F. María Velasco

F. María Velasco

F. María Velasco

My work exists at the intersection of art and social practice, where dialogue, process, and participation lead to new insights. I create site-specific installations, urban interventions, and participatory projects to investigate spaces, architecture; history; and, foremost, the human interactions intersecting them. My artistic practice is an opportunity to connect with a community, examine cultural conditions, and question assumptions about what we take for granted. Specifically, I deal with issues of displacement, migration, gender identity, vulnerability, and the structures of authority that govern our lives. To challenge the idea of ‘single authorship,’ I create open-ended works that invite viewers to become participants and even co-creators of the artistic experience. Ultimately, I see my practice as both social sculpture and an architecture of intimacy, conflating the private and the public, the inner and outer world; the work always in progress, seeking the necessary complicity with viewers. My creative interests have been amplified by becoming a mother. However it has been challenging to figure professional logistics, since parenting is rendered invisible - in the arts, in academia and the culture at large. "Intertwined Worlds" is a sketchbook collaboration with my ten-year-old son, Alex, who loves to draw and is a young artist. Through this exploration, I find a poignant unfolding of our worlds, a sort of peeking in each other's minds.