Featured Artist L. BaLoMbiNi

Mixed media artist L. BaLoMbiNi creates both abstract and narrative art in her New Mexico studio. Learn more by visiting her website.

 

 

I have always been an artist.

 

 

When I was seven, I painted goose egg shells tied with ribbon and took them door to door at Easter. I wanted to buy fabric to sew my own clothes and figured this way I could make what I wanted. I agreed to teach pottery to my fellow students if my high school art teacher would allow me to acquire a wheel, kiln and clay as I was bored with drawing and calligraphy (her favorite). The football team and I became art friends.

 

 

Even now as I am painting or working on mixed media sculpture, I continue to seek out other materials just to keep the exploration part of creativity alive and healthy.

 

 

I moved with my disabled adult son from Maine to New Mexico in 2015 after his father passed away. I knew I would have a hard time going solo in the Maine winters. Both Maine and New Mexico are solitary places, beautiful and full of artists and great thinkers.

 

 

There are junctures when artists are at a place to choose which direction their work is headed—I am at that place.

 

 

Although we try not to be swayed by our audiences, it’s naive to think that we don’t need to produce work that sells versus work that has more social content. They are not always both.

 

 

That rule of “body of work” does not seem to apply to all of us. Exhibitions call for one type of work, while the work we produce for the market is another. Sometimes it’s as if we are two artists trying to meld into one.

 

 

I am finding my way with gallery space changes and holding classes at the studio. I’m working on acquiring the skills to share myself virtually as well.

 

 

It would be rewarding to think that I can relax a bit and just create art that is both meaningful and pays the bills. But I believe that an artist’s new reality is such that more than ever we must be proactive in promoting work, teaching, sharing, making videos and so forth. It’s an endless job, especially for a single woman with a son who still needs home care.

 

 

My work is either abstract or narrative with a fondness still for folk art and storytelling. The desert has gifted me many tales to tell.

 

Featured Artist L. BaLoMbiNi invites you to follow her on Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and Saatchi Art.

 

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