HILAZA
Hilaza refers to coarse or twisted threads made from leftover fabric. For me, it is both material and metaphor — a way of understanding memory, inheritance, and what remains.
This series began without a clear intention, emerging from the subconscious and shaped by the colors, textiles, and visual language I grew up around. Guatemala is its point of origin but not as a place fully known, instead as one remembered through fragments, patterns, and longing. Limited by time, space, and circumstance, I turned to what was physically around me: Guatemalan fabrics, paper, natural materials, and slow, hands-on processes.
The work brings together painting, cyanotype, collage, and handmade sculptural forms. Deep blues recur throughout the series, while textures and relief patterns draw from trajes típicos and their contemporary, commercial counterparts which usually have flowers and symbols. Materials are reused, soaked, layered, and reworked — allowing imperfection, repetition, and process to remain visible.
Like hilaza itself, these works are constructed from remnants. They hold together what is broken, inherited, and transformed, allowing new forms to emerge.
MORE PHOTOS COMING SOON
Abstract painting of white and pink flowers with dark background and brushstrokes.
Colorful fabric butterfly and insect mobiles hanging from the ceiling, casting shadows on a beige wall.
Close-up of a painted wooden surface with colorful vertical stripes and a red embroidered flower at the center.
Painting of three large colorful flowers with yellow centers, red and blue petals, and green stems with leaves, created with bold brush strokes.
Bright and colorful abstract painting of red, blue, and yellow flowers with green stems, created with bold brushstrokes.
A colorful abstract painting with large, vibrant leaves in various shades of pink, red, yellow, and purple against a blue background.
Colorful abstract painting with vivid yellow background, purple and red elements, and green accents.
Close-up of a sunflower with yellow petals and a dark center against a blue sky background.