by Shelby Hammack
In the second week of February of 2025, Valdosta State University’s Dedo Maranville Fine Art Gallery hosted Chico Sierra’s The Good Sun exhibition. In the beginning of the week, the visiting artist, originally from El Paso, Texas, performed live mural painting in the gallery, open for art and design students to view and converse with the artist. From start to finish, Sierra completed his 65” x 15’ painting, Slow Collisions, acrylic on canvas, prior to the opening of the exhibition. On opposing sides of the canvas, two bodiless heads, both appearing to be female, float in the vibrant pattern stained void. The two forces, facing each other, appear to collide in the near center of the canvas. In watching the development of the mural, Sierra moved about the canvas without evident rhyme or reason, which he claims is a regular practice in his artistic process.1 While being the largest in dimension, Slow Collisions is only one of many in “The Good Sun” Exhibition; though this mural captures his central area of work, the larger majority of the exhibition illuminates a central theme among his work.
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