Known to the world as Agana, internationally acclaimed artist Vanessa Solari Espinoza is a multi-dimensional contemporary mural artist.
Of Venezuelan descent and hailing from the San Francisco Bay Area, Agana gives public walls vibrant life with her iconic pictorial imagery, bold aesthetics, bursting colors, textual calligraphic gestures and form. At the intersection of graffiti and fine art practices she communicates common social threads via monumental vision.
Rooted in her Latinx identity as part of the larger American experience, AGANA also translates the artistic mural process into fruitful community-building strategies. She cultivates new leaders in the field via workshop and mentoring with the tools to transform lives through intentional, relevant art.
Her layered storytelling style bridges thought provoking visibility to otherwise marginalized experiences while stimulating transformative conceptualism for diverse viewers through visual linguistics via spray patterns, gradients, drips, and blended mixed medium.
With a background in graphic design and jewelry metal arts, AGANA received a BAS in Visual Effects from Ex’pression College for Digital Art in 2008 working in the film, animation and video game production industries. Prolific in her production, AGANA creates platforms for successful global art projects found on city buildings across the Americas and worldwide from Switzerland to Senegal.
“All the walls built around us are made to separate us, but when we tell our stories – speak our truths – they bring us together and make us sacred and connected. ”
Agana, “Madre Tierra de mi Corazon,” 2018
Agana’s art first appeared at Brava back in 2018, when Brava commissioned her to create the mural “Madre Tierra de mi Corazon” on the east-side gate of our newly opened storefront. The work appeared in our 2018 Baile en la Calle: The Mural Dances, and has become beloved by Brava and the neighborhood alike. This past July Brava had the opportunity to engage Agana again, in the creation of “Brava Breaths Palabra.” Commissioned by Brava! for Women in the Arts with support from our neighborhood partner, Acción Latina, for the July 16, 2020 Paseo Artístico: Art is Collective Action, “Brava Breaths Palabra” honors our nation’s ancestral heritage and the generations of Black and Indigenous women who have given heart, breath, and life to this land.
At the mural’s unveiling on September 7, Agana read an artistic statement she had prepared for the event. The whole of which can be read here.
Several special guest artists contributed to the creation of “Brava Breaths Palabra,” including Shishi Madriz, Toons One, Sonia G, and Josue Rojas Art. They and their work are included in the slideshow below (Photos by Agana).
