Photo of La Mexica, Mexican Indigenous Woman wearing Danza Atuendo with tribal paint adorned on her face standing Strong, Fierce, Resilient, Fearless because she is Brown and Proud.
Visual Artist/Model: Maricella Herrera 
Photographer: Pallavi Sharma


#EMPOWERFUL

A photograph at the George Floyd memorial, two women travel through the melange of graffiti and sidewalk memorabilia.  The colors are intense, the business of the imagery matches the speed at which the women seem to be moving.  These are women of color cruising through an event that addresses the legacy and the death of a man of color. 

Overhshadowed with no time to breath

Center focus: a white tulip whose petals form a perfect star.  Soft green leaves surround it.

White Tulip Star

Black and White Photomontage of a determined woman rowing a boat across Lake Superior with ominous clouds ahead. 

Lake Superior Strong

Photograph of six people wearing COVID masks standing socially distanced on the green grass in front of the stone Fort Snelling Round Tower with a white construction trailer for the new visitor center in background downtown Minneapolis on the skyline under thick dark clouds. Three people are wearing WWII attire consisting of dark green wool men's Army uniform, khaki Women's Air Corps (WAC) uniform, dark blue men's suit. The other three are in modern clothing of bright yellow sweater, blue plaid shirt, and green sweater. All are wearing COVID masks in red, yellow, black, tan, and blue.

Fort Snelling Round Tower - Commemorating 200 Years from Cornerstone to COVID

Tongue-in-cheek reimagining of an ancient sculpture I saw at Mia with my face superimposed as Serapis. The collage is overlaid on the marble sculpture, with a regal purple backdrop, and digital "paint" added over original detail.

The Old Me

Black and white photograph of a memorial on the side of CUP FOODS in Minneapolis, MN, in the aftermath of George Floyd's death. A sign simply saying "ENOUGH" attached to a brick wall with tape, a hand-held sized American flag placed behind the sign, having fallen while still being held onto to one corner of the sign via the tape.

ENOUGH

A photographic print on metallic paper of a scene on the Gokyo-Everest Trail in Nepal, depicting Mount Everest and Ana Dablam.

Mountain Duo

Reflection of the sky in the creek snow covers  the trees and ground.  

Reflection

A digital photograph of the words "white silence is violence" spray painted on a paved road, emphasized by a shadow overlaying the words.

White Silence is Violence

Fall butterfly

A photography of a recliner, covered in rain, sitting along a roadside near a bus stop.  Signs behind the chair read "No Outlet" and "Private Road".  A few red survey flags split the distance between them.

Roadside Assistance

A photo of a dock extending out to a fog-filled lake.

Lower Hay Lake 

A photograph of a two lane road, to the right is a sidewalk that is fenced off, in front of the fence is a sign that reads sidewalk closed. in the background are a couple of apartment buildings and the sky is bright blue with clouds.

sign of the times

Two rough-hewn hands holding a white textured stone in a pose suggesting an offering, against a black background with the text: Migration, rio bravo-rio grande centered directly beneath the hands/stone. 

Terra Offerings - Migration / rio bravo - rio grande

a young auburn-haired woman, mid laugh, standing in the middle of a snowy forest in northern Minnesota.

Snowangel

A vertical window glows with yellow early morning light, surrounded by soft darkness.  Printed on Thai mulberry rice paper, the image becomes delicate and subtle. 

Soki's Room

A hearse from a junkyard which has been lighted using light painting on location by photographer. Multiple images from each colored light (blue and red) have been layered on top of one another to create the final image.

LastRyde

A photo collage of graffiti-painted boarded-up windows on Hennepin Avenue South in Minneapolis, my neighborhood.

A Quilt for George Floyd

A photographic portrait of a mannequin dressed in a red and white plaid cowboy shirt and a white cowboy hat. She has a placid expression on her face behind dark sunglasses. In the background is a bustling outdoor art fair under blue skies with fluffy white clouds.

Cowgirl Dummy

A photograph of a mountain lion who's snow white against a purplish background mouth open with big white sharp teeth.

Snowpiercer

Black and white photo of man holding an axe in one hand and a lantern raised in the other looking pensively off frame in the dark, searching for something the viewer cannot see.

Don't Look Behind You

Rustic light brown wooden framed lush summer view over the Mississippi River front at Munsinger Gardens. Foreground's white and orange flowers frame the trees, inviting the viewer into opposite shore's reflected foliage in the river's lighten embrace.

Mystical Munsinger, St. Cloud, Minnesota

A long exposure, single shot, of the moon rising in the east amongst the stars and clouds over Meadowlands MN.  Taken during the Perseid Meteor Showers, in the "blue hour" of night time photography.

Moonrise over Meadowlands

A black-and-white photograph of a double bed covered with old family photographs which are laid out neatly over the entire bed. 

Family Photos

A photograph of fallen red "fruit" and leaves from a tree into water on the concrete. 

Aspiring Cherries

An image from the Acropolis Museum, Athens. A classical sculpture is on the left. To the right, three benches with human forms worn into the wall behind them. Human ghosts inhabiting the luminous space below the Acropolis

A History of Western Civilization

Minneapolis Mill City Museum as seen during an early morning blizzard.

Mill City

I arranged and photographed my spoon collection as part of a 100-day creativity project that I undertook this year. Some of the most rewarding and enjoyable projects from that time were curating and capturing collections. The images will last forever but the creative exercise of artistically arranging objects was fleeting. I actually didn't realize that I had such a large spoon collection until I started looking for spoons to photograph after uncovering a few unusual ones in the depths of my kitchen drawers. Collections abound.
 

Spoon Collection

Image of an orange and white koi fish swimming through a dark pond, rippling the water. 

A photograph of a woman with her eyes closed, holding a glowing, yellow moon. In the background is star filled sky. 

#EMPOWERFUL, 2020

Maricella Herrera