functional symbiotic body of order and life. There are three birds that are also embedded in the new configuration; one is completely tucked in between two branches at the top and two others are on the sides with their beaks intentionally positioned to appear like extensions of the branches in front of them. They are integrated into this alternative lifeform, the symmetry of which assuredly conveys nature’s ability to reorganize and restructure. The inclusion of the birds is very relevant to Deleuze and Guattari’s A Thousand Plateaus, which devotes a whole chapter to refrain, particularly that of birds, which repeatedly sing the same patterned song to claim their territory.28 The writers revisit this concept of refrain in other publications, equating it with the processes of deterritorialization and reterritorialization, thereby advancing it as another manifestation of assemblage and becoming.29 Here the artist actually depicted male hummingbirds, as identified by the colorful neck feathers. Each of them likely originally occupied a separate tree, but then they were transported to this same location, as they possessively followed their home tree branches that were cut and reassembled to constitute this mélange, with diverse flowers also affixed to its organic armature. As these birds are known to be highly territorial, they will likely fight one another to determine who will “own” this newly developed habitat. Hummingbirds usually sit on top of trees to ward off intruders with their singing and fiercely defend their territory against any competitors who dare to challenge their ownership. So the current staging will noticeably be altered in the next few minutes. The entire movement from past migrations to the present aggregation and impending battle reveals the Deleuzian working of nature in progress. According to Deleuze, an artist is a cosmic artisan, whose aim is to seize the nonvisible forces of the universe, the unknown in nature.30 The artist is able to relay the true character of nature because s/he is able to tap into its self-organizing, generative capabilities. In a number of publications, most notably What Is Philosophy? which is written with Guattari, and Francis Bacon: the Logic of Sensation, the philosopher elevated art as a special conduit whereby invisible forces are made visible

 28

Ibid, 310-350. 29 See also Deleuze and Guattari, What Is Philosophy? 184-7. 30 Deleuze and Guattari, A Thousand Plateaus, 337, 345. They also claim that “the artist is a seer, a becomer” and “painting’s eternal object is this: to paint forces,” Deleuze and Guattari, What Is Philosophy? 171, 182.



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through the materiality of art production.31 Those forces are captured through sensation, which essentially comprises a work of art. Deleuze declares that art is a “block of sensations, that is to say, a compound of percepts and affects.” Percepts refer to the capacities outside of human perceptions and affects are affections that reveal what is yet to come.32 Interpreted as visions and becoming, these factors of sensation enable art to fundamentally operate like nature through the hands of the artist, who deterritorializes elements and reterritorializes them to contrive a new assemblage, mimicking nature in its ability to recreate. Art is therefore not a representation, but a vital and material entity of its own.33 According to Deleuze, color especially embodies sensation that harnesses cosmic forces within the material.34 Along the same lines, Tomasula states, “one of the things I’m trying to do in these paintings is to symbolically enact—in visual form—the sensation of being.”35 Therefore, the Spinozian indwelling divine presence of nature was not superficially duplicated, but such an invisible essence was apprehended and transferred to the paintings directly by the artist herself. Following the Deleuzian logic, she has captured the cosmic force through sensation, which is released on the panel through art making, notably in the use of colors, which indeed infuse an undeniable energy and vibration into the images. Tomasula’s art, though super-realistic in style, therefore, is not a replication after nature, but an extension of nature. It is an abstract machine that realizes the ongoing process of becoming in its very materiality.

 31

Deleuze wrote extensively on art; see Ronald Bogue, Deleuze on Music, Painting, and the Arts (New York: Routledge, 2003); Eugene Holland, Daniel Smith and Charles Stivale, eds., Gilles Deleuze: Image and Text (London: Continuum, 2009); Michael Jasper, Deleuze on Art. The Problem of Aesthetic Constructions (Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2017); Simon O’Sullivan, Art Encounters Deleuze and Guattari. Thought Beyond Representation (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006); Anne Sauvagnargues, Deleuze and Art. Trans. Samantha Bankston (London: Bloomsbury, 2013); Stephen Zepke, Art as Abstract Machine. Ontology and Aesthetics in Deleuze and Guattari (New York: Routledge, 2005). 32 Deleuze and Guattari, What Is Philosophy? 164. 33 Anne Sauvagnargues writes that art is therefore not a copy, but “it is all of reality in itself.” Deleuze and Art, 19. 34 Deleuze and Guattari, What Is Philosophy? 181-2; Deleuze writes, “colorstructure gives way to color-force. Each dominant color and each broken tone indicates the immediate exercise of a force…” in Gilles Deleuze, Francis Bacon: The Logic of Sensation. Trans. Daniel Smith (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2002), 121. 35 Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.”



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As examined in the last two chapters, Tomasula uses still lifes as disguised symbols, which she draws from Mexican and European origins, to transmit messages concerning martyrdom, divinity, death, life, ofrenda, vanity, and prosperity. In addition, she has imbued some of her paintings with personal messages concerning motherhood and cultural issues. All the while she uses still life as a metaphoric device to address critical aspects of life and tradition, she always equally stresses the still life components for what they are: material substances. As she focuses more on organic forms, she really brings nature to the fore, dispelling the notion of a passive backdrop in a supporting role, and asserting it as an active protagonist and agent of life. Stemming from her own beliefs about the essence of life that were founded on the Catholic belief in the porousness of the body and Mexican American experience of connectivity, and nurtured through her philosophical studies, she projects several ontological reflections about nature. These thoughts were reaffirmed and refined particularly through her readings of Spinoza and Deleuze. According to the paintings of Tomasula, nature inherently embodies a being, be it divine or a force. Humans are an integral part of nature and cannot be separated from it. Finally, nature is both a living being and a process that is constantly reinventing itself. These assertions are made distinct through her unique painterly style that utilizes selective illumination, intense colors, controlled application of paint, and fastidious composition to evoke the sacred, animated, sensual, and transformative attributes of nature. The inclusion of non-organic items that gradually become ever more assimilated into the organic structures transmits the concept of assemblage that encapsulates nature’s ability to absorb all matter, living or nonliving, into its creations. This vision of an outlandish bricolage that lends to a possibility of further construction and transformation will be explored further in the chapter that is devoted to New Materialism. While Tomasula’s still lifes instill and communicate different messages, they also eminently foreground nature, for it is an intriguing subject of its own. It has its own logic, structure, and meaning that have long drawn scholarly attention. Tomasula ponders and visually renders the complexity of nature through her ingenious mannerism that, foremost, highlights its living essence and beauty. Her paintings absolutely speak for the wonders of nature.



CHAPTER FIVE EMBEDDED FEMINISM

In a 2002 interview, Tomasula claims that her hand series has a feminist context: Sometimes I’ll use gloves, sometimes little doll hands. But even when the hands are covered, they’re very clearly female. You know, it began as nothing more specific than a desire to indicate female agency. I remember reading a World Bank report some years ago that outlined how the immense work for caring for the young, the sick, and the old of the world is mostly done by women, usually without pay. The contributions of women are so devalued….[I] wanted to paint a universe that was held in formation by the organizing forces of that feminine hand.1

Tomasula’s hand series, which discloses a glove or a doll’s hand encircled by or below a mass of flowers, fruits, and insects, as in By Hands Unknown (Pl. 7), My Alba (Pl. 4), and Web (Pl. 15), stems from La Mano Poderosa, as examined in Chapter Two. She has reinvented the formula, while keeping its original signification about martyrdom, power, and regeneration in her own rendition. In the statement quoted above, she explains that the hand actually represents female agency, thus reinterpreting the powerful hand of God/Christ as that of woman. These paintings indeed manifest silky opera gloves worn by women. Through the allusion to La Mano Poderosa, she implies that the hand reflects woman’s perseverance, but also ultimately her power. The series represents women in charge and creating the world. Ghost (Fig. 5-1) of 2005, for instance, exhibits a gloved hand, which holds a bundle of a wide variety of materials—a feather, flowers, butterflies, bones, mushrooms, jewels, and eggs—all unified by the overall blue-gray gradation of the painting. They are assembled, raised up, and electrified by the mysterious light emanating from the hand. As discussed, the hand is the source of energy and life, inducing the encircled vegetation to bloom and nonorganic forms to rise

 1

Maria Tomasula and Julie Farstad, “Word for Word: Artists and Their Influences Trade Tape,” Mouthtomouth (Fall 2002). http://mouthtomouthmag.com.

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up. The powerful hand of woman even brings bones to life in As No Gives Way to Yes (Pl. 13) and can create a whirlwind that carries organic as well as non-organic objects to the heavens, as demonstrated in Held (Pl. 17). Such empowering message is not immediately apparent, as it is not loudly trumpeted, but, like other messages of the artist, is artfully and intellectually communicated through metaphoric means.

Figure 5-1 Tomasula, Ghost, 2005

When asked if her art is feminist, her response is both affirmative and negative.2 Similarly, when asked if she can be classified as a Latina artist, Tomasula replies that she is that, but not just that. She explains that she

 2

Maria Tomasula, interview by the author on September 29, 2017, audio.

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paints from her experience and being, but does not want to be pigeonholed by a specific label. She is afraid that such branding would circumscribe her art to be considered through that singular lens and comprehended only from that point of view. All the analyses so far have corroborated the multiple dimensions of her art as it addresses divergent religions, histories, cultures, and philosophies. Feminism is another framework interwoven into the entire layered iconography; and the very works of art previously discussed lend themselves to the gendered perspective as well. Diverse ideas are simultaneously connoted in the works, but the feminist aspect will now be isolated and unraveled for a clearer apprehension of the topic that is embedded within the complex iconography. The Catholic-inspired works are the very expressive vehicle of women’s voice in Tomasula’s art. Recent critical publications have shown that this is a common phenomenon among Latina artists who use their Catholic upbringing and their religious heritage to speak for themselves as well as to make feminist statements.3 Although overlooked in the past, Latinas had a special connection to Catholicism, as they were traditionally the primary practitioners and enforcers of the religious doctrines and rituals at home.4 It is thus no surprise to have Latina artists lead the way in employing Catholic images and symbols in their works. The most preeminent sources that are referred to and utilized most by the Chicana artists are the Virgin of Guadalupe, home altar, and the Sacred Heart. Tomasula too recasts religious images and practices in order to articulate feminist claims, but again in a more discreet and enlaced modus operandi that requires decoding. Furthermore, while her application of religious motifs is specific, her concepts navigate expansive themes such as feminist

 3

Laura Pérez’s Chicana Art. The Politics of Spiritual and Aesthetic Altarities (Durham: Duke University Press, 2013) is the most comprehensive publication on this topic to date. See also Robert Henkes, Latin American Women Artists of the United States. The Works of 33 Twentieth-Century Women (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 1999); Charlene Villaseñor-Black, “Sacred Cults, Subversive Icons. Chicanas and the Pictorial Language of Catholicism.” In Speaking Chicana. Voice, Power, and Identity, eds. Letticia Galindo and Maria Gonzales (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1999), 135-170. 4 George Vargas, Contemporary Chican@ Art. Color and Culture for a New America (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2010), 100. Espinosa writes, “it is almost impossible to fully understand the experience of working-class Mexican American women throughout the United States without some understanding of the role that religion plays in their daily lives.” In Gastón Espinosa and Mario García, Mexican American Religions. Spirituality, Activism, and Culture (Durham: Duke University Press, 2008), 385.

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understanding of nature and the theory of the abject. This chapter will uncover the gendered deployment of Catholic imageries and germane feminist theories that expose another critical facet of the works of art. One of the prevalent themes in Tomasula’s art is suffering, which stems from the images of martyrdom with which the artist grew up. The numerous depictions of flowers and butterflies torn, pricked, nailed, and stretched have already been explained in length. The torture is also implicated in the paintings of the aforementioned hand series, most of which reveal gloves or doll hands likewise nailed or bound by strings to connote oppression. Like Recognition (Fig. 1-21), Reach of 2002 (Pl. 14) unusually displays two hands, which are broken off and tightly fastened to the wall with droplets of water flowing down on them. This can be read as another reformulation of the La Mano Poderosa with the scarred hand of Jesus, but as the artist explicitly identifies the hands as belonging to women, the painting can also be interpreted as relaying the laboring hands of women that are in bondage, with concomitant tears and sweat. Yet, the hands do not relinquish their work; they continue to effectuate beautiful creations, as this assembly of hanging glass balls, flowers, and butterflies attests. They nurture, labor, and sacrifice in order to sustain families and advance the entire world. As ennobled by the embossed floral backdrop and the oval limelight, their works are sacred, like the hands themselves. Women are thus elevated to the level of the saints. There are many Chicana artists who have transposed images of women onto those of saints in order to canonize Mexican American women through the bold identification. Many accentuate women’s tribulations through the religious association. For instance, printmaker Elena Baca superimposes the image of her grandmother onto that of Christ in Ecce Homo and on the cross, to foreground her long-suffering care and sacrifice that saved and upheld her family.5 Marianismo, which calls for mothers to be self-sacrificing for the family in emulation of the Virgin Mary, has long been a model in traditional Mexican homes.6 Christina Fernandez and

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Discussion on Elena Baca’s Portrait of My Grandmother of 1994, Atocha Dream of 1996, and other prints, see Villaseñor-Black, “Sacred Cults, Subversive Icons,” 137-144. 6 Marianismo (Marianism) was first coined and addressed by the political scientist Evelyn Stevens not as a religious phenomenon, but as a “secular edifice of beliefs and practice related to the position of women in society,” in “Marianismo: The Other Face of Machismo in Latin America.” In Female and Male in Latin America, ed. Ann Pescatello (Pittsburg: Pittsburg University Press, 1973), 91-2.

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Kathy Vargas manipulate photographic devices to conflate images of women with the Passion of Christ in order to shed light on and amplify the agonies of Chicanas.7 The legacy of Mexican American women is exhaustively marked with affliction that adds gender abuses to the longstanding record of colonial, racial, and labor persecutions that plagued their ethnic history. Countless women have endured and are currently enduring societal and domestic adversities to survive and maintain their households. This explains the abundant references to saints and martyrs in the works of Chicana artists. They deliberately quote the religious scenes to parallel and highlight the hardship of Mexican American women. While a number of Chicana artists relate the images of women to saintly figures in order to dignify their struggles, others reimagine the religious icons to speak for women’s empowerment. The figure that is most commonly refurbished in this manner is the Virgin of Guadalupe, who no longer appears passive and submissive with downcast eyes in the hands of Esther Hernandez, Yolanda López, and Alma López.8 These artists reenvision her as a martial artist, a runner, and with a body that is fully sexual. These are direct remonstrances against the Marianismo that imprisons Latinas into subservience, as they purport to redefine Latinas as active women in control of their bodies and open to all possible roles.9 These are not intended to be anti-religious but anti-cultural, using the popular image of the Mexican Virgin to contest the prescribed female identity and to encourage Latinas to pursue their dream goals and activities of their inclinations. Although Tomasula could not deviate much from the convention in her rendition, Our Lady of Guadalupe (Fig. 5-2), since it

 See also Carolyn Mendez-Luck and Katherine Anthony, “Marianismo and Caregiving Role Beliefs among U.S.-Born and Immigrant Mexican Women,” The Journals of Gerontology 71 no. 5 (September 2016): 926-35. The term, however, is controversial and is refuted by scholars such as Marysa Navarro; see her article, “Against Marianismo.” In Gender’s Place. Feminist Anthropologies of Latin America, eds. Rosario Montoya, Lessie Frazier and Janise Hurtig (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2002), 257-72. 7 See Christina Fernandez, Sin Cool series of 1993 and Kathy Vargas, Broken Column: Mother, 1997. For Vargas’ works, see Lippard, Lucy and MaLin WilsonPowell, Kathy Vargas. Photographs, 1971-2000, exh. cat. (San Antonio: The Marion Koogler McNay Art Museum, 2000). 8 On these and other artists who reformulated the Lady of Guadalupe, see Pérez, Chicana Art, 258-81. 9 Jeanette Rodriguez provides a different perspective in Our Lady of Guadalupe. Faith and Empowerment among Mexican-American Women (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994).

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was commissioned for a church presentation, she too made some editions. Her version reveals her trademark vibrant colors and emphasis on flowers, which occupy here the space where the aureole appears in the original painting. Most significantly though, she traded the downcast eyes for a full gaze that betrays thinking at the moment, but is also ready to meet the eyes of onlookers.10 This Virgin is alert to her internal life as well as her surroundings.

Figure 5-2 Tomasula, Our Lady of Guadalupe, 2009

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The painting is presently displayed in the Holy Angels Chapel of the Basilica of the Sacred Heart, Notre Dame, Indiana. Although not as conspicuously as in the works of other Latina artists, Tomasula too has infused images of contemporary women into the image of the Virgin Guadalupe: the two faces in her painting are based on the portraits of her two daughters.

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Nevertheless, the Guadalupe painting is an exception, as Tomasula communicates mostly through metaphorical means. Yet her emblematic paintings are not remote from the more overt and controversial works of the Chicana feminists, as they too emphasize women’s affliction and also transmit empowering messages. Her hand series forcefully advances her feminist position, particularly through the gesticulation of the bound hand that stands for woman’s oppression as well as her power. Tomasula is conscious of her legacy with the “history of suffering people,” particularly of women, and speaks for them as well as women around the world through her paintings of the hand series. Through the religious reference, the martyred woman is portrayed as a source of nourishment and regeneration. As always, the illustrious embellishment with the intensified colors, floral decorations, and divine limelight magnifies the subject; in this case, it amplifies the hand as the central protagonist in the fore and in control. It empowers the hand of the woman. On the other hand, all the flower imageries of Tomasula plausibly emblematize women. Flowers have traditionally been considered to symbolize women, denoting their beauty as well as their fragility. While subscribing to different notions and attributes of women, Tomasula too aligns flowers with women, made especially emphatic in two specific paintings that reveal their interconnection. The body that is delineated by the encircling flowers in Laguna (Pl. 19) can be assumed to belong to a woman due to its notably curvy hips. Among the array of luscious lilies and a sensuous orchid stands a long calla lily that exposes its inner part between the legs of the woman to heighten the sense of eroticism. The female association is more pronounced in The Structure of Coincidence (Pl. 20) with definite curvature to the entire silhouette, this time formed by the flowers inside the body. This is not a coincidence but a deliberate interface on the part of the artist to validate the woman-flower identification. In that sense, all flower images painted by Tomasula represent women, though not exclusively of course. From this inference, all tortures inflicted on the flowers, even without any reference to a female body as in The Structure of Coincidence, can be construed as women’s suffering. The woman-flower, despite its palpable torment and distress, however, is always sumptuously rendered in meticulous detail and rich colors that reinforce its vitality and strength. Such edification is demonstrable in all flower images. For instance, Recure (Pl. 9) discloses a highly damaged flower that has been recured. This flower metaphorically exemplifies womanhood, particularly Mexican womanhood and its unfortunate intimacy with violence, betokening years of agony and

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persecution. It, however, stands tall, evidencing a persevering spirit that is worthy of the martyrdom of the saints in the past. The martyr-woman-flower conjunction lends to a broader feminist concept that is predicated and expands on the forthright affinity between women and nature. Originated from the 1970s, ecofeminism sees a parallel between the oppression of women and the exploitation of nature.11 They are both victims of the patriarchy that overrules and uses them to advance itself. Ecofeminist activists advocate that women are more attuned to the plight of nature and consequently must fight to protect it. The conjugation of the symbolic allusion to women’s suffering and the actual torture inflicted on natural objects in Tomasula’s art can be viewed as an ecofeminist statement connecting the experiences of woman to those of nature. They identify with each other through suffering. Ecofeminists also assimilate earth-based spirituality to promote the sacredness of nature that embodies a life-force within, thereby dismissing the notion of a merely passive repository of raw materials and reappraising nature as an active agent with plenary regenerative powers.12 The sense of sacredness and inherent vitality are apparent in all of Tomasula’s flowers, which always seem fresh and vivacious, even when afflicted with pain. Ecofeminists’ emphasis on woman’s innate connection to nature due to her reproductive capabilities, however, is problematic, as such essentialism has been much criticized, deemed as perpetuating the myth of woman’s natural proclivity toward child bearing and nurturing.13 Most feminist theorists, in fact, are weary of this alignment that preemptively establishes a dialectic between women-nature and men-culture.14 Stacy Alaimo, however, points out that such objection is built upon the denigration of nature, assuming it to be inferior to culture. In her seminal publication, Undomesticated Ground. Recasting Nature as Feminist Space, she espouses a new theory that offers a positive outlook and a novel

 11

See Maria Mies and Vandana Shiva, Ecofeminism (London: Zed Books, 1993). The concepts were first developed by the feminist writer Susan Griffin, in her Woman and Nature. The Roaming Inside Her (Berkeley: Counterpoint, 1978). 12 Miles and Shiva, Ecofeminism, 17; see also Carol Adams, ed., Ecofeminism and the Sacred (New York: Continuum, 1993). 13 Stacy Alaimo and Susan Hekman, eds., Material Feminisms (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2008), 4, 239. 14 Susan Hekman, The Material of Knowledge. Feminist Disclosures (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2008), 70.

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spin on the woman-nature relationship.15 She reconsiders the nature vs. culture dichotomy from the standpoint of women and space, reframing it as a question of wilderness vs. domesticity. Women have been traditionally bound to the domestic sphere and have essentially been identified with it. Therefore, to be in nature is to be liberated from the servitude of domestic life. Using a number of American literary examples, Alaimo shares cases of women who left their homes, which had shackled them to endless chores and service for others, to discover their true selves in the wilderness. Alaimo explicates nature as a place of freedom for women to be who they want to be and thereby defines it as a feminist space. It is easy to apply this theory to Tomasula’s art, which also accentuates the positive and attractive side of nature with the organic materials manifested in the full glory of their effervescence. Tomasula indeed creates a feminist space through her primary focus on natural subjects. There is a sense of wild dispensation of the flora and fauna in her art, despite the obvious human intervention, in the way heterogeneous elements are all assembled and fused together. Even though they derive from traditional floral and kitchen still lifes, their unusual arrangement and juxtaposition transport them to a sphere beyond the domestic setting. In this fantastic pictorial space, they have a willful presence, taking center stage and commanding attention. Ultimately, they represent the artist’s freedom to manipulate them as she wants. She in fact switched from figurative art to still life precisely for that reason, desiring to cut, bind, and join the natural forms in the most uncanny, unaccustomed manner without inviting displeasure, which a mangled human body would automatically arouse. The demonstration of nature at play infers the artist’s freedom of expression. It is her space where her beliefs in humanity, nature, and being are divulged. It is where the woman is signified through the emblems of the natural objects and she presides; it is a feminine space. Although home altars, on the other hand, are domestic, as they are established in homes, they are critical instruments for women’s voice, spirituality, and identity, notably among the Latinas. As previously discussed, home altars were an integral part of Mexican and Mexican American households. Home altars, however, as extensively researched by Kay Turner, traditionally belonged to women, as women created them and

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Stacy Alaimo, Undomesticated Ground. Recasting Nature as Feminist Space (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2000). See also Alaimo, “Trans-Corporeal Feminisms and the Ethical Space of Nature,” Material Feminisms, 237-264.

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practiced their daily devotion before them, usually in the bedrooms.16 Home altars represent women’s spiritual autonomy, allowing women to take ownership of their faith. They enable women to reclaim Catholicism as their own, since the altar items are organized according to their will, speaking for their personal attachment and encounters of specific saints and religious incidents.17 Thus, they sanction a unique experience afforded only to women. Although seemingly secluded and harmless, they are admittedly transgressive vehicles of female devotion as they disassociate from the established official church worship that is traditionally patriarchal and demands prescribed formal rituals. Home altars exist around the world, but they are eminently prevalent among Mexicans and Mexican Americans. The practice passed from one generation of matriarch to the next, thereby demarcating this truly as a woman’s domain in space and in action. A number of prominent Chicana artists, such as Amalia MesaBains, Carmen Lomas Garza, and Patricia Rodriguez, have created altarlike installations, inspired by the home altars that they saw their grandmothers create and preserve. They engage with this custom, as it infuses meaning into their legacy as Mexican Americans and as women.18 Many contemporary artists reformulate this genre, not necessarily for devotional purposes, but often to champion feminist agendas or communicate other urgent interests. Tomasula too reenvisions the home altar tradition in the series of paintings from 2006 to 2010 (Pls. 25, 27-31, 33, Figs. 4-2, 4-8), as elaborated in the previous chapters. The feminist command of this phenomenon redefines the physical environs of its construction as belonging to woman, since she practices her faith as she wants in this space. Though its setting is domestic, it is not dictated by constraining

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Kay Turner, Beautiful Necessity. The Art and Meaning of Women’s Altars (London: Thames and Hudson, 1999). Lucy Lippard agrees, “The makers and keepers of these shrines are almost always women.” In Living Shrines: Home Altars of New Mexico, ed. Marie Cash, exh. cat. (Santa Fe: Museum of New Mexico, 1998), 46. 17 See Amalia Mesa-Bains, “Domesticana. The Sensibility of Chicana Rasquachismo.” In Chicana Feminisms: A Critical Reader, ed. Gabriela Arredondo (Durham: Duke University Press, 2003), 302-305; Gaspar de Alba, however, finds this problematic, considering this altar-female space as a male prerogative to alienate women, see Alicia Gaspar de Alba, Chicano Art Inside/Outside the Master’s House. Cultural Politics and the CARA Exhibition (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998), 146. 18 For discussion on altar-art by contemporary Latina artists, see Pérez, Chicana Art, 91-145.

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domestic burden of chores and servitude; the space is carved out and demarcated by woman for her private use and expression. It is a space of freedom. In Tomasula’s altar-based series, the very dynamic vertical, circular, and spiral energies have been interpreted as manifestations of the spirit; in this context, though, they can also be read as indices of woman’s freedom. For instance, Never Let Me Go (Pl. 29) parades a swirl of organic and non-organic objects in movement. The inclusion of natural items such as fruits, flowers, and animal parts enclosed by green shrubbery definitely brings the wilderness into the home, fortifying this mystical space as a female space of freedom. The helical green formation may have originated from breaking a laurel, thereby liberating itself from the prescribed configuration. It can jell into any shape as it moves in this space. Women are free to connect with the spirits in any way or form as they desire. They command this altar space. It is critical once more to revisit Tomasula’s childhood memories of the saint images at church that formed the foundation for her art. The paintings and sculptures of the martyrs were very lurid with endless variations of torture, such as eyes gouged out, body parts ripped, and skin flayed off. Yet Tomasula found this museum of horror totally exhilarating, describing its showpieces as “powerful,” “incredible,” “amazing,” and “gorgeous.”19 In every mass, her head would turn toward the images that endlessly fascinated her and subsequently made a deep impact on her psyche. What she encountered was “the abject,” and at a young age she intrinsically comprehended the power of the abject to disturb and attract all at the same time. Tomasula hence has long been acquainted with and was already acclimated to the abject. It was part of the milieu of the artist during her formative years and now constitutes an indispensable component of her art. Tomasula’s still life objects, even with palpable signs of impending expiration and sure hints of degradation, are usually so sprightly and visually stunning that they sway more toward life than death. The one exception is the pear, which is often shown in the process of decay, therefore at a midpoint between life and death, in a number of paintings such as Trace (Fig. 3-20).20 Despite the sensational presentation with the

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Tomasula, “Word for Word.” 20 William Miller remarks that all rotting vegetation invokes disgust not due to its impending death, but its “capacity for life,” pointing to fertility through death and its resultant cycle of life. This affirms all the fruits and flowers in transition toward

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partial suspension in the air, bright colors, and spotlight effect that makes this stage alluring, the visceral impression of the rotting pear with its liquid spill of inner spoilage is inescapable. This is an example of the abject, which according to Julia Kristeva in her groundbreaking publication, Powers of Horror. An Essay on Abjection, is a discarded article that exists in an ambiguous in-between state.21 More evidently, Tomasula visualizes a number of indisputably abject subjects—skulls, bones, organs—that fit the descriptions and theories of Kristeva, who also infuses a feminist perspective into her treatise. These paintings will now be considered in detail in light of Kristeva’s writings to reveal their feminist dimension. Kristeva characterizes human cadavers, waste, and discharge as abject, but not for sanitary reasons. As she describes in her much quoted statement, the abject is “what does not respect borders, positions, rules. The in-between, the ambiguous, the composite.”22 These bodily elements were once segments of a living entity, but now are discarded; yet, they still remind and sustain a connection to their origin. They are now placed in this ambiguous state between subject and object that dislodges the segregating line between life and death. They, therefore, endanger the identity of an integral being. Of these, the corpse is the most alarming, since it used to be an imperative constituent of a subject, but now is cast off; yet it still makes direct reference to the very person. It is the ultimate abject and “the utmost of abjection,” since it must be conscientiously and artificially severed from the world of the living in order to maintain the decorum of the categories of life and death.23 Kristeva likens abjection to the rejection of a mother by her child, who learns to forgo the original dependence on her in order to become an autonomous entity. The mother, thus, becomes the abject. However, the separation is never fully achieved, as the child struggles with the desire to break free and, simultaneously, remain clutched to the mother. The abject involves repulsion and attraction at the same time. Although refashioned in novel ways, the skulls and bones in Tomasula’s still lifes recall the memento mori tradition of the past. In

 expiration as the abject, connoting both death and life. Miller, The Anatomy of Disgust (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997), 40. 21 Julia Kristeva, Powers of Horror. An Essay on Abjection. Trans. Leon Roudiez (New York: Columbia University Press, 1982). 22 Kristeva, Powers of Horror, 4. 23 Ibid.

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Royalty of 2008 (Pl. 30), the articles of still life are not placed inertly on the table, but are suspended in air. Regardless, the discarded head arouses horror, especially in how the hollow eye sockets are directed straight out toward the viewers. The onlookers are squarely confronted with death. It is unavoidable. There is, however, no indication or even a hint of any future decay on this clean, shiny skull with no blemish and intact symmetrical teeth. It is also fabulously embellished by luscious produce, which is a pure delight to behold. Although the subject here is undeniably fulsome death, the painting evokes more of a buoyant life and sense of activity. The skull seems to smile as it is being crowned with the wreath of fresh fruits and flowers, which are further enlivened by the surrounding little particles that catch light and swirl around them like fireflies. The abject is not just wholly acknowledged in this work; it is clearly celebrated. The skull is also evocative of Día de los Muertos, as discussed before, the Mexican observance when the dead return to earth to be reunited with their families for a day. It is a festive holiday filled with activities involving interaction with the returning souls. The Day of the Dead can be categorized as a liminal phenomenon, which anthropologist Victor Turner ascribes to initiation rites in African and medieval monastic life. Described as a “no-place and no-time that resists classification,” it is where “the liminal entities are neither here nor there; they are betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention and ceremonial.”24 Both the living and the dead are liminal entities on the Day of the Dead, enjoying a day together on the threshold between life and death, where the two realms collapse into each other, creating a liminal space. The illustrated skull, likewise, is a remainder of a dead person, yet appears to be robustly alive, and therefore lodges in the liminal space that belongs neither to the dead nor to the living. It defies the categorical bound constructed by humans, and transgresses even those decreed by nature. The skull of the Day of the Dead originates from indigenous traditions of Mesoamerica. The persistent appearance of the skulls, though abject, manifests the presence of the gods and the souls of the afterlife in the earthly realm. Death is not something to fear, as it means living a second life elsewhere, hence the acceptance of the abject in the Mesoamerican culture. On the Day of the Dead it is customary in Mexico to give toy

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Victor Turner, The Ritual Process. Structure and Anti-Structure (New York: Aldine de Gruyter, 1995), 95. See also Victor and Edith Turner, Image and Pilgrimage in Christian Culture. Anthropological Perspectives (New York: Columbia University Press, 1978), 249-50.

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skeleton figurines to kids and to make sugar pastries shaped like skulls to be enjoyed by all. But why make such a hideous object so ubiquitous? Are they overdoing it to overcome fear and to compensate for the revulsion toward the abject? After all, these images are usually rendered in jest and embody humor, as when one eats the delightful sugar skulls. Regardless of the sugarcoating, though, the skeleton is abject. The abject due to its liminal status, simultaneously frightens and attracts, like the mother, who is both feared and desired by the child. The mother is rejected and resisted for fear of losing independence and identity. Such a singular wholeness, however, is a grand illusion, according to Jacques Lacan. In reality, one has a fragmented sense of being, which is disguised by the assumption of a coherent whole that was initiated at the mirror stage, when as an infant one identifies with one’s mirrored reflection of an enclosed body entity.25 Such individuality and intact closed form are but an illusion, as fleeting as the reflection in the mirror. The incomplete being thus feels compelled to revert to the origin, the mother, who completes him/her. Psychoanalytically, everyone ultimately desires to return to the mother, to the state of chora, as explained by Kristeva, as the semiotic primordial state prior to the introduction of the symbolic order with the law of the father.26 Estelle Barrett notes, “all abjection is a recognition of want for the maternal body on which being, meaning, language and desire are founded.”27 In Royalty (Pl. 30), the skull is revived to demonstrate its desire to return to its original entity, exposing its fragmented condition and its drive to be completed again. Concurrently, this in-your-face skull that is immaculately portrayed with the alluring paraphernalia insinuates the threatening but desirous mother herself. Kristeva expands on the abject as not just representing the mother but all women and the other who are discarded and suppressed in order to sustain the one, the authority, and patriarchy in power. The abject, as concretely visualized in the painting, therefore divulges woman’s voice,

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Jacques Lacan, Écrits. A Selection. Trans. Alan Sheridan (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1977), 1-7. 26 Kristeva, Power of Horrors, 14; also Julia Kristeva, Desire in a Language: A Semiotic Approach to Literature and Art. Trans. Leon Roudiez (New York: Columbia University Press, 1980), 133. 27 Estella Barrett, Kristeva Reframed. Interpreting Key Thinkers for the Arts (New York: Tauris, 2010), 98.

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space, and time.28 In this liminal state, she reveals her viability, rules over her realm, and presides over time, as this transitional state, that is supposed to be “permanently thrust aside in order to live,” is suspended here for eternity through the visual fixation.29 This is a “regression” back to the mother, who instead of being discarded, is celebrated through the hearty reception of the skull.

Figure 5-3 Tomasula, Rapture, 2006

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Women’s voice and space have been much discussed before, but not women’s time, according to Kristeva. She distinguishes women’s time from historic, linear time; see Julia Kristeva, “Women’s time,” trans. Alice Jardine and Harry Blake, Signs 7, no. 1 (Autumn 1981): 13-35. 29 Kristeva, Powers of Horror, 3.

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Death is the object of voyeurism, as it fully participates in life and action. It is invited to a party in Please Don’t Go of 2010 (Pl. 33), which is another example of altar-based painting with a dynamic spiral mobilizing the articles of an offering. The items are all vital fragments of life. The marble sculptural face of a child and the lollipops may be piecemeal brica-brac of memories of different events and experiences of the past. Kristeva writes, “the abject from which he does not cease separating is for him, in short, a land of oblivion that is constantly remembered….Then, forgotten time crops up suddenly….The time of abjection is double: a time of oblivion and thunder, of veiled infinity and the moment when revelation bursts forth.”30 The last description is appropriate here, since the polished materials appear to be suspended in this indefinable space and time for eternity, but simultaneously seem in a rush, being part of the fast circular motion of the spiral that is whisking the items from the picture plane into the depth of darkness at the center. Is the invocation, “please don’t go,” a warning cry not to regress back to the mother or a yearning call for the sphere of chora, delivered by the thunder, not to depart? The painting illustrates the abject rising from oblivion to memory through bursts of revelation. As much as the regression back to the mother, the abject, is terrifying, since it endangers the perceived self-sufficiency and the integrity of the subject, it is also desirous, since it begets fulfilment and joy. The elements that trigger the memory and bring back the pre-nominal and pre-objectal are described as the “sublime,” like the mesmerizing items of Please Don’t Go. Kristeva states: “The ‘sublime’ object dissolves in the raptures of a bottomless memory. It is such a memory, which from stopping point to stopping point, remembrance to remembrance, love to love, transfers to that object to the refulgent point of the dazzlement….A divergence, an impossible bounding. Everything missed, joy—fascination.”31 Tomasula’s paintings are replete with intriguing pieces that are dazzling in effect and are a delight to the eye, even if mysterious and repulsive in nature. In fact, she names another work of a spiral swirl of still life objects Rapture (Fig. 5-3, Pl. 25). That rapture, joy, and fascination points to “jouissance,” which Lacan explains as a state of excess and indescribable euphoria that is beyond the world. Kristeva notes that “jouissance alone causes the abject to exist as such,” and so to regress back to the mother means to relive the jouissance.32 This unnamable state of jouissance, according to Lacan, is the realm of the

 30

Ibid, 8-9. 31 Ibid, 12. 32 Ibid, 9.

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other that is not just of woman, but of God.33 All ecstatic spiritual experience is jouissance, found in the liminal space, where the initiates from Africa and medieval monks meet the sublime, the spiritual entity beyond this world that is felt, but cannot be pinned down. The “I am” is the unnamable God who is met in the state of jouissance on the threshold of the abject. In “Stabat Mater,” Kristeva uses the Virgin Mary to claim the maternal as the ambivalent space where “the most intense revelation of God” can occur.34 Following Kristeva, Pamela Anderson states, “abjection and the sacred come together” in the maternal.35 Tomasula incorporates parts of dead animals into her paintings, such as a piece of raw meat and fish in Please Don’t Go (Pl. 33). She also isolates some of these items, such as octopus legs and oysters, which are featured on fancy dining tables in many seventeenth-century Dutch still lifes.36 Three oysters are depicted in Ground of Being of 2010 (Fig. 5-4, Pl. 34), appearing scrumptious and revolting at the same time. These are no ordinary oysters to be consumed. They float in the air and form a cross shape above a shiny yellow folded skirt and below a cluster of water drops that creates a holy apparition of a brightly-lit crown. In fact, the entire painting is filled with a sense of sacredness due to the infused light and levitation of the objects. This expresses the jouissance moment of the oysters which were naked with half of their shells ripped apart, leaving them fragmented, but now feel complete again through the addition of the skirt and the ghostly crown. Elizabeth Grosz in Volatile Bodies. Toward a Corporeal Feminism explains that the more one has a fragmented sense of being, the more one is driven to attach many external items such as clothes

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Juliet Mitchell and Jacqueline Rose, eds., Feminine Sexuality. Jacques Lacan and the École Freudienne (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1982), 145-6. 34 Julia Kristeva, “Stabat Mater,” Poetics Today 6, no. 1/2 (1985): 134. See also Philippa Berry, “Woman and Space according to Kristeva and Irigaray.” In Shadow of Spirit. Postmodernism and Religion, ed. Philippa Berry and Andrew Wenick (New York: Routledge, 1992), 250-264. 35 Pamela Anderson, “‘Abjection…the Most Propitious Place for Communication.’ Celebrating the Death of the Unitary Subject.” In Bodies, Lives, Voices. Gender in Theology, ed. Kathleen O’Grady, Ann Gilroy and Janette Gray (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1988), 225. In this article, Anderson equates women in religion with the abject, 209-230. Virginia Burrrus relates all saints to the concept of abject, see Burrus, Saving Shame. Martyrs, Saints and Other Abject Subjects (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2008). 36 For the octopus leg, see It Happened One Night (Fig. 1-25). Like Ground of Being, this painting too sports a vibrant skirt and a shiny crown, encased in an oval light.

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and jewelry to one’s body in order to feel whole again.37 The result of the additions to the oysters that induces this ecstatic moment of completion is an evocation of a human body with the two horizontal oysters forming the shoulders and arms, while the bright crown serves as the head and hair. More specifically, this is a woman with a skirt. This reveals the desire to return to the mother. Though still fresh, these are dead oysters, but ones that are currently undergoing transformation through some spiritual ecstasy that brings them back to life. They are able to transmute because they are abject and live in liminality, where no limits and boundaries exist.

Figure 5-4 Tomasula, Ground of Being, 2010

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Elizabeth Grosz, Volatile Bodies. Toward a Corporeal Feminism (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1994), 73, 80.

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Figure 5-5 Tomasula, Second Nature, 2011

Tomasula depicts a number of organs, many of which, like the oysters, are arranged to look humanoid and evoke a woman, conveying the abject position. In a sumptuously beautiful painting titled Second Nature of 2011 (Fig. 5-5, Pl. 35), a modified, bubbly brain is pinched by needles and hooks with glass beads at the ends, that mimic human limbs. Some bone fragments are added at the top to simulate a head with the hollow circles denoting the eyes. It is placed on rows of flowery cloth folded to resemble a tutu, marking this metaphorical figure as a woman. The dead brain, removed from the body, is revitalized in this liminal domain through spiritual ecstasy. Engulfed in the mystical air of greenish blue monochrome, it dances joyfully in its fluffy tutu, while a circle of beads fashions a halo above its head. The incomplete abject finds fulfilment and satisfaction by returning to the mother.38

 38

Tomasula also paints body parts of dolls that form part of a new figural or organic shape. According to Barrett, dolls too are abject, since they mimic human form, but are essentially inert, dead objects, see Barrett, Kristeva Reframed, 89.

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Figure 5-6 Tomasula, Chorus, 2012

Of all the organs, Tomasula most frequently depicts the heart. The series of the heart is based on the Catholic Sacred Heart, with antecedent in the sacrifice of the heart in the indigenous tradition. As seen in the examples of All I Know (Pl. 6), The Doctrine of Affections (Pl. 12), Meridian (Pl. 23) and What I Know (Fig. 2-12), the heart is illustrated most often in graphic detail and, unlike the other organs, is not accessorized to resemble a human body. The heart is grotesquely repulsive, but like all the other works, it is contradictorily encased in sumptuousness with decorative accessories and the artist’s typical delightful use of paint, color, and light that ultimately render the muscular pump enthralling to gaze upon. The presentation, in fact, transforms the

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heart into an object of voyeurism. Chorus of 2012 (Fig. 5-6) is another such instance of a detailed heart with pronounced veins and muscles, enclosed by a shiny silk purplish collar and symmetrically aligned bones. The dispersed illumination, analogous colors, and the floral resemblance make this spectacle intriguing. They, however, do not diminish the revulsion caused by the realism of the organ. This confirms the abject nature of the visceral throbbing heart, which however can serve as a conduit through which jouissance can be obtained. The cult of the Sacred Heart, as explicated earlier, was founded on numerous visions of different nuns since the eleventh century. As Olivier Debroise states that “the devotion to the Sacred Heart falls effectively into a marginal category in which it is quite difficult to distinguish the holy from the perverse,” on the corporal level, the visionary experience was rather grotesque and ghastly.39 The nuns’ accounts, which are documented, all provide detailed physical descriptions of Christ’s pulsating, bloody, raw heart as they witnessed it. Initially the devotion was highly criticized, deemed as “fantastical, womanish, and ridiculous,” and accused of attempting to make the “material flesh” into an object of worship.40 This female phenomenon became even more controversial due to the incomprehensibly repulsive behavior of Saint Marguerite-Marie Alacoque of France, the founder of the cult of the Sacred Heart. After undergoing several revelations of the Heart, she acquired a healing power, but also a compulsion to eat all the bodily discharges including pus, vomit, and diarrhea of the sick she attended.41 She did more than behold the abject; she embraced it, striving to embody the abject to continually relive the momentary spiritual raptures. The vision was jouissance where she met Christ, whom she identified with the abject, as the point of their crucial contact was his sacrificial heart. Consequently, she sought the abject by becoming abject herself. Though the cult of the Sacred Heart was eventually accepted by the patriarchal authorities and observed by both genders, it assuredly originated from women, designating it as a woman’s engagement with God. The visionary experience of the Sacred Heart clearly constitutes the sacred feminine, since the protagonists are all

 39

Olivier Debroise, “Heart Attacks: On a Culture of Missed Encounters and Missed Understanding.” In El Corazón Sangrante. The Bleeding Heart, ed. Olivier Debroise, Elisabeth Sussman and Matthew Teitelbaum, exh. cat. (Boston: The Institute of Contemporary Art, 1991). 17. 40 David Morgan, The Sacred Heart of Jesus. The Visual Evolution of a Devotion (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2008), 17, 19. 41 Debroise, Sussman and Teitelbaum, El Corazón Sangrante, 15.

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women and it saliently involves the abject.42 This vision of the abject, as it occurred only to nuns and categorically bypassed the monks, verily exemplifies woman’s space and time. In Tomasula’s art, the jouissance aspect of this feminine phenomenon is bolstered by the decorative accessories, luminous light, and the alluring colors that redress the grotesque Sacred Heart into an object of delight, as evidenced in The Doctrine of Affects (Pl. 12) and Meridian (Pl. 23). The Heart is not rendered the same, varying in hues and values, and some more alluring than others. While on the one end are descriptive delineations as in All I Know (Pl. 6), Chorus (Fig. 5-6) and What I Know (Fig. 2-12), leaning more toward reaffirming the abject by concentrating on the reality of the vital organ, on the opposite end is Music of Chance II of 2005 (Pl. 24), which is dispensed with the graphic details.43 The latter reveals a heart that is drastically modified to resemble the ubiquitous stylized red heart shape. Also, due to its diminished size in this picture, the attention is drawn more to the enclosing three layers of variegated pink cloth and the white pearls dispersed across the surface. Unlike the other hearts which are fully exposed and project forward against a wall or cloth or curtain, this miniature heart is comfortably tucked into a trio of draped bowls, as if it belonged there in the first place. The compatibility of the fusion is accentuated through the harmonious repetition of the circular silhouettes of all the forms. The petal-like enclosures, which allow a home for the heart, also interchangeably need it, which serves almost like an ovary of this creation of floral resemblance. Continuing the flower illustration, the pearls can be read as either pollens or seeds about to enter or have departed from the reproductive center of the plant, marking the heart as an indispensable component of the cycle of life. This vision is in line with sea creature partitions (Figs. 1-25, 5-4), which are gloriously illustrated in consummation through the addition of the female accoutrement. Also like the brain of Second Nature (Fig. 5-5), this excised heart too seems to return to the mother, shown in complete satisfaction as expressed by the vibrant colors of the flowing folds and the celebratory rise of the pearls.

 42

On the subject of the sacred feminine, see Catherine Clément and Julia Kristeva, Le Féminin et le Sacré (Paris: Stock, 1998); Griselda Pollock and Victoria Sauron, The Sacred and the Feminine: Imagination and Sexual Difference (London: Tauris, 2007). 43 A counterpart to this work is Looking for a Common Language (Fig. 4-5), which too contains a small heart in the center, but the interior of the heart is partially opened to dispense drops of blood around it. Hence the implication is not as pleasing.

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This is the visual representation of jouissance at hand, ignited by the acknowledgment of the mother and female space through the repositioning and reparation of the abject in the heart of the painting. In the context of the Sacred Heart, it also signals the heart’s return to an enclosure; this is desirous on the part of the nuns, who wanted to continually relive the rapturous moment of encountering Jesus with his heart. Whether one’s mother or the Lord, the object of desire is fully experienced in this divine female space through the abject.

Figure 5-7 Tomasula, What the Water Gave (for Frida), 2017

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When Tomasula was asked to submit a work that addresses any famous artist for a group exhibition in 2017, she chose Frida Kahlo (Fig. 5-7).44 The very title, What the Water Gave (for Frida), is a modified quotation of the Mexican artist’s What the Water Gave Me of 1938. The flowers at the top recall the floral ornamentation that Kahlo frequently donned on her head in real life as well as in her self-portraits. While the necklaces are Tomasula’s take on decoration, they point to Kahlo’s propensity to ostentatiously accessorize herself, again in life as well in her paintings. Her face is replaced by the Sacred Heart, which points to Kahlo’s own prominent use of the heart, but more potently, signifies her own broken heart due to physical and mental hardships in her life. Once again, there is a discrepancy between the disturbingly real heart and the beautiful adornments. Yet the graphite pencil, through consistent value gradations and textural effects, unifies all the parts of this drawing. Therefore, the heart, even in its repulsion, seems to be an integral part of the embellishments surrounding it, producing a coherent pictorial sensation. The heart belongs to Kahlo, rendering this display as her space of beauty and suffering. As Tomasula symbolically encapsulates the different components of Kahlo’s external and internal life, she ultimately renders a euphoric vision of a woman’s realm that is governed by imagination, expression, and emotion. The abject, though frightful, is undeniable and unavoidable. Consequently, according to Kristeva, it has been cleansed and refined to make it more accessible, particularly in the church.45 Despite the lurid aspects of the martyrdom, the saints are usually rendered handsome or beautiful, and exhibit a mild and graceful reactionary disposition toward their predicament, all to attenuate the effect of the abject. These cleansed abject works are actually necessary, as they induce a release of repressed fears and desires. Kristeva asserts that such “catharses” are art “par excellence.”46 Tomasula, as elucidated, was transfixed by the horrifying images of saints that she observed as a child. Because the abject was delivered by means of art—more specifically, spectacular art—, it was able to heartily draw out desire. She transcribes her response: “Those decorated surfaces seemed to say, among other things, enjoy the world, indulge yourself in the beauties and pleasures available to you. That fantastic degree of sumptuousness radiated generosity, it evoked wonder,

 44

For “Artists by Artists: The Artist as Subject,” Forum Gallery, New York. 45 She writes, “The various means of purifying the abject—the various catharses— make up the history of religions.” Kristeva, Powers of Horror, 17. 46 Ibid.

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and encouraged a joyous, awe-inflected attitude towards existence.”47 Such indulgence, years later, is molded into the foundational core of her paintings through the careful application of the simmering paints, saturated colors, glorious light, and other technical means to emblaze her subjects. Resultantly, even the abject items of rotting fruits, strained flowers, skulls, and organs appear resplendent with joy and euphoria, arousing pleasurable sensations in the viewers. They are absolutely captivating to view and study. Her abject images are inarguably enticing and uncannily repulsive at the same time. As they affirm the frightful yet equally desirable existence of the abject, they acknowledge the mother. There is an exuberant enjoyment of the abject and the return to the mother is celebrated. These paintings, therefore, epitomize the abject. A number of exhibitions have been devoted to “abject art” in recent years.48 To force viewers to confront the abject, many artists have brought grungy and unsightly sculptural images of cropped body parts and human waste for display in pristine gallery space. These pieces are objectionable due to their transgression of boundaries. They highlight the revulsive nature of the abject, but they do not elicit its other side, the simultaneously desirable. Tomasula’s art, on the other hand, does not overlook and, in fact, emphasizes the attractive aspect of the abject, which points to the mother and woman. Whereas the gendered elements are often overt in Latina art, they are more discreet in the works of Tomasula. Largely due to the use of still life rather than figuration, the woman’s voice seems less pronounced. Yet it is undoubtedly there. Her works symbolically, physically, psychologically, and theoretically represent woman’s endurance, power, freedom, spirituality, time, and space. These are illustrated through the association of women with the images and concepts of La Mano Poderosa, nature, the home altar, the Sacred Heart, and other abject elements. Using Catholic motifs and themes that are integral parts of the history and identity of the

 47

Maria Tomasula, “More than a Feeling: Painting with a Distributed Sense of Agency,” a paper delivered on November 14, 2017, at the Institute for Latino Studies, University of Notre Dame, n.p. See Appendix. 48 Rina Arya, Abjection and Representation. An Exploration of Abjection in the Visual Arts, Film and Literature (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014); Jack Ben-Levi, Craig Houser, Leslie Jones and Simon Taylor, Abject Art. Repulsion and Desire in American Art, exh.. cat. (New York: Whitney Museum of Art, 1993); Konstanze Kutzbach and Monika Müller, The Abject of Desire. The Aestheticization of the Unaesthetic in Contemporary Literature and Culture (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2007).

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Mexican American woman, such as suffering and private devotion, Tomasula expresses her voice and delineates a space for women. In addition, her manner of presentation aids her conceptual intent, as the grossly torn flowers and the most abject organs are transformed into objects of delight. The enchantment induces a sense of festivity; it celebrates woman and her domain.



CHAPTER SIX NEW MATERIALISM

In the last seven years, Tomasula’s paintings have tended toward denser, integrated compositions with even more detailed components. While her motifs and themes as well as the fastidious mannerism that produces dazzling effects have remained consistent over the decades, some modifications have been made lately to accommodate newly infused philosophical leanings. New Materialism is the recent conceptual adoption, but the intellectual shift was gradual and emerged naturally from her previous thoughts and beliefs.

Figure 6-1 Tomasula, The Complete Yes, 2015



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The changes are discernable when one compares later works with the early works of the same topic or theme. The Complete Yes of 2015 (Fig. 61, Pl. 38) parades another rotten pear, but compared to the earlier Trace of 1997 (Fig. 3-20), it is far more decorative, down to the pear’s breach with its liquid spillage that forms a floral design consisting of bubbly textural petals. The pear’s interior unveils a mysterious space with a light source above that reflects on rows of glassy bubbles that mimic pearl necklaces, and exposes diaphanous filaments, thus transforming the abject into a captivating microcosm of wonder. Though the colors are vivid in both, the earlier work contains a glaring pink backdrop that jarringly supplements the hue of the pear’s shiny skin, whereas the later work unifies the entire pictorial space by matching the orange, white and blue of the pear and the cushion to the diluted stains on the background. The wall in the latter is a showpiece in itself with water marks, cracks, slits—each of which ends with a fly,—and water drops at regular intervals that create a pattern that echoes the bubble necklaces inside the pear. The refined flies with fluorescent green bodies and delicate wings parallel the shiny jewel beads at the end of the pins that pierce through the pear. Everything in this painting looks delectable, even down to the black fungus spots that appear to be decorative additions along with the water droplets on the surface of the fruit. The format of a cushioned pear encircled by flies recalls another earlier work, Corona of 2002 (Fig. 3-21), which, however, flaunts a rotting, bubbly-textured pear with a circle of thick, coarse flies. The red, brown and black hues of the objects in the front stand out against the garishly contrasting whitish beige wall. The backdrop of The Complete Yes, on the other hand, is not a mere prop for the main subject, as it partakes and continues the drama in the front, integrating the entire painting into a more cohesive vision. A more complicated background also appears in Refrain of 2017 (Pl. 41), which manifests a variegated brownish wall with cracks, blotches, and stains that seems to have peeled off to reveal a yellowish underpainting in the middle. This certainly departs from the more monochromatic backdrop of the earlier hand series, such as Web of 2002 (Pl. 15). More noticeably, the emblematic glove and doll’s hand of the past have been replaced by a real broken hand, or a very realistic mannequin hand, with minute details of veins, wrinkles, and bones sticking out. The perfect pedicure identifies this as the hand of a woman, but now her long years of labor are made evident through the sagging skin that exposes the interior of the hand. The heightened realism also extends to the flowers, which still look inviting and glorious but lack the usual firmness and vibrant luster of the petals, and even hint at the withering process with some of the stems slightly



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drooping. The additional nuanced surface detail is also apparent in the graphite drawing, Kingdom of 2018 (Fig. 6-2), where the skull still displays perfectly aligned teeth, as in Royalty of 2008 (Pl. 30), but now imparts a textured, uneven exterior with blemishes, replacing the glossy, smooth surface of the previous rendition. It amplifies the realism of the abject, making the disparity between its undesirability and the alluring embellishments more visually poignant.

Figure 6-2 Tomasula, Kingdom, 2018



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Figure 6-3 Tomasula, We Eat the Sun, 2018

The faceless dolls too have been transformed. Although they still occasionally emerge with blank features, most of the new works sport specific faces. Such characteristic delineations are apparent in the recent graphite drawings such as We Eat the Sun of 2018 (Fig. 6-3), which reveals a doll with a vivid expression, smiling not only with her mouth, but also with her eyes and cheeks. If not for its miniscule scale and abrupt cutoff with straw-like ragged ends, it could be perceived as an actual animated individual with emotion and personality. In Everpresence of 2014 (Pl. 37), a number of individualized heads are prescribed with identifiable gender, sundry hairdos, skin colors, and facial peculiarities, such as differing eye sizes and shapes that characterize divergent ethnic



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distinctiveness. The variety of skin complexions from taut and puffy to wrinkly also suggest the approximate age of each face. Everpresence’s entire composite of the dispersed heads, along with the nailed or dangling broken arms and legs, harkens back to the dense exposition of milagros, the tiny metal offerings for supplication or gratitude to a saint that are usually affixed to a wall or an image of a saint at church.1 The detached legs shown in profile particularly are prominent milagros, typically shaped in generic and simple manner. The dolls’ legs, arms, and few hands here, however, are rendered distinct like the faces, varying in size, skin color, and detail. Despite such differences, the fragments ultimately constitute a single integral, as they are tightly conjoined at the bottom and symmetrically positioned above the ballooning skirt that harmonizes them as belonging to a single floating constructed being. This illustrates the Deleuzian rhizomatic process of haphazard clumping and molding of animate and inanimate units that preserves their heterogeneity while transforming them into a new species. Previously the idea of such assemblage was demonstrated by plants, animals and objects. The eerily lifelike dolls demonstrate that this theory applies to humans as well. As will be expanded upon later, this conglomeration also pictorializes the New Materialist theory of entanglement that defies any defined borders and thus denies any separation between entities, human or nonhuman. The work that epitomizes the stylistic trend of this period is All the Breath We Can Hold of 2018 (Pl. 48). All the dramatization and intensification have been raised a notch. In pure Baroque fashion, the entire panel is compact with close-ups of common and exotic flowers and plants, wild fungi, blue feathers and a bat tugged behind the big pink rose in the fore. While the artist typically highlights the main subjects with an intense spotlight, allowing only subtle shadows within them and reserving caliginous shadows for the edges, this latest painting exhibits some darker halftones on the front surface of the objects, as on the lower half of the huge mushroom in the center and the richly red tulip above it. This results in constant alternation between low and high value, a prevalent Baroque device, which along with tenebrism transforms this creative ikebana into a monstrous and robust assemblage of living forms that is about to burst out of the picture plane. The hooks connected to the horizontal metal pole by brown strings at the top rationalize the hanging of the aggregate, which is

 1

See Tomasula’s inclusion of milagros in the earlier Rezo of 1996 (Fig. 2-17) and more recent When I Was You (Pl. 39), When I Knew You (Pl. 43) and Echo (Pl. 46).



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sustained by fine blue strings that hold all the items together. These apparatus, however, are barely visible, fostering the illusion of the entire bundle’s levitation, adding to the dramatization of the staging. The organic forms are ever more forceful in energy and assertive in presence, pointing to their agential materiality. The items are so intricately entangled that they are almost resistant to demarcation. The blue feathers, for instance, appear to have grown out of the flowers, while a wing of a bat stretches out to the right of the central pink rose. The theatricality also creates a sense of perpetual dynamism that insinuates a process of evolution, a visual becoming in advancement. These terms—agency, entanglement, becoming—constitute the central tenets of the twenty-first century philosophy known as New Materialism. Coined in the late 1990s, New Materialism is an emerging philosophy that is cross-disciplinary, formulated and applied by scholars from a wide range of fields encompassing the humanities, social studies, and the sciences.2 It features a posthumanist ontology that dismantles the anthropocentric view of the world and deviates from the previous era’s poststructuralist preoccupation with the linguistic and the discursive. Much of its theories, including a nonbinary, anti-Cartesian account of the world, are grounded in the ideas already expounded by Spinoza and particularly Deleuze, whose prominent neologisms of assemblage, emergence, and becoming have been readily adopted. It acknowledges all the forerunners of its stance, but emphasizes the “material turn” that is driven by the primacy of the material, regardless of the diverse theoretical, philosophical, and political bent projected by its advocates. All forms of existence, whether human or nonhuman, organic or nonorganic, animate or inanimate, are vital agents, intersecting and interpolating one another in tangible ways. While Stacy Alaimo and the ecofeminists espouse the exclusive bonding relationship between women and nature, Donna Haraway believes in the intrinsic connection between all humans and nature, pointing out that the human body is only 10% human and 90% microbes of bacteria and fungi, thereby coining the term, “natureculture.”3

 2

See Diana Coole and Samanth Frost, eds., New Materialisms. Ontology, Agency and Politics (Durham: Duke University Press), 2010; Rick Dolphijn and Iris van der Tuin, New Materialism: Interviews & Cartographies (Ann Arbor: Open Humanities, 2012); Sarah Ellenzweig and John Zammito, eds., The New Politics of Materialism. History, Philosophy, Science (New York: Routledge, 2017). 3 Stacy Alaimo, Undomesticated Ground. Recasting Nature as Feminist Space (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2000); Donna Haraway, The Companion Species Manifesto: Dogs, People, and Significant Otherness (Chicago: Prickly Paradigm,



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Haraway, in the seminal article, “A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century,” initially engages the cyborg, symbolic of a genderless being, with a feminist agenda, but eventually applies it to New Materialism, forging a broader definition of natureculture that even includes machines.4 The human-nature connection in the works of Tomasula has already been discussed at length. The foregrounding of nature in her paintings, even as it embodies layers of meaning, promotes its agency, amplifying its worth as more than or at least the same as that of human. The act of decentering the human as the principal character of life and the world is in full agreement with the New Materialist stance. Posthumanism and antiAnthropocene philosophy do not deny the importance of humanity; they merely question its exclusionary, singular position of superiority that validates its dominance and lordship over the world.5 New Materialists, along with ecofeminists and environmentalists, want to promote the forces of nature as agents that are equal in status to humans. One of the ways to attend to and comprehend nature is to humanize it, imagining it as having the same characteristics as humans, in order to acknowledge and respect it as a living entity in its own right. This is one of the strategies employed by Jane Bennett in Vibrant Matter, which explains anthropomorphism of nature as a means to discovering similarities between nature and culture as well as to develop sensibilities toward nonhuman beings.6 This ironically works against anthropocentrism, as human exceptionalism is denigrated as the cause of all “actant” material existences. In another publication, Bennett discusses Charles Darwin’s study, The Movements and Habits of Climbing Plants, which examines the changes that occur in the climbing plants due to their environments, particularly their human-like behaviors

 2003). On New Materialist Feminism, see Stacy Alaimo and Susan Hekman, eds., Material Feminisms (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2008); Donna Landry and Gerald MacLean, Materialist Feminisms (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell Publishing, 1993); Victoria Pitts-Taylor, Mattering. Feminism, Science, and Materialism (New York: New York University Press, 2016). 4 Donna Harraway, Simians, Cyborgs, and Women. The Reinvention of Nature (New York: Routledge, 1991), 149-181. 5 For variant theories on the subject, see Richard Grusin, ed., The Nonhuman Turn (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2015); Rosi Braidotti, The Posthuman (Malden, MA: Polity Press, 2013). 6 Jane Bennett, Vibrant Matter. A Political Ecology of Things (Durham: Duke University Press, 2010), 99.



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arising from their responses to touch, light, and gravity.7 Bennett also directs attention to the plant illustrations in the book by his son, Francis Darwin, a botanist, that evidence the humanoid or animal characteristics of the moving plants. Some drawings (Fig. 6-4) demonstrate plants picking up and integrating pieces of wood and other objects along their path into their overall dynamic formation.8

Figure 6-4 Darwin, Solanum Jasminoides Clasping a Stick, 1875

Figure 6-5 Darwin, Cardiospermum Halicacabum, 1875

Figure 6-6 Darwin, Bignonia, 1875

 7

Jane Bennett, “Vegetal Life and Onto-Sympathy.” In Entangled Worlds. Religion, Science, and New Materialisms, ed. Catherine Keller and Mary-Jane Rubenstein (New York: Fordham University Press, 2017), 89-110. Charles Darwin has been reconsidered by the New Materialist Feminists, who see value in his theory of evolution, see Elizabeth Grosz, “Darwin and Feminism: Preliminary Investigations for a Possible Alliance.” In Material Feminisms, ed. Alaimo and Hekman, 23-51. 8 See his own writing, Francis Darwin, “Climbing Plants,” Popular Science Monthly 17 (September 1880): 635-50.



New Materialism

Figure 6-7 Tomasula, Bind the Branches, 1995

Figure 6-8 Tomasula, Possession, 2006



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Francis Darwin’s drawings could certainly be read as precursors to Tomasula’s paintings, which are also based on close observation of life, though presented in a highly contrived manner.9 The illustrations of petioles and tendrils of the plants tying knots to merge disparate elements are analogous to the strings binding and fastening variant botanic segments together in many of her paintings. The spiral shaped branches of Sapindaceae (Fig. 6-5)10 are evoked in Tomasula’s early Bind the Branches of 1995 (Fig. 6-7), which is a completely artificial concoction with individual cut-branches specifically placed to replicate the appearance of the organic configuration. The symmetrical lateral alignment of the spiral branches is more closely echoed in the bone formations of As No Gives Way to Yes (Pl. 13) and in the green metal pole of Possession of 2006 (Fig. 6-8). The latter resembles the structure of the plant in the decorative stand with multiple shoots of mirroring pairs of spiral forms holding the head of a rose atop. The metal stand ends in the detailed three-toed claw of a bird, which can be traced to another drawing by Darwin that illustrates a claw-like tendril end of a plant named Bignonia (Fig. 6-6).11 These paintings definitely make reference to nature, namely animals and plants, but also to culture, represented by the inclusion of artificial objects and traces of human intervention in the construction of the formation. Possession divulges the creative human hand, which discreetly stabilizes and provides support to the flower head behind the curtain. All are conjoined and connected. While the principal subject of her art is nature, human involvement is ever present, inferred by the conspicuous manipulation of the objects in the paintings. Both Possession and As No Gives Way to Yes reveal the hand that is responsible for the floral structure, but even without the inclusion of a hand, the patently fabricated arrangements and precise placements of her compositions disclose a decisive cultural intervention in the presentation of nature. The human presence is most plainly communicated through the insertion of a glove or doll’s hand in numerous paintings, but also is invoked through the distinctly shaped objects that recall human bodies, such as the piece of meat in Halo (Fig. 2-8). Lately, the artist has been composing the image of a figure through the entire accretion of juxtaposed and joined divergent objects. An earlier example is the organ series, such as Ground of Being (Pl.

 9

See Charles Darwin, The Movements and Habits of Climbing Plants, rev. 2nd ed. (New York: Appleton & Company, 1901), 47, 73, 139. 10 Ibid, 150. 11 Ibid, 86.



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34), where cloth and accessories are appended to simulate a bodily formation. Recent works display a greater accumulation of objects to build the shape, such as We Eat the Sun (Fig. 6-3), where the symmetrical arrangement of salient, vibrant plants essentially constitute the lower half of the doll’s body. The variegated nonorganic components in Everpresence (Pl. 37) are also combined to delineate an overall human frame. This diverges from the earlier examples such as The Structure of Coincidence (Pl. 20), where the human body is entirely built by amassing flowers. More often now, organic and nonorganic items are intermixed to create a humanoid pyramidal construction, such as When I Knew You of 2017 (Pl. 43), which reveals a doll’s head based on Alba’s face hanging by strings pinned at the top, and metallic hands that likewise are affixed on the left and right side against the wall to meet the ends of two long plants emerging from the center to simulate arms reaching outward. The triangular bluish-green cloth is the unifying factor, consolidating all of the fruits and plants to construct a solid bulk. The same composition is apparent in Echo of 2016-18 (Pl. 46), which retains the metallic milagro hands; however the head here is formed by a turquoise oval stone and the body by the piece of meat that is overlapped by plants, flowers, a pear, different rocks including crystallized stones, wood, mushroom, seeds, a bird and insects. Another case of interfusing dissimilar organic and decorative pieces explicitly to create a human shape is the drawing titled Who Do I Remember When I Remember You? of 2016 (Fig. 6-9). Here a piece of salmon, an opened fig, an egg, enoki mushrooms, a leaf, a wrapped candy, twisted and knotted cloths, and various types of beads are coupled and nailed to the wall to erect a more fully articulated humanoid armature with distinct body parts, including arms and legs. It sports a spiritual nimbus as noted by the encirclement of the shiny beads around the head, but also embodies the very physical, as the fig connotes the reproductive organ. Despite its appearance, it is a fully functioning, sacred body. These examples of anthropomorphism elevate the nonhuman elements to the level of humans. At the end, all material entities are considered equal in significance, as the same weight is granted to all segments of the images through the careful attention conferred on all the minute details. These delineations also demonstrate the interconnectivity of all matter, whether human or nonhuman, natural or artificial. It is worth repeating the artist’s statement, “we need to see nature as having agency, as part of us,



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and we of it.”12 These paintings are all projections of natureculture with all the integral parts exuding vibrant energy and strength, regardless of their material origins.

Figure 6-9 Tomasula, Who Do I Remember When I Remember You? 2016

 12

Maria Tomasula, “More than a Feeling: Painting with a Distributed Sense of Agency,” paper delivered on November 14, 2017, at the Institute for Latino Studies, University of Notre Dame, n.p. See Appendix.



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The inherent inseparability of all forms of matter is most formidably advanced by Karen Barad, who like Haraway draws from scientific sources to build her thesis in her groundbreaking publication, Meeting the Universe Halfway. Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning.13 Trained as a quantum physicist, Barad provides an instructive and logical analysis based on scientific evidences that diverges from the elusive, discursive treatises formulated by some of her contemporary associates. She describes the phenomenon of diffraction, where sound, light, and water change from the projected course as a result of encountering obstructions and slits, such as waves spreading, bending, and overlapping around a rock. Then she explains that essentially all particles interact (or interfere) with such wave activity, resulting in indeterminacy in the material status and fluctuation of boundaries among the different participants. The superposition of diffraction stands in opposition to the representation of reflection, which is a fixed mirror image of bound subjects. Its constant reconfiguration of the boundaries disrupts the limits of the individual properties of different materials, thereby confirming the fundamental inseparability of all entities. Calling it “agential realism,” Barad sees this diffraction phenomenon as a preexisting active process, thereby undergoing “intra-action,” where fragments merge to form a unit, instead of “interaction,” which implies already intact substances coming together.14 The intra-activity is actually a ceaseless dynamic operation, producing an ever-entanglement of animate and inanimate entities that interchange and interconnect. All materials are entangled agencies. Tomasula was already acquainted with the notion of porous borders through Catholic teachings that stressed the embodiment of the spirit within the human form. Moreover, she has always been receptive to the notions related to connection and inseparability of entities, coming from her traditional Mexican American background that stands diametrically opposite to the concepts of individuality and autonomous living. Even before her exposure to New Materialism, she was aware of the mutual association and influence between the organic and the nonorganic, as described in these two examples of her observations at church: There was this carved stone statue of a saint on a pedestal that people prayed to and everyone rubbed its foot that extended out from under its robe….It was incredible to me as a kid, that touching by soft fingers could

 13

Karen Barad, Meeting the Universe Halfway. Quantum Physics and the Entanglement of Matter and Meaning (Durham: Duke University Press), 2007. 14 Ibid, 132-185.



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Long before, Tomasula absorbed the lessons about entangled agencies that encompassed humans and nonhumans, animate and inanimate, which are visually reflected in her paintings of enmeshed, intra-active objects. As in the case of her engagement with Spinoza and Deleuze, her intuitive understanding of the world became amplified by her perusal of New Materialism texts, which were supported by logical explanations that were augmented by scientific, feminist, environmental as well as political and empirical sources. Furthermore, this recent philosophy provides Tomasula with the language to articulate her intrinsic leanings and refine her beliefs. Her recent verbal communication attests to her adoption of the New Materialist lingo. She writes about her art: “I paint a lot of items categorized as from ‘nature’ but that are interfered with by being cut, grafted, bound with other things, and so on, to emphasize a sense of boundarylessness between nature and culture.”16 The primary aim of her images is “to promote an ethics and a politics of re-conceptualizing ourselves as contiguous with the world.”17 She analyzes herself: “My sense of myself is of a body made through an entanglement with biological, historical, familial, economic and other forces.”18 Her paintings dating back to the 1990s all demonstrate the phenomena of natureculture, diffraction, intra-action, and entanglement, but these ideas become more pronounced and gradually more explicit over the years. Cat’s Cradle of 2013 (Fig. 1-26), which reveals a very vibrant backdrop vying for attention, typical of her works of this time, is in line with other earlier paintings of assorted flowers grafted together. Here the

 15

Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.” Appendix. 16 Ibid. 17 Ibid. 18 Ibid.



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two recurring flowers, iris and lily, as in other floral presentations, are cut, positioned, and conjoined by pins and strings that are barely visible in this version. It mimics the earlier works of fusion of different plants, but the flowers now seem to rise out together from the same bulb and roots. The artist frequently mixed dissimilar flowers, but rarely experimented with fusing divergent materials in the past. All in All of 2001 (Fig. 1-23) and Signs of Intruders of 2004 (Pl. 22) were the earliest examples and precursors to the trend of painting a decade later where selective portions of animals, fruits, and flowers are severed and coalesced to construct a new entity.

Figure 6-10 Tomasula, When I Was You, 2014

The motif of a half-cut cantaloupe in When I Was You of 2014 (Fig. 610, Pl. 39) can be traced to Signs of Intruders (Pl. 22) as well as all the way back to Divina of 1995 (Fig. 1-17), which seems simple with just long pins piercing through the fruit, as compared to the later examples. Echoing Signs of Intruders, When I Was You has a cantaloupe forming the central core of a hybrid structure that locates likewise blue birds—two this time— at the top and dispenses strings and stalks on the sides replacing the green



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wings of a butterfly, while the black line below the fruit is exactly in the location of the red snake in the earlier work. The previous translucent white head feathers are transformed into a rugged crown of thorns, and the descending white luminous dust is replaced by studded black nails on the wall as well as tiny milagros of metallic hands and legs dispersed across the surface. The martyr theme is clearly prevalent still, referenced further by the striking blood-red stain marks on the wall and the withering flowers, both characteristic of this period. This painting is ostensibly busier and more complicated than the earlier work, marked by a patent allover effect and massing of intertwined contraptions. While Signs of Intruders appears to be a modern take on a mythological composite creature, the recent painting showcases an undefinable, aggregate formation that evades any category of existence. Entanglement, referred to also as a mangle, is not meant to be a neat brick-block construction, but an unpredictable, indefinite, creative process, made manifest here through all the twisting, turning, stretching and hanging of the objects that, nevertheless, comprise a synergetic singular unit at hand.19 This dispersed creation with parts extending out and around the core is still an integrated new assemblage, with individual segments each assuming a substantial role in the overall layout, so that the removal of one would disrupt the entire symmetrical order and generate a sense of incompletion. There is therefore a logic and stability embedded in this madness. Tomasula has produced a sensation of fusion with dense compositions of mass collection of organic and nonorganic subjects before, namely in the altar-based series of 2006-2010, but here, an excision of few objects would not destroy the integrity of the structures, which will remain intact. Although the items are tightly positioned against one another, they are dispensable and not coalesced as in the case of When I Was You, in which the disparate, severed parts are conjoined to erect and form an integral part of a new entanglement. From 2016 to 2018, the assemblages of the heterogeneous fragments gradually become more concordant and compatible, evidencing the process of intra-action. While Refrain (Pl. 41) manifests a free-standing hand that is visibly and tangibly tied to the branches, River of 2017-18 (Pl. 47) displays a hand that seems to have been carved out of a tree with multiple branches growing from its fingers. Occupying a mediate position, the hand is completely fused into the timber formation that as a whole embodies a single new intra-active agent of life.

 19

See Andrew Pickering, The Mangle of Practice. Time, Agency, and Science (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995).



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Shortly after, Tomasula paints another plant-conforming hand in Reach of 2018 (Pl. 49). The hand here is barely discernible, since it is camouflaged in the wood, displaying the same color and overlapping the branches. Though the hands in both paintings are rendered realistic with detailed vein marks, the one of River can still be distinguished due to the highlights and warm brownish color that set it apart from the greyish bright wrist and striated tree trunk. The ends of each finger are also lit with a spotlight and marked with a smooth surface that stands out against the irregular ring marks of the branches. In the Reach, on the other hand, the realistic vein marks of the hand appear to have emerged from the textured tree trunk, and the fingers that display similarly ringed wrinkle marks seem to have been glued to the branches, making the parts completely congruent and continuous. Human and nonhuman elements are ever more integrated to form a consolidated unit. Despite the subtle transition, both River and Reach demonstrate the reversal of anthropomorphism, which was examined above, where the organic forms adopt and acclimate to human shapes. It is the other way round with these two works, where the human hands are now biomorphic, conforming to the plant form. The assimilation and influence can go both ways, putting human and nature on the same footing. The overall appearance and layout of Reach are actually reminiscent of Call Me by Your Name (Pl. 44), painted a year before. Both reveal a plant configuration of a base, an intermediary stem, and outreaching branches with a circular spotlight circumscribing the organism as a whole. Although the flowers of Call Me by Your Name are all grafted to the main stalks, they thrive as they derive nourishment from the bulb and roots, as illustrated in the painting. Reach, on the other hand, is utterly illogical, as the plant starts from a dead wooden fragment, from which a human hand rises and diverse types of birds, which are notorious for being territorial, occupy almost all of the branches at the top, replacing the assortment of flowers in the previous work. In fact, the ratio of flowers to birds has been reversed from numerous mixed flowers and three tiny hummingbirds in the earlier one to now a legion of eclectic birds and barely noticeable white flowers in the later painting. The heterogeneity of the individual segments is maintained, even as their conjugation is cultivated. Reach displays human, animal, and plant portions, animate or inanimate, live or dead, that act as individual autonomous items that are pieced together to complete this jigsaw puzzle of a new vision. This intra-active, entangled creation defies borders and any previously prescribed identities of existence.



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What distinguishes New Materialism from the historical Materialism is the complete abrogation of the dialectic binary system, upon which the latter was predicated, and the advancement of the vitalism of matter.20 While the preceding Materialism conceived matter as inert, passive, intact, solid, and raw, consisting of controllable substances to be activated and energized externally, the new version views matter as inherently vital, fluid, animated and regenerative.21 This is the core message of Bennett’s Vibrant Matter, which advances the notion of “enchanted materialism,” where all the material agents, however mundane, have capacities to selfdirect, move, change, and organize, and therefore constitute the “thingpower” within.22 Barad too advocates not just intra-active entanglement, but also intra-active becoming.23 Applying the ideas of the earlier philosophers as well as quantum physics, she stresses the performative nature of matter that is not defined by its substance, but by its activity. Coole and Frost state that “matter becomes,” not “is.”24 No entities are isolated and at a standstill; they constantly, mutually entangle with one another and are in the perpetual process of reconfiguration. The vitality of the objects in Tomasula’s paintings is more than evident. The intense hues and dramatic devices also induce a flare of dynamism in her art. That is particularly salient in the altar-based series, such as Please Don’t Go (Pl. 33), which has all the items moving in a spiral form toward infinity in the center. The articles are not integrated, but the swirl implies some kind of transformation of all its components at hand. Although generally denser and more complex, the recent works do not display such palpable motion, yet as indicated, the items are more congealed and reveal a sense of fundamental transmogrification at work. Murmur of 2016 (Fig. 6-11, Pl. 40) is an update of the earlier still lifes with a central doll figure in bondage such as Lot (Pl. 2). The new doll image, made up of flower stems, bones, a rubber band, and a seed, is likewise tied and constrained by strings, but the figure seems to be striding forward. Furthermore, there is a greater sense of animation with the surrounding flowers: the diagonally placed purple petals at the top appear to be forcefully charging upwards, while the orchids in the middle seem to be fluttering and the leaves underneath are pulling down. Even the bent nails in the middle above the head of the doll suggest movement. All

 20

Dolphijn and van der Tuin, New Materialism, 85. 21 Ellenzweig and Zammito, The New Politics of Materialism, 66. 22 Bennett, Vibrant Matter, xvi. 23 Barad, Meeting the Universe Halfway, 234-36. 24 Coole and Frost, New Materialisms, 10.



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ingredients of this assemblage seem to possess power and dynamism, motioning in various directions. At the pinnacle of this kinetic aggregate are three golden scarabs, the three directional movements of which are copied by the three feather formations mimicking arrow marks, created by smaller green ones overlapping longer yellow ones, on both sides of the insects. Scarabs are of course sacred animals in ancient Egypt, representing eternal renewal of life. The entire conglomerate is teeming with bursting life, about to move and transmute as a whole. The complete ensemble does not insinuate a human body, but rather a new creature formed through the entanglement of organic and nonorganic materials. Though pinned down by nails and strings, this new formation appears to be in transition, imparting an added sense that it will not look the same in the near future. It is evolving of its own accord. Although originally conceived by a human, the creature is self-generative and about to shed, connect, and alter as time progresses.

Figure 6-11 Tomasula, Murmur, 2016



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This morphogenetic creature in making qualifies as a holobiont, a biological concept that Haraway advances to explain the entanglement of intra-active heterogeneous species.25 In Staying with the Trouble. Making Kin in the Chthulucene, she emphasizes the process of sympoiesis, which goes beyond symbiosis, a mutually beneficial relationship between two dissimilar organisms, and is characterized by an interpenetration of multiple disparate units that collectively organize and consolidate.26 Driven by a creative synergy, the participants enter an intra-active mode and depend on one another to generate a new system. The result of this course is a holobiont, which refers to the entire assemblage of its everevolving constituents. The multispecies grouping of eclectic plants and insects in Murmur illustrates sympoiesis, as its actants are conjoined, attached, and overlap one another. Although the stick figure occupies the most central position, it looks rather fragile and is definitely overpowered by the more vibrant energetic floral arrangements. All elements of this construction that induces an allover busy effect are vital and essential to the buildup of indeed a holobiont. Its dynamism points to the collective creating and organizing still underway. The precise symmetrical alignment reveals its inherent ability to structure in a systematic manner, even as it evolves into another unpredictable state and shape. Another multispecies, sympoietic holobiont is the Star Eater of 2017 (Fig. 6-12, Pl. 45), where the segments are more neatly aligned: the central orchid soars with the gliding green butterfly wings that stretch to the sides, while decorative beads and lily branches dangle down. Again there is a centrifugal force in divergent directions and a crown of golden scarabs at the top that alternate with pieces of bones. The reigning scarabs represent the self-generative nature of this new constellation. The elements are interfused and intra-acted, triggering a metamorphosis. They rely on one another to complete this new morphogenetic puzzle, as each part mirrors another vertically as well as horizontally, such as the matching wings and flowers left and right as well as the orchid counterbalanced by the triangular makeup of the metallic beads underneath. No part is dispensable, each playing an equally important role in the process of regeneration. Organic and nonorganic items are entangled to collectively effectuate a new nexus of a dispersed agency. This flying creature will no doubt continue to evolve, ever becoming a new formulation with mutative configurations. It may continue to amass more items to gain strength and

 25

Haraway, Staying with the Trouble. Making Kin in the Chthulucene (Durham: Duke University Press, 2016), 60. 26 Ibid, 58-67.



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energy, so that it can catapult all the way to the heavens to reach the stars, to procure nourishment from them. The possibilities of alterations and metamorphoses are endless, abounding in imagination and fantasy. This flight of fancy, however, is deeply grounded in profound philosophical materialist tenets with an ontological basis. In all the visual assemblages, the artist endeavors to create “a sensation of being that’s qualified and deeply complicated by the knowledge that it’s in formation with the world of histories, ideas, and material realities, more like a bio-feedback loop, an always becoming within particular conditions of possibility that are themselves in flux: a moment within a process not the trace of an essence.”27 This is a belief that the artist held for years but made more illustratively conspicuous through her recent paintings.

Figure 6-12 Tomasula, Star Eater, 2017

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Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.”

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Although not as neatly integrated as the Star Eater, the latest paintings demonstrate an even greater sense of sympoiesis with the introduction of increasingly more heterogeneous elements to the mix in order to build complicated creatures of evolution. One of the latest paintings is I Can Feel It of 2018 (Pl. 50), which displays two blue long-necked birds conjoined above an accumulated heap of incongruous mass of disparate fruits, bones, flowers, prism-like structure, and other odd objects. This is the ultimate illustration of entanglement and natureculture that even includes a humanoid configuration in the middle with the insinuation of eyes outlined by the greenish-brown prism facets and green mustache out of green leaves. This phantom face is surrounded by textured mushrooms and vegetable stalks that resemble human fingers. The haphazard nature of intra-action is transparent with all of these incompatible articles of life fused together, yet in a manner that has a logic of its own, as they are all symmetrically aligned and erect pronounced geometrical units within the overall composite. The entire concoction also encompasses a wide range of textural effects from sharp and hard to the vague and soft. This conglomeration of high density and quantity is messy and labyrinthian, perhaps evidencing the early stages of the holobiont in progress. While the morphogenetic creatures of Murmur and Star Eater may have already undergone several cycles of transformations that resulted in the formation of integrated consolidated shapes, albeit still in the process of mutation, the actant components of I Can Feel It appear to have just been convened. Two birds, although with no apparent legs, just sit on top of the assembly of materials which are not genetically coalesced. Intra-action will no doubt transpire soon, as the organizing impetus is loudly proclaimed through the tight symmetry of this group, and the sense of regeneration is connoted through the bursting of the objects below the birds, as if just begotten. They do not lay eggs, but round fresh fruits along with other mostly organic materials such as withering flowers and bones. The holobiont embraces all raw materials from life, whether biotic or abiotic, whether ripe, dying, or dead, to generate a new sympoietic specimen, a one consolidated unit that is continually becoming. As far-fetched as these fantastic visions may seem, they are based on a New Materialist agenda, which is grounded in science.28 From the

 28

For other art works representing New Materialism, see Estelle Barrett and Barbara Bold, eds., Carnal Knowledge. Towards a ‘New Materialism’ through the Arts (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013); Kate Mondloch, A Capsule Aesthetic. Feminist Materialisms in New Media Art (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2018); Roger Rothman and Ian Verstegen, eds., The Art of the Real: Visual



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perspective of microbiology, all beings including humans are holobionts, since all biological entities are largely composed of multiple, mutating microbes. While these miniscule existences are easily overlooked, since there are not apparent to the naked eye, the microbiome is the lifeline, responsible for digestion, growth, and immunity in the bodies. Certain microbes can also kill the living. The complicated interactions of trillions of microbes and other substances are hard to fathom and replicate. And this is just microbes; there are other physical, emotional, mental, spiritual, and environmental thrusts both inside and outside of a body that constantly interject, intersect, shape, and alter a being without ceasing.29 Therefore, to bring awareness to the audience of these agents of force, the artist employs her imagination as well as stately aesthetic means to divulge the inescapable reality of sympoiesis that is present at all times in all surroundings. The exaggerations drive the message home, pointing to the fundamental nature of matter that is in a continued state of collision and evolvement. All New Materialists ultimately call for a naturecultural economic, social, and political reorientation through the adoption and application of their ontological perspective that they assert through diverse theoretical and scientific substantiations to validate their cases. They want this new point of view to help humans rethink their roles in society and nature, obviously with ethical overtones to respect all humans and non-humans, as they are all interconnected and are leveled.30 They want substantial political decisions and business deals to consider all agents, big or small, and execute them responsibly, as matters directly impact one another and there are always consequences for favoring one while overshadowing and superseding others. New Materialism has been especially instrumental in furthering the causes of ecofeminists and environmentalists. The destruction of the earth and nature has already become severe, owing to

 Studies and New Materialisms (Newcastle upon Tyne, U.K.: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2015). 29 Since the body is inseparable from its environment, Alaimo refers to it as “transcorporeality” in “Trans-Corporeal Feminisms and the Ethical Space of Nature.” In Material Feminisms, ed. Alaimo and Hekman, 238. On the impact of emotional forces, see Melissa Gregg and Gregory Seigworth, eds., The Affect Theory Reader (Durham: Duke University Press, 2010). 30 See Clayton Crockett and Jeffrey Robbins, Religion, Politics, and the Earth. The New Materialism (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012); Nicholas Holm and Sy Taffel, eds., Ecological Entanglements in the Anthropocene (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2017).



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the Anthropocene and Capitalocene (Haraway’s idiom for capitalism) as the driving force of all actions. Instead of these, Haraway urges Chthulucene, another of her neologism that is a derivative of two Greek words combined: “kainos,” which is “now” and “chthonic,” which means “in or under the earth.” She explains the term as “a time place for learning to stay with the trouble of living and dying in response-ability on a damaged earth.”31 Hence the title of her latest publication: Staying with the Trouble. Making Kin in the Chthulucene. Despite the dire predicament of current times, she is positive, relating stories of regeneration and advocating for new possibilities through sympoiesis. As an avid gardener and devoted painter of flowers, Tomasula has always been a naturalist, observing and recording the intricate color variations, textures, and minute details. Even as she employs the natural subjects for various symbolic purposes, the original beauty and intrinsic power within them are never denied. Her highly manipulated constructions speak for natureculture. Her reading of New Materialism confirmed her own beliefs and refined her works to demonstrate the ever-entangled and ever-becoming aspects of matter in process. Her political views are completely in alignment with this new philosophy that abrogates all past dualism and hierarchical systems. As noted, the artist does not overtly make a political statement, though she is deeply concerned with world issues, particularly the unceasing suffering inflicted on humans and nature alike. Her very adoption of New Materialism relays her stance toward humanity, nature, and matter. Her respect for all material agents is made manifest in her mesmerizing paintings on mundane subjects that possess an energy of their own. They are alive, dynamic, and entangled. Also like Haraway, Tomasula infuses a sense of optimism through her faith in the ordinary items that garner strength to the extent that they are empowered to transform. Even when the plants are severed, twisted, and constrained with nails and strings, they still stand tall and retain their vibrancy. The diverse range of flowers represents people from varied backgrounds and manifold walks of life coming together, even in the midst of trials and tribulations, forming glorious assemblages, holobionts. Nature, human, or thing, all are pivotal and are worthy agents to be reckoned with. New Materialists claim that matter is no mere matter. Likewise, Tomasula’s still life is no mere still life. The flowers are no mere flowers, as they connote and embody many profound concepts and beliefs, ultimately relaying multiple meanings and content. As examined in the

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Haraway, Staying with the Trouble, 2.

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previous chapters, her paintings are grounded in various integral sources of her life and being that shaped the course and representation of her art. Her Mexican heritage and Catholic upbringing formed the foundation of her art that is molded by European artistic traditions and contemporary cultural trends, and then has evolved through her intellectual engagement in certain philosophical treatises and feminist perspectives. And these influences and thoughts are embedded directly in the particular, selective manner of visual presentation. Taking a cue from another New Materialist contention that meaning and matter too are inherently inseparable, the artist states that “we are all of us, concepts and matter, deeply entangled with each other.”32 Her abundant, complex ideas match the illustrious delineation that is notably hallmarked by, as reiterated many times, her clever employment of a distinctive arrangement of supremely refined still life objects that are highlighted with magnificent illumination and sumptuous colors. The rich iconography of the works readily lends itself to the luxuriant visual evocations. They are interconnected and equally constitute the art of the artist. Embodiment and splendor are the conjoined twin characteristics that encapsulate her works. Tomasula’s foremost conviction, however, before any beliefs and stylistic commitment, lies in the fundamental physicality of art. Her ultimate faith is in the material substance of art, from the selection of specific panels and pigments to the tedious process of applying countless individual brush marks and constant editing to refine the images to perfection. This is what the artist invests most of her time and energy in, defining her being as that of an aesthetic material creator. Her fastidious delineations of the minute details, meticulously calculated compositional layouts, and strenuously constructed color surfaces are not mere means to conceptual and artistic ends. They constitute the sense of a breathing entity of life and an aggregate that is created through the entanglement of the artist and the tangible materials themselves. This process is a material creature of its own standing to be reckoned with, as it demands the entire life of the artist, draws the fascination of onlookers, and invites an extended analysis on the part of an art historian.

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Tomasula, “More than a Feeling.”

APPENDIX MORE THAN A FEELING: PAINTING WITH A DISTRIBUTED SENSE OF AGENCY

(Maria Tomasula’s paper delivered as part of the Latino Studies Seminar series at the Institute for Latino Studies, University of Notre Dame, on November 14, 2017) Thank you: audience; Tim Matovina and Luis Fraga for the invitation to speak, and Laly for all your help getting this set up! I’m pretty excited for this opportunity to speak to a group of such distinguished scholars from across so many disciplines partly because, for me, it’s unusual to have this many fields represented in an audience since most all the talks I give are to faculty and students at art departments and art schools, with an occasional museum collector group. So, there’s two parts to my talk, a short part and a longer part. The short part is I’m going to tell you what I think my paintings are about and then the longer part is where I explain that “aboutness.” So here’s the short part: In my paintings, I try to give visual form to, basically, a feeling, a complex assemblage of often elusive qualities that have to do with a sense of being, of what it’s like to exist as an embodied entity constituted by a particular sense of self… and, what that’s like for me, comes from a set of experiences that are historically situated because they involve having encountered, over a lifetime, a series of different ideas that produce different kinds of subjects, the thinking, feeling entities that we are. I’ve lived in four, overlapping, thought worlds that each imagine people in distinct ways: first as a traditional subject with an understanding of communal self-being; then as a modern subject with a conception of individual selfhood; and then as a post-modern subject conscious of having been socially constructed through discursive practices; and finally, now—whatever we call our present state—of being a more dispersed, distributed self. Like for each of us, my conceptions of self have altered in

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response to historical developments, so in my talk, I’ll try to outline how my pictures are a way of searching towards visual materializations of a sedimented sense of self that has grown out of these historical changes. So now comes the longer part where I’ll show a selection of paintings while I talk. The images are all oil on panel and the objects depicted are roughly the size they are in life. The sequence is more or less chronological, starting with older paintings that lead up to the most recently finished pieces that are for an upcoming show. So, I’ll talk about the ideas I’m trying to deal with while the images are projected and at first there might be a little disjoint between the images and what I’m saying because I’ll be talking about the ideas that eventually led to these pictures, but I hope the effect, by the end, is to show that what I’m talking about is made manifest in the pictures. OK, I’m one of those people that started life in a very traditional milieu. I was born into a family and community of Mexican immigrants who all lived near the steel mills of Gary and East Chicago, Indiana. So this was a working class, urban, heavily industrialized, immigrant neighborhood full of people who came from rural, agricultural, village backgrounds and who brought with them very defined conceptions of self, family, and community. I came to consciousness in a world of extended families, a place full of a multitude of saints, spirits and forces; we talked to, and ritually remembered, the dead, as an extension of our love for them. There was God and La Virgen de Guadalupe, and so many others, unseen but ever present. So my first notion of self, had a cosmic dimension overlapping an earthly dimension. The cosmic dimension centered on understanding myself as a soul en-fleshed, as being composed of some kind of eternal essence whose embodied life on earth was a small part of a much grander story playing out, that is, the monumental redemption narrative that would lead to the reign of heaven. I understood myself as part of this teleological narrative, and of the eternal stakes at play, so I, along with all us neighborhood kids, tried to be good. We had to be on guard knowing we were subject to malevolent influences that could enter and change us without our consent, we could even be possessed by something evil. I understood people, then, as material entities but with porous borders, who could be affected by spirits, influences, ideas. So, for me, both my embodied self and the material world it existed in, was a phenomenon of depthless mystery, all matter was enchanted, that is, animated by a sort of agency that everything possessed: people of course, but also animals, nature, and all the stuff of the world.

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This overlapped with the earthly realm of my early existence, where I wasn’t an individual as defined by Modernity—I mean of course I was an individual, but that was far from the main source of my identity. My primary identity was as my father’s daughter, that is, a member of my immediate and extended family, of my neighborhood, of my community. My status, my very being, emerged from, and resided in, the fact that I was a daughter expected to abide by the traditional dictates of my family. For me, there was no being outside of that. Then, I got married, moved out of my family’s house, away from my neighborhood, and that’s when I became immersed in another ethos: the world of radical individual being, and I began to understand people differently. In those surroundings, I picked up that it was embarrassingly stupid, humiliatingly backwards to be superstitious, and the idea that you could be possessed by another entity was ridiculous, because people were actually self-directed and autonomous. Humans, in this universe, were the only dynamic presences, while the material world we lived in was composed of inert matter that humans, with their capacities of mind, had come to understand and control. While we weren’t yet able to fully explain all of it, eventually nature would be completely comprehensible because with our big brains we create instruments and technologies that extend our abilities of understanding, and through our language, which mirrors reality, we would come to accurately describe a completely knowable world. To be modern was to be self-possessed, to be freed from the past, to believe in the promise of progress and, to believe, above all, in a hierarchy of being with rational humanity the undisputed masters on top. (Not all humans were at the top, though.) I eventually did “pass” as modern by gradually, but only partially absorbing these attitudes, before I went to college where my already shaky modernity buckled under the force of Postmodernism. For example, I came to understand that language isn’t actually the instrument of precision that it had been presented as, and further, that it didn’t describe a fixed, unchanging reality, but that it instead is what creates realities. Critical theorists showed me how social scripts exist that imagine, for example, what a female is, and how that script doesn’t describe a pre-existing factual reality, but instead brings a condition into existence through its power to produce and police a reality. And now? After Postmodernism, where are we? In this present, that at this moment feels pretty dreadful, we need another framework to think about our condition; we’re trying to figure out how to make a better present out of all that’s preceded it. We want to find relation to the past, we want to earnestly engage with real

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problems to make changes, to in good faith, examine complex crises— neoliberalism, racial inequality, climate change. How do we reconcile— CAN we reconcile—what we’ve inherited, both the cherished parts and the destructive parts, with new realities, and in the Anthropocene, how do we come to terms with what Post-Structuralist thought left out: it expanded our understanding in its dazzling analysis of the ways discursive practices shape our reality, but it left out the important matter of…matter. I’ve inherited from Catholicism an understanding of worldly being as absolutely centered on embodiment, and on what’s been called the needs of our species-being, on the terrible capacities of bodies to suffer and the attendant ethical responsibility that suffering makes on us to work towards ending it. Because of that, I’m oriented towards considerations of matter, of individual bodies. And stemming from that, I’m interested in how we come to be constituted as the embodied individuals we are. And how ideas of what particular individuals are, help create the material conditions that allow, or prevent, those individuals from flourishing. That interest has expanded to include not only human bodies, but also non-human bodies, things, and matter in general. However, I don’t want a return to thinking about matter in the traditional way that modernity privileged matter, where there was a presupposition that our knowledge is an accurate, unmediated reflection of an independent, objective reality, nor do I want to pursue the postmodern tendency to privilege discursive practices that tend to overlook the material agency of matter. I’m trying, instead, to give visual form to a sense of the inseparability of object/matter and ideas; I assume that knowledge is always mediated by concepts, but unlike the social constructionists, I want to say that concepts and theories have real, actual material consequences, I want to think about how the discursive and material are integrated and I want to figure out how to make pictures that visually articulate that. So, yes, we access the world through our ideas, but different ideas are going to bring different iterations of the world into being. We are all of us, concepts and matter, deeply entangled with each other. I want now to expand on how these briefly outlined ideas never existed as a set of distant, historical abstractions for me, but as lived realities. So I’ll talk more specifically now about how these ideas took material form. The Latino neighborhoods I grew up in were dotted with Catholic churches, and the ones I went to as a kid were visually fantastic. Insurance pressures have mostly eliminated all the candles and with them that incredible theater of flickering lights and shadows, but if you’ve ever been inside one of those old churches, you’ll know what I’m talking about when

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I say that going to church could be a dazzling experience, instead of a numbingly boring one. The visual rhetoric of sumptuousness is so powerful and the tradition of opulence in those churches made me understand the link between luxuriousness and transcendence way before I knew about the link between luxuriousness and commerce, with its associations of corruption and selfishness. During mass, everyone spent time looking at the opulent ornamentation and that activity acted as a sort of springboard to meditation on the imagined glories of the immaterial beyond, but also of the material here and now. In those dusky, cavernous settings, with their huge, tilted, iron racks of candles casting the only light, with the smell of incense, the carved and glimmering gilded altar, the flowers, the velvet curtains parting to reveal statues of beseeching figures that threw towering shadows, and all those painted eyes cast upwards, it seemed that one’s senses were a kind of gift given to navigate through a world where a lot is hidden, un-seeable, and unfathomable. But, what could be seen there was absolutely gorgeous and, even better, a sort of permission appeared to have been granted to indulge in the visual, and other, pleasures of material creation. Those decorated surfaces seemed to say, among other things, enjoy the world, indulge yourself in the beauties and pleasures available to you. That fantastic degree of sumptuousness radiated generosity, it evoked wonder, and encouraged a joyous, aweinflected attitude towards existence. The priests were talking, too, but I was more interested in what those things had to say. I encountered another, radically different, tradition in some other churches from another part of town: not opulence as heavenly representation, but the purity of asceticism, in churches marked by the total absence of images. Those expanses of white, unornamented drywall, and plain wooden benches under fluorescent lights felt, to me, like a visual desert, a sensory deprivation chamber. The ascetic sensibility, especially in its more extreme manifestations, acts as a reassertion of the idea that the body is base, vile and sinful and that it must be subjugated to the higher faculties of the rational, abstracting mind. With its drive towards purity, it’s a kind of scolding impulse that denigrates the senses. And at the heart of asceticism is the act of renunciation. Pleasure of the world and of one’s body seems to inspire nothing so much as dread. That sort of unrelentingly severe, chaste, and sober austerity seems intent on withdrawal from every kind of material comfort. I’m not interested in advocating for notions of purity or asceticism. But the point here is that what exposure to different aesthetic sensibilities taught me early on, is that a mindset, a sense of being in the world, an entire philosophy, can be embodied in form and that form, form itself, apart from subject matter, can generate meaning. So,

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about some of that stuff in church: There was this carved stone statue of a saint on a pedestal that people prayed to and everyone rubbed its foot that extended out from under its robe. That statue was an amazing thing: it was both a receptacle for every kind of hope and anguished yearning you can imagine, it was also a portal that took people to another world of sustaining forces. It had stood there, its foot being touched by 1,000s of people over the decades, lots of them now long dead, and the foot–which used to be long, was worn down to a little nub. It was incredible to me as a kid, that touching by soft fingers could wear down hard stone like that. But the real wonder for me was to realize that every time anyone rubbed it, they took at little of it with them and left a little of them on it. You became part of an endless community of people, all of them having a material exchange with that statue, and it seemed a little magical. When I looked, from a distance, at the row of marble pillars holding up the ceiling of our church, they looked utterly solid. But when kneeling right next to one, you could see the scratches and rubbings where the paint had been worn off to reveal that the pillars weren’t actually reddish marble, but some kind of grey stone, and if you looked real close, you could see that the stone was made up of the tiny shells of animals that had died and that their bodies were densely sedimented in layers. Those pillars and that statue showed me how to think about the material world of seemingly inanimate matter: while they were for the moment solid, that was only a temporary state, because earlier they had been wriggly animals and fluid sea, and they still contained energies of potentialities; they were dimension-altering presences, as if time itself had gained mass under its own transforming weight, and compressed into solid form. It seemed like everything was endlessly nested within realms comprised of forces, time, and matter. When I went to college, I wanted to make pictures with the impact of the things I saw at church. I went to a school, though, with a highly conceptual art department where representational painting was not well thought of. I had grown up around lots of art, it was everywhere, not only in church, but also in people’s homes where everyone had picture calendars of Aztec warriors and framed prints of saints, as well as in the neighborhoods in the form of murals. Those images were focal points that seemed to broadcast the community’s shared history while imaging our common aspirations. All that art generated a sort of invisible cohesive force that made me feel connected to the community. So I thought I knew what art was and what it was for, but I soon found out that those murals and paintings had almost nothing to do with the art that was considered important on the world stage. I loved college and had really wonderful teachers, but a lot of what I learned was very foreign to me, at least at first

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before I assimilated to Modernity. Like, the notion that humans are autonomous and largely self-generated through their capacity for reason. This idea took immediate and forceful form in the work of the NeoExpressionism painters that were hot at the time, this was the late 80s. I learned that those painters were linked to the earlier abstract expressionists that I’d previously known nothing about. I should make clear that while images were important to me growing up, the makers really weren’t. The art I was most familiar with was largely anonymous—religious Spanish colonial paintings being the most politically fraught example, so all the inordinate attention given in class to the personalities of individual artists was new for me. In the 80s there were still Abstract Expressionistgeneration teachers around. I had one who would talk about “the mark” with a kind of reverence. The mark was the primary, irreducible, element of drawings, etchings, paintings, and so on. Artists, he said, work to distinguish their art from the efforts of other artists by developing a distinct mark, that is, a signature style, that, along with other formal elements, distinguish original work. Even beyond that, it marked the artist as distinct not only as an artist, but as an individual. The way the mark was invested in, and thought of, probably takes its most extreme form in mid-20th-century writing about abstract painting; because there’s no recognizable subject matter in abstract painting, there are only formal elements like the mark to distinguish one artist’s work from another. So the mark got invested with a lot of importance. Take, for example, you all know those Franz Kline paintings, the ones with those huge, violentlooking gashes that tear across a canvas. Looking at those, a viewer has a strong sense of purposefulness in the gesture, a sense of incredible action. The immediacy, the willfulness, the agency of the artist as he made that emphatic gesture across the surface of the canvas is overwhelmingly evident. It’s the mark of an individual who is authorial, original, autonomous. I remember thinking, when I first heard this idea, Oooo, a mark can do all that?! Yeah, apparently, those marks were seen as traces left by the hand of the artist, and signaled his autonomy; those artists were, at least at the time, seen to possess a kind of individuality that enabled them to stand outside of bourgeois society and critique its premises, and even to defy history! This idea was astounding to me when I encountered it in college. On the one hand, it was really exciting to think that people who studied art history could understand the language of those marks and their meanings; they could read an oppositional stance, a politics, a statement about ontology, in those marks. That part, the idea of a mark having the capacity to communicate that much, was pretty heady. It was a language I didn’t speak, but I wanted to learn about it. However, the other

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part, the idea that a person could stand outside of society and even contravene history just seemed really…overblown. I surely didn’t see myself (or anyone, for that matter) as possessing anything like that heroic sense of individuality. Until I went to school and came up against the idea that marks themselves can contain meaning, I had always thought that content in art resided in its subject matter and the effect of its form. I never really considered the way it was made. Once, however, I understood that meaning could be embedded in the very process of making something, apart from the subject, that made me seriously consider what sort of marks I wanted to use. What did I want the traces of my hand to say? Well, my experience is NOT characterized by a sense of mastery or self-actualizing will. My sense of myself is of a body made through an entanglement with biological, historical, familial, economic and other forces. My life consists mostly of repetitions of small acts: cooking, eating, washing, talking to people. These ordinary and pretty inconsequential moments, though, do make up a textured life. So I began to wonder how I could convey that sense through a mark—what kind of mark would that be?—I gradually adopted a mark that’s the opposite of the sort used by the abstract expressionists, that is, a mark that’s virtually nonexistent. I use a process where I make such tiny marks that you virtually can’t see them. I then further eliminate them by blending, and in the final reworking of every layer, I stipple to try to erase any visible trace of my hand, thereby symbolically dispersing “myself” as I paint, that is, eliminating the traces of my hand so the image looks not so much made as materialized. The process is meticulous, precise, cool and utterly methodical. BUT the image that emerges from this calculated process is totally centered on the idea of embodied subjectivity. Every element in the image is chosen for its expressive values; the picture is meant to engage with a viewer emotionally. These images are meant to be affective, engaging, eliciting responses centered on reflection and feeling. It’s an aesthetics founded on the delight of the senses, even of the erotic, of sensation that conjures the tactile quality of material experience. In other words, it’s an aesthetics founded on the embodied self. So, one of the things I’m trying to do in these paintings is to symbolically enact—in visual form—the sensation of being, a being that for me centers on this feeling of particularity, but it’s a particularity that understands itself NOT to have emerged from conditions of autonomy and freedom, the way some people seem to imagine willing themselves into whatever they want, but rather, a sensation of being that’s qualified and deeply complicated by the knowledge that it’s in formation with the world of histories, ideas, and material realities, more like a bio-

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feedback loop, an always becoming within particular conditions of possibility that are themselves in flux: a moment within a process not the trace of an essence. Along with lots of other people, I’m trying to rethink myself as an emergence, or an assemblage, or a node in a network, or a rhizomatic being, and all kinds of new knowledge has helped us, or maybe more like forced us, to rethink ourselves. My project involves finding ways to resist the idea of the self-generated individual, the idea that you can be separate from the conditions of possibility you emerged from. I want to advocate for a more distributed sense of being, and have been spurred to do so by my experiences and helped by writers in various disciplines that verbally articulate what I’ve tried to visually articulate. For example, philosopher and cognitive scientist David Chalmers who argues that it’s arbitrary to say the mind is contained only within the boundaries of the skull. He sees the separation between mind, body, and the environment as an unprincipled distinction because external objects play a significant role in aiding cognitive processes, in other words, a mind and the environment it is part of, act as a "coupled system." Here are a few bits of evidence for all this: 1) Having grown up in an industrial city, a so-called ‘sacrifice zone,’ I know all too well that our bodily boundaries are very porous by the fact that we’re all affected by our exposure to environmental risks such as pollution, lead and other toxins. Ulrich Beck, who published the book Risk Society writes how these risks have become a predominant product, not just an unpleasant and manageable side-effect, of industrial society. It turns out that we literally are our surroundings. 2) There are hundreds of research papers that complicate belief in humans as rational actors, but this is one of my favorites: In the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a publication outlined how in Israel, 1,000 parole applications were ruled on by 8 judges over the course of 10 months. The parole board judges all considered themselves to be using fair, impartial analyses in the granting or denying of parole. However, the regular pattern that emerged revealed that the likelihood of their granting parole was largely dependent on the amount of time that had passed since their last meal. It turns out that we are embodied minds. 3) Science researchers have demonstrated that of the trillions of cells that make up a human body, about 50% are nonhuman. Turns out each of us is not an ‘I’, each of us is a ‘we.’ 4) Benjamin Libet’s experiments on the timing of conscious awareness shows how there is a 500 millisecond delay (and that’s a really long time, neurologically speaking) between the time our brains register an event and

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when we become conscious of it. This is even the case for decisionmaking. In other words, brain processes have formed the intention to act before we are even conscious that we’ve made a decision. Below the threshold of consciousness, our mind decides how we’re going to act before ‘we’ do. When you apply this finding to the way police react towards individuals with racialized bodies, you see yet again, how our discursive practices have real, material consequences. There is so much more evidence that counters the idea of humans as bounded, fixed, supremely rational actors and I’m sure you can think of others having to do with extreme stress, nutrition, marketing strategies, the effects of pharmacological substances, and so on. So, what I’ve tried to do in my talk is to outline a set of encounters with ideas that have caused shifts in the understanding of a ‘self,’ first from a traditional, then a modern, then a post-modern, and now a contemporary, new materialist perspective. The result is these pictures, painted with surfaces as uninflected as I can manage, to communicate a sense of dispersed agency, getting rid of the traces of my hand as markers of autonomy. I paint a lot of entities that are made of pieces of disparate things, tied, pinned, clamped, or sewn together to constitute a whole, but one made up of parts that presumably could continue to lose and acquire pieces. I paint a lot of items categorized as from “nature” but that are interfered with by being cut, grafted, bound with other things, and so on, to emphasize a sense of boundarylessness between nature and culture. In fact, I hope one of the things these paintings do is symbolically liquefy the border between those dualisms from Modernity that present themselves as inevitabilities but have to be thought against: nature/culture, rational/emotional, subject/object, male/female, and countless others. Finally, I’d like to end by stressing that for me, painting isn’t only about self-expression, it really has to do with advocating a position. Something I ask myself is: “What has the world made of me, and what am I making of the world, that is, what sort of world do I want to live in?” These pictures are an attempt to promote an ethics and a politics of reconceptualizing ourselves as contiguous with the world, instead of replicating the nature/culture dualism that has been so injurious not only to non-human nature, but to so many humans. Rather than perpetuate that dualism that imagines nature to be the inert ground for the exploits of universal man, we need to see nature as having agency, as part of us, and we of it. So these paintings advocate for the agential materiality of the

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world, including of bodies, and for reimagining the world and us as mutually co-constituting phenomenon. Whatever we are, that self isn’t encapsulated in a brain, we don’t even end at the surface of our skins. What we are, are the material experiences we have, the love we’ve received, the medical care available to us, the disease-causing toxins we absorb depending on whether we do or do not live in polluted surroundings, the ways we interact with educational and cultural systems that either provide or deny ways for us to flourish. We are co-produced, by and with our environments, we are relational beings that developed and survive by being a part of the world, not apart from the world. Having lived through a series of thought worlds and their material manifestations, I have to be open to further redefinitions, knowing how the world changes us as we change it, but for now, I say we are neither transcendent essence, nor the autonomous self-created, nor are we defined by social scripts, instead, we are…a conjoined dance in partnership with the world, entangled with each other in a choreography of continual becoming. Thank you for your attention.

SELECTED EXHIBITIONS

One Person Exhibitions 2018

2016 2012 2008

2006 2005 2004 2003 2000 1999 1998

1997 1995

1994 1991

“All the Breath We Can Hold,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “Saturation,” Brainard Gallery, Eastern Illinois University, Charleston, IL “Everpresence,” Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL “Singularities,” Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL “Rapture,” Snite Museum of Art, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN “Flow,” Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL “Delirium,” South Bend Museum of Art, South Bend, IN “Solo Exhibition,” Snite Museum of Art, Notre Dame, IN “Meridian,” Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL “Vast,” Forum Gallery, Los Angeles, CA “Second Nature,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “Accretion,” Zolla/Lieberman, Chicago, IL “Corpus,” Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN “Encanto,” National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago, IL “Recognitions,” South Bend Museum of Art, South Bend, IN “Im/Mutable,” Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL “Convergence,” Snite Museum of Art, Notre Dame, IN “Devotion and Dominion,” Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL “Maria Tomasula,” Vander Velde Gallery, Trinity College, Palos Heights, IL “Desire and Devotion,” Deson-Saunders Gallery, Chicago, IL “New Work,” Hamlet Gallery, Chicago, IL

Selected Group Exhibitions 2020

“First Impressions: New Works and New Acquisitions,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY

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2019-20 2018-19 2018

2017

2016 2015 2014-15 2014

2013 2012

2011 2010 2008

2006

2005 2004 2003

Selected Exhibitions

“Undying Traditions: Memento Mori,” Muskegon Museum of Art, Muskegon, MI “Wild Kingdom,” Nassau County Museum of Art, Roslyn Harbor, NY “Artists by Artists: The Artist as Subject,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “Drawn,” Printworks Gallery, Chicago, IL “Seeing With Our Own Eyes,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “Radical Kingdoms,” Mandeville Gallery, Union College, Schenectady, NY “20/21 – Visionary Artists of the 21st Century,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “Love: The First of the 7 Virtues,” Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art, Peekskill, NY “Tradiciones,” Rockford Art Museum, Rockford, IL “Fleur Coupée,” The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA “Nuestras Historias: Stories of Mexican Identity,” National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago, IL “Singular Vision,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “The Female Gaze: Women Artists Making Their World,” Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, PA “Perception of Self,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “Peace on Earth: Art Against War,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “Sacred and Profane,” Portsmouth Museum of Fine Arts, Portsmouth, NH “Contemporary American Realism: 2008 Biennial,” Fort Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, IN “The Feminist Figure,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “An Eye for Detail: Works by Selected Artists,” Forum Gallery, Los Angeles, CA “Transitional Objects: Contemporary Still Life,” Neuberger Museum of Art, SUNY Purchase College, Purchase, NY “Collective Imaginings: The Howard A. and Judith Tullman Collection,” Mobile Museum of Art, Mobile, Al “Poetas y Pintores,” Taller Boricua, New York, NY “Exquisite Snake,” Printworks, Chicago “Larger Than Life: Women Artists Making It Big,” Susquehanna Art Museum, Harrisburg, PA

The Art of Maria Tomasula: Embodiment and Splendor

2002 2001

2000

1999

1998

1997

1996 1994

1993

199

“Precision,” Forum Gallery, Los Angeles, CA “Recent Acquisitions,” National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago, IL “Of Dreams and Dreamers,” Carl Hammer Gallery, Chicago, IL “Obsessive Drawing,” Delaware Center for Contemporary Arts, DE “The Object Considered,” Columbus College of Art & Design, Columbus, OH “Under the Influence,” Zolla/Lieberman Gallery, Chicago, IL “New Visions by Nine Contemporary Women,” Forum Gallery, New York, NY “WILDflowers,” Katonah Museum of Art, Katonah, NY “Examination and Practice: Painting in the Late 20th Century,” Cardinal Stritch University, Milwaukee, WI “Exquisite Corpse,” Printworks, Chicago, IL “Al Paso del Tiempo: Day of the Dead,” National Museum of Mexican Art, Chicago, IL “With Many Voices: Celebrating Cultural Diversity,” The Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago, IL “Flora,” Elise Goodheart Gallery, Sag Harbor, NY “New Season,” Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL “Disposition: Replacing the Figure,” Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL “On Your Mark,” Artemisia Gallery, Chicago, IL “Out of Eden,” Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art & Design, Kansas City, MO “Natural Selection,” Peter Miller Gallery, Chicago, IL “(Un) Earthly Delights,” State of Illinois Gallery, Chicago and Illinois State Museum, Springfield, IL “Timely and Timeless,” The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT “Gravity and Grace,” Marguerite Oestreicher Fine Arts, New Orleans, LA “Contemporary Realists,” Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design, Milwaukee, WI “(Un)Real,” Gibson Gallery, State University of New York, Potsdam, NY “Selections,” Artemisia Gallery, Chicago, IL

200

1992

Selected Exhibitions

“The Dreamer Awakens,” Deson-Saunders Gallery, Chicago, IL “Parabolic Matter,” Beacon Street Gallery, Chicago, IL “Finesse,” Deson-Saunders Gallery, Chicago, IL “New Sensations,” Deson-Saunders Gallery, Chicago, IL

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