An Interview With Mercedes Llanos

Mercedes Llanos' artistic practice explores the surreal connections between our dream worlds and the realities of waking life. Drawing from her experiences growing up in a South American patriarchal environment, her work often examines power dynamics in domestic relationships. Through her paintings, Llanos navigates themes of repressed freedom, both personal and transgenerational. Her intriguing imagery presents a complex interplay of tension and tenderness, often blurring the lines between pleasure and pain, love and hate.

Can you tell us a little bit about you?

I was born in Argentina, the coastal town of Mar del Plata, and growing up I moved to different countries and cities. I moved to the US as a teenager and it was a very challenging and shaping experience that moulded me as an artist. I currently live in New York, I love to surf and play soccer. I have a baby boy who is one year old, and I’m currently exploring the world as a mother and an artist with all its challenges and possibilities.

You mention your upbringing and its influence on your work, particularly regarding patriarchal structures. Could you elaborate on how specific experiences or observations from your upbringing have shaped your artistic vision?

As I said earlier, moving to a different country with a different culture, forced me to see life through two different lenses. I lived in a typical Argentinean, patriarchal, household, but in the suburbs of Bible Belt America, Tennessee. Two absolutely opposing lifestyles in on setting. I have to say, that despite really hating living in the US, specifically, Tennessee, I joined an all women’s soccer team and saw a more equal treatment between genders than was seen in my country of origin. I questioned the upbringing I was receiving, with my mother as a housewife without any kind of autonomy, in a country and a city where she didn’t even speak the language. She couldn’t navigate and would spend most of her time at home, cooking, cleaning, raising her kids, and shopping. My mother had me when she was just turning 21 with her first boyfriend, she then divorced and met my stepdad years later, whom which she had three more children. Me, being the oldest of the four, had to help my mother a lot with childcare and housework, and saw from first person perspective, sexism in our household. I always told myself I never wanted this for myself, and I find myself now repeating some of the same patterns, that I gratefully am able to work out in my paintings and connect with other people going through similar things.

How did your move to New York City influence your perspective on these themes, and how has it impacted your art?

Moving to New York, made me feel very small at first, and then gave me much more autonomy. Seeing the artworks I most admired in person is one of the things that shaped me as an artist the most. I can tell from paintings that transmitted all kinds of emotions from others that seemed fake. I never wanted to make a “fake” painting.

You focus on power roles in domestic partnerships. How do you visually represent these power dynamics in your work? What visual cues do you use to convey the tension and ambiguity you describe?

I have been using my recollection of dreams for the imagery in my work. I am a very calm person, sometimes even submissive, but in my dreams, I scream, fight, cry, and am completely unhinged. I love that aspect of my dream self. It’s like an alter ego, that leaves me thinking when I wake up. It’s myself forcing me to workout my issues, I wake up with a clear mind, sometimes anguished, with tears in my eyes, other times in rage. Back to your questions, these dreams put me in a powerful position, that I enjoy painting. I fight with my partner, and the father of my son, for equality and power. I like to use color fields and drawing in the painting to create a perpetual movement of push and pull, showing conflicting imagery, opposing forces, polarity, and mostly showing double or even triple meaning in one piece.

How do you depict the connections, or perhaps the breaks, between different generations of women in your art?

I recreate images or scenes, from experiences I have had, in dreams or waking life, that directly mimic the way my mother acted or grandmother. My grandmother, was also an artist and I feel a strong connection with her, and her suffering.

What do you hope viewers take away from your paintings?

I hope they can Connect, and feel like the painting is speaking to them.

Are there any new themes or directions you're interested in exploring in the future?

I am exploring motherhood now, and all its challenges. Being in a relationship while having a child. The relationship with the child. The joy and sorrows of it all.

Are there any South American artists who have particularly influenced your work?

Grete Stern and Leonor Fini

What is your favourite book or film and why?

A brave New World by Aldous Huxley. I just really love all the themes within the book. Dystopia seems to be closer and closer to the reality we are going towards.

Are you working on any projects you are particularly excited about?

I’m doing this massive drawings that are super exciting to me, as well as keeping on pushing paint and drawing towards my own language.

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