Pupusera
This is an illustration I did during an online drawing session hosted by Creato, a Latinx-inspired community for creatives in Toronto. The theme behind the event was ‘Food for the Soul: Favorite Foods from Home’, so I decided to pay homage to pupusas, the most popular traditional dish in El Salvador (the country I’m from) by creating an illustration that portrays a common scene in El Salvador: a pupusera enjoying an exquisite pupusa.
Regarding the process, I wanted to use this creative exercise to play digitally with some linocut designs I did a few weeks before in my Printmaking class at Seneca College, and I thought it would be a great idea to use those richly-textured patterns as part of the textile design of the huipil that the pupusera (a person who makes pupusas) is wearing in the illustration.
A huipil is a loose, embroidered blouse worn principally by women in Central America, so by including this element, I wanted to talk about my heritage and the visual elements that are part of it. The reason behind this, is because I often like to address my background in the illustrations that I create and the projects I work in, because for me visibility is key.
In this illustration, I also wanted to use vivid colours that refer to the colourful and vibrant culture of El Salvador, so that is why I picked a limited palette to create the artwork. Some of the influences for this illustration are Fernando Llort, a Salvadoran artist and muralist, and the symmetrical illustrations by Muxxi, a Guatemalan vector artist who I greatly admire.
Scroll down to see the full huipil design, some details of the texture I decided to use and the complete series of linocut prints I did in my Printmaking class.
Creato / Illustration / 2022
