Today we’d like to introduce you to Vince Alfonso.
Vince, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I am a 32-year-old Colorado Native. I grew up in Aurora, Skateboarding and causing trouble with neighborhood friends.
I ended up going to three different high schools, Which I think contributed to my introversion and my tendency to spend a lot of time with my head in a sketchbook or in front of a wall with a can of paint. Luckily, I had some great teachers that saw my passion and gave me opportunities to grow as an art maker.
In 11th and 12th grade I was able to take college art courses at Arapahoe Community College where I was really introduced to deeper art practice. These classes helped me solidify the notion that I was going to be an artist.
I attended Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design 2008-12 where I received my BFA in Painting.
This school helped me to connect with the Denver art community and to realize art as a way of life.
Since college, I became associate member at Pirate art Collective from 2018-2022 where I contributed four separate solo exhibitions. I have done mural work for Denver and Aurora Public school district. Also created Mural work for local businesses and breweries, Including Colorado Cider Company, Denver Beer Company, Blue-Pan Pizza, and Fire On The Mountain. I have participated in mural festivals In Denver, Miami, and Los Angles.
In summer 2021 was part of a one-month long artist residency on Ilhabella Island off the coast of Sao Paulo, Brazil
I am currently a resident artist at RedLine Contemporary Art Center
My work has been featured In local and international magazines such as Birdy Magazine, Nakid Magazine, and Juxtapoz Magazine.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall, and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
The whole world is a challenge right now.
For anybody pursuing anything, I’d say the biggest challenge is staying engaged in your practice while staying true to yourself.
In a world where everybody is putting out such high volumes of content, it is easy to get caught up in this mindset of “PRODUCE, PRODUCE, PRODUCE”. However, it is important to slow down; really give your mind time to process/absorb information and complex emotion. It can be a challenge remembering to respect process in this way.
I like to think of art making as a relationship. You have to know when it needs your undivided attention, but you also need to know when to give it space. It’s a tricky balance, but for me, it keeps the work meaningful and keeps my relationship with my practice healthy.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
For this interview, I am going to define my work as…
Impressionistic cartoon surrealism with a bit of dark comedy.
I will break it down:
I grew up watching cartoons, in fact as a very young kid I wanted to be a Disney Animator. This has deeply influenced color choices in my work and also contributed to my love of movement. I like to imply a sense of motion and ‘ever-changingness’ in all my paintings. Animation relies on this principle of movement in every single frame. Thousands and thousand of pieces to create one seamless organic dance. This always captivated me.
Speaking of thousands of pieces and dancing…
…IMPRESSIONISM!
One of my all-time biggest influences of style. Thick paint, thousands of brushstrokes giving justice to the complexity of every little moment of the image. Capturing light. Impressionism is a way of painting that has always struck a chord.
I hope to achieve such complexity and manipulation of color that impressionism embodies.
However, it is just so goddamn romantic that it hurts.
See the impressionists had the paint application down, but they where just looking outward; Plein air painting at beautiful estates overlooking rolling hills and in aristocratic port oasis’.
The surrealists twisted the other direction. They were painting super smooth and flat with seamlessly blended transitions (not my style), But they were looking inward and at a darker side of existence. At dreams and the subconscious; what reality was and felt like philosophically rather than just “what it looked like”.
I like to think my work rides these two lines. The formal techniques of impressionism but the darker human story that surrealism tells.
Speaking of stories…
…DARK COMEDY!
The fourth piece to the Vinni Alfonso art cocktail is film.
Writers and directors like David Lynch, Charlie Kauffman, and Jim Jarmusch have also been a huge influence on my creative practice. Similar to the idea of motion and the word “ever-changingness’ I made up earlier, my work strives to tell a story; but to tell a story without giving away the ending or even what the stories about.
Similar to life. We can only speculate the plot, and we will never get to see how it ends.
It is comedically tragic.
Do you have any memories from childhood that you can share with us?
I remember spending a lot of time playing out front of my house as a young kid. Whether I was playing basketball, riding my bike, rollerblading, skateboarding, throwing a football up in the air, and catching it, I always had this fantasy that somebody would be passing by and just acknowledge that I was REALLY GOOD! ha. I thought I was going to get scouted out of my neighborhood. like “hey kid that was a sweet bunny hop on that bike, wanna be in the next x-games?”
Its’ silly but wouldn’t it be sweet?
Art is similar in some ways. I’m still trying to get scouted.
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Website: VinceAlfonso.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/i_touch_art/
Image Credits
Wes Magyar
