East Austin studio tours was mostly a bust this year (for obvious reasons) but one standout event, Too Broke for Canopy, was hugely successful. It was put on by local artist and organizer @inkcolor.
Today we continue our Cosmic Collaborator Series with Jair Piñeros, a painter, digital, artist and cofounder of Unknown Collective. He’s originally from Colombia and moved to Austin from Boulder CO 3 years ago.
Jair is one of those people you connect with right off the bat, and we’ve been inviting him to create and collaborate ever since! Swipe to learn more about him and watch out for his work beautifying our feed all week.
What’s your full name, pronouns, and IG handle?
Jair Piñeros, he-him, @inkcolor
When did you move to Austin?
I moved to Austin 3 years ago
What is your primary medium or other mediums you like to create in?:
Right now I would say it is oil, but I really do anything and everything… pretty much anything that makes a mark I’ll use to make art.
So many of us are multi-media…. If you had to survive on Art Island with just one artistic tool/prop/object what would it be?
My iPad I love to work digitally. I love the flexibility of digital work and also the fact that I can explore ideas and concepts that in real life would be too expensive for me. Even my non digitally pieces are planned digitally everything I do has a touch of digital work.
How did you first hear of Art Island?
I met Maria at Polis a couple weeks before the COVID era started. She told me about artisland and I asked her to participate in one of them
How did you get involved in Art Island?
My first art Island was one of the Quarantine editions y’all made thru Zoom. I was doing live portraits of people that sent me their selfies.
Where and when did you show work or collaborate with the team?
Multiple QT artislands and the latest artisland that we did in person I worked on an oil piece.
How has your artistic flow during quarantine/COVID times/The ‘rona been?
I always feel bad answering these kinds of questions because I know how hard the pandemic has been to everyone, especially artists in Austin, but I haven’t been hit nearly as much or as hard as many of my friends. Plus I thrive in isolation just as much as I thrive working with people. So really my creative process hasn’t being affected
What’s your favorite artistic expression/project/life-giving experience you’ve had during this time?
Definitely it was the “Too Poor For Canopy”show it all started as this idea I had of putting a couple of pieces in my front yard then I realized I had the space to incite more people and I invited Marcella (@marcellaispainting) the we realized we still had more space and if we built/got wall we could´ve accommodate more artists and some vendors as well the within a couple of weeks the idea grew from me putting a couple of pieces to an even showing art of more than 25 artists that left $17,500 in total revenue all of which went directly to the artists. We didn’t charge comisión or entry fee to artists showing or vending because this year more than any other year seems ridiculous and downright cruel to do so.
What brings you life during the ‘rona?
Painting, and creating in general, also Marcella and I founded Unknown Collective (@_unknownvollective) to create more art events to help the art community.
Favorite Austin gallery/venue/art collective… basically who should we be paying attention to??
Unknown Collective we have many cool projects prepared for 2021
What do you want most for 2021?
A solo show but before that I need to paint a lot more
What do you want to create in 2021?
More events like too poor for canopy show
What do you want to see Art Island do in 2021?
Tbh all I want is a full blown in person Art Island event… I’ve never was part of one before the covid era so I never got to experience what you guys can do without restrictions (fingers crossed will have a vaccine and we all be able to go back to normal)
Where can we find your work: (online or IRL)
In my Instagram at @inkcolor
About
The Cosmic Collaborator Series is a month-long takeover featuring Art Island collaborators from different artistic worlds. We’ll be exploring their art and attitude in the time of the ‘rona. They’ll share their words, their work, and they’ll takeover our stories to showcase a way that they express their art.