HUES OF HUMANITY - JADEN D. BLANGO

Jaden D. Blango is a figurative artist with a concentration on graphite and charcoal drawing. For Jaden, creating art is an inevitable practice. "Asking why I make art is to ask me, 'Why do you walk?' Because I was given the capacity to walk, so I may go where I please."

The artist began drawing early in life when his older sister introduced him to anime. "She would draw these great faces and expressions and I thought it was the coolest thing ever. I started drawing manga characters over and over all the way up until high school." His interests quickly shifted toward the depiction of real-life scenes and forms, and he began teaching himself new skills from drawing books, including The Natural Way to Draw by Kimon Nicolaïdes. "Because I didn't have the chance to take an art class in high school, I would rush to finish my schoolwork so that I could read and draw what was being explained to me," he says.

As an artist, Jaden intends to walk a poetic art path that leads him to "all the earth's children and the fruits of man's burdens, in hopes of one day being able to temper knowledge with instinct and mark with surface." His drawings aim to explore a view of humanity as tired and decaying, and strive to tell the stories of "once-magnificent creatures of God who have grown to exhaust their beauty."

Jaden pulls inspiration from artists such as Jacopo Pontormo, Megan Hildebrand, and Andrea Del Sarto. He cites his favorite UTRGV professor, Rigoberto Gonzalez, as a mentor who has fostered his artistic development over the last two years. Lastly, he expresses his gratitude to his good friend and locally acclaimed artist, Josue Garcia, for giving him the opportunity to participate in his first art show in October 2019, "which I will never forget."

Jaden is an active supporter of the #BlackLivesMatter movement. "To me, the movement simply means that my existence is not trivial. I am not to walk around with a target painted on my back for the bull of injustice to run me through. I am a human with a soul and a purpose." He hopes this political climate will encourage open dialogue in the RGV and wants to see more people expressing themselves. "Most people that I have met here have such an interesting story to tell."

Figurative drawing is a lifelong venture for Jaden. "I want to become a scribe for the earth, to detail the world that exists as I know it," he tells us, "So that one day, when I do die, I can recount what became of the world that was made before I came and stayed after I left."

Scroll down to browse Jaden's works.