Vanesa Rodriguez del Rey

I was born in Cuba in 1983. I started drawing at the age of three helped by my grandmother who was an artist as well. This continued through elementary school and then high school, winning several competitions. After high school, I enrolled in San Alejandro Academy of Fine Arts in Havana. During the four years I spent there, my work was exhibited in two student shows. In the year 2001 I moved to the United States, enrolled then in Miami Dade College with Art as my major. In 2005 my work was chosen to appear in the Miambiance magazine, the 40th student show at Kendall Campus where I won third prize, the League of Innovation competition in which a National Merit was awarded to me and finally I was granted the Frances Wolfson Scholarship for art students this spring.

Human figures are the main subject in my work. I rely on them to express feelings and situations that surround me. My work extends from simple studies of the model to ideas of my own. Currently I am very interested in the phases of change. How people change, how their lives change, how nothing stays the same. Us humans grow and transform both naturally and intentionally consequently leading to a chain of alterations. I approach this matter by the use of a traditional painting style, realism from the 19th century in a modern setting.