Today we’d like to introduce you to Francesca Monzon.
Hi Yadi, really happy you were able to join us today and we’re looking forward to sharing your story and insights with our readers. Let’s start with the heart of it all – purpose. How did you find your purpose?
Drawing has been my escape ever since I can remember. It kicked off as a simple source of joy, just something I did for fun. But as the people around me – family and friends – started cheering on my doodles, it gave me a boost of confidence. High school came around, and my grades were nothing extraordinary. That’s when the idea hit me: why not aim for an art college and let my love for drawing shine?
So, I took the plunge into the world of fine arts, and I’ve been on that journey ever since. Turning my passion into a craft has been a fulfilling pursuit—one that’s taught me that building a career around your love for art is a pretty remarkable journey.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
I am a witness.
When I went to Antarctica 26 years ago, the words “glacial pace” had a different meaning. The ice moved constantly but slowly. Melting during the two summer months and freezing back up the rest of the time.
I have been chasing this moving ice for the past quarter century, knowing the whole time that I wanted to paint these alien worlds and bring them back to the warmer parts of the planet. These paintings are based on my trips to Antarctica, Iceland, Alaska, and the High Arctic (near the North Pole).
Using water to paint water (ice) allows me to connect to my subject. The luminosity of the medium is its superpower. I’ve certainly heard that watercolors are the “hardest” of mediums but my experience is that I can capture the light and the fragility of these ice monuments in ways that are not possible using oils or acrylics.
Since I was 15, I read about the Heroic Age of Exploration. Of course, Shackleton, Amundsen, and Scott did not have any women on board. And yet, I never doubted that I would be able to go. I have been working on painting these landscapes since 2001 and it has been my privilege to be able to travel as an Expeditionary Artist to so many wild places on our planet and see big ice. I’ve written about my travels to the High Arctic in the New York Times: In Hot Pursuit of Ice and Cold – The New York Times (nytimes.com).
Three years ago, like everyone else, I was stuck in place. How does an artist pivot? I no longer had a large studio to work in and could not really travel anywhere. Flying around the internet were wild animals that crept into spaces normally filled with humans. Some animals were brought to places, others recaptured the territory.
And so my practice split between Animals Taking Over and Polar Landscapes. As humans, while we may make this planet less habitable for some species (including ourselves), the planet and some opportunistic animals will definitely survive. And who knows, perhaps these animals WILL take over our museums and our streets. There are places such as Pyramiden, in Svalbard (where I’ve been) which have been abandoned and left to the elements. Arctic Fox and Polar Bears roam freely in this space – WE are the foreigners.
Having traveled to many places that others haven’t been to, it is my honor to try and bring the images back to the rest of the planet.
I’m heading for an artist residency in Iceland soon and am currently writing grants to get to Greenland. You can see the animal paintings on my Etsy site: https://www.etsy.com/shop/AnimalsTakingOver and read about my travels in my blog: www.lisagorenpaintings.wordpress.com.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
The biggest discipline I am focused on in my profession is the mastery of time. Time is the most valuable currency we have. As am a producer, multi-instrumentalist, and non-profit professiona, l am juggling a variety of tasks and projects that require equal attention to detail, creative vision, and team work. Learning how to juggle all of my ideas and execute accordingly is a work in progress.
My first studio album is in production. This project taps into the consciousness of the lonely/isolated, telling the stories of self-discovery, self-awareness, and transformation. My co-producer, Skitzo, and I wanted to sonically juxtapose synthetic and realistic sounds to support the dualistic themes of man and machine and moving from solitude and servitude. We approached this by creating moments where songs were powerfully supported with instrumentation /vocals, and moments with a minimalistic approach to arrangement and sounds. We blended Jazz with
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