Art is a Waste of Time.

But then again, so is: Blowing bubbles, staring into puddles, petting a dog, kissing your beloved.

Equally inefficient are the acts of: Tickling a babies’ feet, shit-talking with a likeminded friend, listening to Coltrane, or Sabbath, or Hank Williams.

Or the slow and easy summer lethargy of eating strawberries in the heat that radiates from a riverbank. 2:00 p.m. on a Sunday with nowhere to be.

This is where the energy of art and creativity live. In the throw-away moments that don’t move the plot forward in any significant way.

After March of 2020, it was as if time itself ceased to exist. With it went

people-pleasing, and the tireless need to find deeper meaning.

Because in the end, all that is left is getting back to these moments.

Finding joy and peace in the every day. And not taking it all so very seriously.

Because the alternative is a reality too confounding to contemplate,

In a timeline too alien to be real.

You’ll find all of this in my work:

The rich vividness of humanity and nature,

The quiet and naked darkness of horror,

The beauty of color for colors sake.

Thank you for looking.

About the Artist:

Magdalena is a classically trained figurative artist from Santa Cruz, CA.

Her work explores painting and drawing moments in time, and aims at capturing a glimpse of humanity through the elements of light, shadow, reflections, and color.

Magdalena’s work begins primarily from photo source, rendered in the mediums of watercolor, ink, soft pastel, and oil paint.

Compelled to create images that speak to the myriad of human emotions— from serenity, to terror, to wonderment, her work spans broadly across varied subject matter, both light and dark.

Healing from trauma through the creative process has revealed that human beings are really capable of anything, both beautiful and horrifying, and she hopes to convey the dizzying range of what that contrast can look like in her art.

Consistency in the work is achieved by focusing on common design elements rather than subject matter. In this way, there is beauty in everything when taken objectively.

*Magdalena holds a Bachelors in Fine Arts (pictorial arts concentration) from San Jose State University, 2011