Life/Death/Life: Vexta in Mexico City
fluoro checks in with Vexta on her recent Neon Tour global adventure, and her series in Mexico.
Initially leaving her mark in Melbourne, Australia Vexta has since created artworks on walls in cities worldwide including Paris, Sydney, Bogota and San Francisco.
Her most recent venture has seen her immersed in the culture of Mexico. Her initial travels to Mexico in 2012 left her with the burning desire to return to paint a piece she felt belonged in the centre of the creative district of Condesa and Roma in Mexico City.
(f) Tell us more about your time in Mexico?
(V) I spent a couple of months travelling across Central Mexico. I painted a wall in Mexico City, a large skull in Oaxaca for Day of the Dead Festival, a skeleton bird by the sea in Puerto Escondido and another on the Caribbean coast in Tulum.
(f) What was it like for a street artist in Mexico?
(V) Mexico has a long history of muralists and I feel like they truly value the importance of the emotive power of art in their everyday life. It is special and hard to explain but something you experience when you are there.
(f) Why did you choose Mexico City for the home of a prominent piece?
(V) I chose Mexico City because the idea for the painting had originally came to me when I was there last year. I was painting the same character on a canvas for an exhibition in India and while I was in Mexico City I kept thinking how awesome she would look painted on a wall there. I also knew that in Mexico City nobody would be concerned by the fact that she is essentially naked. Even though the detail in the nudity is subtle, it is there and it is four stories high.
(f) What was your experience like?
(V) It was definitely hard work. I didn’t have adequate scaffolding and was right by a main road so the pollution was quite intense. One morning I arrived to start painting and climbed up the scaffolding only to realise that it had moved by a few feet, we couldn’t figure out how it happened. We asked around and then examined the ground and discovered that during the night someone had driven a massive crane into the car park to install a huge electronic billboard right next to where I was painting. The weight of the crane had essentially pushed the tarmac like it was cake mix and moved the entire scaffolding a few feet on to unstable ground. This experience was pretty dangerous and scary.
On the other hand, some amazing people appeared out of nowhere to help me during my time creating artworks. One man lost his wallet nearby to where I was painting; when he discovered that a worker in the car park where I was working had found it he decided it was his karmic duty to help. The man turned up early in the morning everyday and stayed until nightfall, helping out with anything and everything. Incredible. That is Mexico in a nutshell; amazing things seem to happen all the time. Some of these things are extremely good, while others are dangerous and crazy.
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The energy of Vexta’s process in the creation of the large painted wall in Mexico City, has been captured in a film that you can see here. The film highlights the way Vexta’s work has found its place amongst the rich and vibrant culture of Mexico. A soundtrack that evokes the project’s vitality accompanies the moving image.
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