Sandra - interview - off-camera 11/19/88

This is Sandra, off camera, Nagra interview, November 19.

Why don't you just give us your name so we have an extra item.

Just say it.

Sandra Anton Georgi.

It's easy.

Can you just tell us something about your background? I'm Puerto Rican.

I was born in Puerto Rico and I came to Chicago when I was one year old.

I've been here for a while.

I'm able to see everything else and I don't really grow up with Puerto Ricans.

I've never grown up with them.

I know more about Mexicans.

I know more about their attitudes.

I grew up with Mexicans instead of Puerto Ricans.

Is your family still connected to Puerto Rico? Yeah, they are.

I have a lot of family in Puerto Rico.

In the north side, my parents go down there all the time.

We have only one family here in Chicago.

That's who we really associate with.

I associate with everyone.

It's different for me.

Your door doesn't lock.

Just take the handle on the door and push it down.

That's what locks it.

Now just pull it.

Let me see if that worked.

Just pull it straight.

I want you to let Susan sit down.

This place is very echoing.

You'll notice when the elbow is by the underground.

Really? Yeah, that's right.

Oh, okay.

All right.

It's half read and half listen.

We have to sit very still.

We have to wait until she stops.

That's what I do.

Let's talk about the whole cultural thing.

Languages and different ways of looking at things between you and your parents.

Do you speak Spanish? I speak Spanish to them.

My Spanish isn't perfect, but we communicate both English and Spanish.

If I talk to them in Spanish, they'll answer me in English or Spanish.

If I talk to them in English, they'll answer me in Spanish.

We understand each other in both languages, so we speak both.

Do you feel there's a cultural difference between their perspectives and your perspectives? Sometimes there is.

Not all the time, but a lot of times, yeah, I think in a way I do.

There's just a lot of differences there.

Because they grew up in Puerto Rico and they expect different things from me.

I was raised here in Chicago, and it's a lot different from Puerto Rico.

Every time something goes wrong, they'll bring back what happened in Puerto Rico and things like that, and how different they are.

Things like that.

It's understandable.

How about your connection? What kind of feelings of connection do you have to Puerto Rico? I don't know much about the culture.

I know enough.

I feel that I should go back to Puerto Rico and study their culture more.

I think I should read a lot more books.

A lot, because I've gone there twice.

Plus the time I was born.

I've gone there twice.

It's beautiful.

It's a place that I want.

I would love to stay there.

But I don't think I know enough right now, and as an artist, I feel I should.

So it's different.

When did you first notice murals? When did I first notice them? Probably when I was in seventh grade, sixth grade, I started noticing them.

I didn't even know what they were.

I would just see paintings on them.

I was always interested in art as it was.

I'd look at them, but I wouldn't interpret them in any way.

I'd like them.

But it was really just there.

It was just a painting on a wall.

Do you remember some that you especially liked, and could you describe them for us? At that point, there was one on the north side.

I don't remember exactly where or what it was.

I liked a lot of the Tropic Islands and things.

It was one of palm trees and green grass, but it was just an advertisement for a store, some fruit store.

I liked that one a lot.

We'd always drive by it, and I'd always look at it and think how beautiful it was.

That's the one I remember the most that I liked at that time.

Later on, were there subjects or styles or things in the murals that you, really before you got involved, that you noticed or became interested in? The color of it always caught my attention.

I didn't know much about art, but I liked the color of any mural that was colorful.

It would always catch my attention, anything having to do with a lot of color.

One thing was when I was younger, I couldn't look at color too much.

It would get me dizzy.

I don't know why.

I couldn't look at it.

I didn't like painting.

I didn't like anything having to do with color, because it would just hurt my eyes.

But I would look at murals.

That was the only thing that I could look at without it disturbing me.

I couldn't color in a coloring book.

I never did that.

I just didn't like it.

I liked a lot of that.

I liked a lot of big faces on murals too.

Big bodies.

They take up the whole thing.

I liked that a lot.

That was what I liked when I was younger though.

It's a lot different now for me.

Now I view a lot on art having to do with the neighborhood.

What I look at a lot is artwork from Mexico.

Not from Mexico, but Mexican artists.

They'll do it with the people having a lot of pain in their eyes or being very poor.

I look at that a lot.

That's what I'm starting to look at more.

How do you interpret it? Right now in Little Village, that mural of Vince, he does a lot of Mexican artwork.

I think of it as having to do with 26th Street, having to do with how it is, because there's really a lot of Mexicans in there.

I think they're picking up.

I think they're starting to talk more and be more and notice a lot more about each other.

But before, I think most of the murals that I look at, it seems like before, there was so much pain and so much poverty and all these things.

But I think some of the murals are positive and they're starting to show how their people are standing up now at Little Village right now.

So the earlier ones were more about the pain and now you're seeing other things? Now I'm seeing more.

What kind of themes do you see now? As I go around, every time I go to a different neighborhood, I'm starting to see more positive things.

I'm seeing a lot of murals, Aztec murals.

I see that a lot.

A lot of places that I go, it's Aztecs, men with feathers and standing brave with some lady next to them or something.

And now it's starting to be more modern.

Now you see a Mexican person or Puerto Rican, whoever, and you see downtown and you see how they're dressed up more nice and they don't have all these things.

And you don't think a lot about their culture as much as they used to before.

How would you relate that to your own dreams and aspirations? Okay, what I want to do more in my artwork is more about Puerto Rico, more about how I was before and how it is now, or how I was before and how I am now.

I think that the murals from before, as well as Puerto Rican murals, they're the same because now they're picking up too.

I'd like to interpret it differently too.

I'd like to show how it is now, how people are now, and how I am now.

Because it influences me a lot, Puerto Rico.

And my artwork, I think I will do that.

I think what I really want to do is show people that we're starting to pick up, that Hispanics are getting.

You know, they're getting where they want to be.

They're not as low as people would say they were or things like that.

So you feel that, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but it seems as though what you're saying is you're trying to get a message about your people out to the community.

What are the main things that you want to say, at least now, that you want people to understand? Well, I wouldn't say exactly about Puerto Rico too.

Because what I think a lot about is the gangs and things like that.

And especially in the north side, when I go to the north side, sometimes I don't want to be there.

Sometimes there are just a lot of gangs.

And maybe it's because I go to the wrong parts.

But wherever I go, when I tell people they ask me what I am, I say I'm Puerto Rican.

They'll say something like, you guys are mean, you guys are tough, and always into gangs and things like that.

They have the wrong idea.

I think I'd like to interpret that differently.

Because it's not always that way for teenagers.

They're always thinking that Puerto Ricans are always talking a lot and starting fights or things like that.

That's what they tell me.

So I think I'd like to perceive that differently in their minds too, just as well.

Well, can you tell us the story of how you first got involved with murals? With painting? The farthest back that I could remember was probably in second grade.

I don't know what I was drawing, but I got a lot of attention for it.

And while I was in fourth grade, I remember drawing something that some girl drew better than me, and I got really upset.

Because she did it better than me.

So I tried picking it up and doing better than her.

Eighth grade, the same thing, someone did better.

And I don't know why I didn't like that.

And I started doing good artwork, and I started noticing that's what I wanted to do.

By the time I was in high school, I had met a lot of people at the Art Institute.

They spoke to me of murals, and I started realizing how is it to draw big? Because I was always drawing small.

I wouldn't even draw, I would draw pretty small, just regular sheet of paper.

And I started experimenting drawing on bigger paper, and I got the opportunity by Francisco Mendoza to draw on a mural.

And I was scared, because it's something I don't do.

I've never done it before.

But once you do it, it's something different.

It's like you can actually walk in there for the first time.

I wasn't actually looking at something and trying to see the detail.

I can walk in there.

I can do whatever I want, and I can make the viewer come in, or not even come in, or not want to come inside.

It was all what I wanted to do, because it was like their size.

They could see it, or even bigger, exaggerated.

So I started doing it in 1985, I think it was.

And I worked on one mural.

I designed the bookshelves.

It had something to do with education.

And then I started working on different ones, little by little.

And I ended up, the last one I worked on was Cooper School.

Because the office is always busy.

It was for the main office.

It's always busy.

And one time I went inside, and some lady says, What do you want? Or, Can I help you? Really mean.

And I was shocked.

I'm here to visit, at least you could do.

And they were always upset and throwing papers around.

And ladies would argue with each other.

The parents would argue with the teachers.

So I wanted to do something different for the school.

And I spoke to the principal.

She invited me, she wanted me to paint a mural for them.

So I ended up painting a mural having to do with the scene in Paris.

And it was real calm, a park.

I guess that's when I really showed them a part of me.

I really showed them how I think they should be.

And I think that's what I wanted to do.

I wanted them to feel a part of it.

So I think I did the right thing with that mural.

Because next time I went inside, everyone was calm.

And it made a difference.

I didn't think it would.

I thought it was just, maybe it will, maybe it won't.

But it did.

So that was the last mural I've worked on.

And I worked on that one by myself, which took a lot of time.

And I'm presently working on one at Curie High School.

It has to do with, this is something I want to do.

This is my kind of artwork, I think.

It has to do with gangs.

It has to do with drugs, pregnancies, teenagers, and graduation, and being a success.

So it was different roads.

And that's the one I'm presently working on right now.

And hopefully, at Curie, once this is presented, hopefully people will start looking at it, and maybe it will give them some type of message across to them.

But that's what I'm hoping for.

I don't know if it will work, but if it works for the office, it could just work at Curie, hopefully.

What do you think about the graffiti murals? I never liked them.

People liked them.

A lot of people would say, it's cool, or whatever.

I didn't like them too much.

Some of them had good messages, stay in school.

But I didn't think it was enough.

I didn't think that they should paint them everywhere, and people should make a big deal out of them and have them in actual exhibitions.

But in a way, it is their own artwork.

That's what they feel comfortable with.

But as in my opinion, I didn't feel that they were the greatest thing.

So it didn't always catch my attention to look at one.

Not much.

What did it feel like after seeing murals ever since you were a little kid, these huge murals, to all of a sudden one day be painting one? Well, to tell you the truth, the first time I did, I really couldn't sleep at night.

It was the biggest thing that ever happened to me.

I was so proud of it.

It made me smile every day.

It made me look forward to actually doing something like that.

I always thought about the people who would see it.

I always thought about how they thought about it.

It was a group of students working on it, but if they could actually look at mine and really let it outstand, I felt great the first time I worked on it.

I felt like an artist.

I felt like if I could say that I'm an artist.

It was hard for me to say that.

It was hard for me to say, I'm a true artist.

But once I started working on murals, I didn't mind calling myself an artist.

I didn't mind calling myself a good artist.

Do you have a few favorites in murals that you just think are absolutely the greatest that you can tell us about? I like them all.

I wish I could say that there was a favorite, but I don't have a favorite.

I like them all.

I'm always looking around at them.

No, I don't have a favorite one.

A favorite artist? That's alive today? Yeah.

Alive today? No.

Right now I look at all of them.

No, I don't have favorites right now in art.

I try not to.

The person I do look up to, her name is Bibi Ana Suarez.

She draws in pencil.

Huge, huge drawings.

They're beautiful and they have to do with her inside.

She's Puerto Rican too.

I suppose she's an artist that I look up to right now.

I do consider her my favorite because she draws everything having to do with Puerto Rico.

What she went through when she was young or how it is or her grandfather dying, but it always has something to do with Puerto Rico.

She's pretty much the one I like a lot.

When I do my artwork, I hear her telling me concentrate more on this because she used to tell me that a lot.

I met her and she would talk to me about it.

When I do my artwork having to do with pencil, I always hear her voice in me.

I would say her, Bibi Ana.

Do your parents or your brothers and sisters, do they ever talk about murals? Do they notice the murals? My sister, I would say.

My sister took a course in art, having to do something in art or teachings or I don't know what.

When we were young, she would always draw a figure of a lady and I would always draw the figure of a man.

We'd cut them out.

I always thought she was the best artist.

Suddenly, I started growing in art.

It wasn't an interest to her.

It was something she didn't care for.

She started writing.

She notices the most.

She looks at murals and says, do you see this mural by such and such person? She'll look at my murals and it's very rare because I think she's the best critic I have right now.

She'll tell me straight out what she thinks of it.

She's good at it.

My mom likes it a little.

She loves art, but she doesn't know how to interpret it too much or how to talk about an artist.

Say this person is good and this person isn't.

She has the touch for it, but she just has to let it all out.

Somehow, I think she has somewhat of an artist in her.

My brother, graffiti, but writing, gangs and stuff like that.

My father is just not really interested in it.

Maybe he's interested in it more than I think, but he doesn't give me the idea that he is.

My mom and my sister mostly, they have an artist in them where they can interpret it more too.

They understand me too, so that's good.

I guess I just have one last question, which is if right today or whatever someone gave you a great big wall in Little Village and all the supplies you needed for a mural, what would you paint? I'd want to get this message across because I'm trying as hard as I can.

I see all my friends just falling down.

I see all my friends ruined for life or shot right in front of me or shot right in front of my brother and things like that.

I would have to say something similar to the mural I'm working on right now.

Something huge, powerful, having to do with the Hispanic culture and how you can improve it.

How you can stop being in gangs or stop all these things that you're doing.

Have a career.

Don't think about falling in love all the time and just going with your man and letting him support you.

Be something that you want to be.

That's what I would normally do.

I think that's what I would focus on.

That's it.

I want to ask you something we talked about briefly when we were having breakfast that we just touched on here.

That has to do with the old murals and the way you felt about those, but then also the need for newer messages that related to people your age.

Could you just talk about that again? We didn't get that on tape.

The older murals, I felt they had to do a lot with how the people were suffering.

How the culture had just, they were all in pain.

They had just come from Mexico and they were trying hard to support themselves and things and how they were put down by a lot of people.

I feel that the newer murals now, they're starting to pick up.

You don't see that as much.

Now you seem to see in a mural, you see a Mexican or Puerto Rican person.

They'll have a nice suit on or something.

They'll have the skyline of Chicago and they'll have people working.

They don't have the pain in their eyes that they used to have.

They don't have the worry that they used to have now.

It's different.

I feel that's what I seem to interpret from it.

It's not as bad as it used to be.

I don't think it is.

Everything is just picking up for them.

They're just starting to work for it.

They're starting to be better in it.

Do you notice that people your age are looking for something different in a mural than say people your parents' age? What kind of different messages do you think that age groups are looking for? Sometimes a lot of people will tell me about that.

They'll say that parents think differently.

They'll think in the olden times.

They'll think about what I think is probably cutting their corn or everything having to do with how they worked in Mexico or how they worked in Puerto Rico or wherever they're from.

They would tell me a lot about it.

They'd say maybe I should do something more modern.

Maybe I should do something like that.

I've got a lot of people telling me that.

Maybe that's what they look for.

They look for something more modern, different styles instead of having to do everything with people sad or something.

A lot of friends of mine like a lot of modern art.

I like all of it, so I wouldn't say to change it.

Maybe a little bit, but not too much.

I never really ask them what they think.

They'll just come up to me and tell me, maybe you should change that a little.

Or maybe, don't you think those artists should do this and this and that? Different things like that.

Are there different messages for different age groups in the murals? I don't think so.

I get the same message and my mom would get the same message and my sister.

Maybe sometimes there are.

Maybe the younger group can't relate to the older murals or the murals that older people paint.

Maybe they just don't see all those problems.

Maybe they're just thinking about today only and they're not thinking about what it was like before, what's going to happen to them in the future.

Maybe they don't.

But with me, I guess I think about it all.

Some of my friends are just closed minded or some of the people that I see around are not like that.

Maybe that could be it.

You mentioned that the one at Cooper, you could really see a difference once you painted the mural.

Are there other murals? That's a pretty remarkable thing.

You don't think of that many paintings in public places or something like that.

Are other murals around town having some kind of impact on the way people are looking at themselves in your community? I don't think so.

Not right now.

I don't see too much of a difference.

I see the neighborhood looking nicer.

I see more people concerned in it.

I see more people looking at more murals, stopping in looking at them and not as much graffiti and a lot more respect for artists.

But not really.

I don't think so.

Maybe it doesn't change too much for what I see.

I don't think so right now.

Do you have something you want to ask, Susan? I guess the only thing would be I'm just too interested in the kinds of comments you get from people.

For example, you're a little manicurist.

Did you talk to them? Yeah, we did a little.

Yeah, I like when people come up to me and they'll comment on something.

At first it used to hurt like crazy if they used to say something bad about my artwork.

It used to kill me.

But now I'll take their ideas and I'll make something of it.

If they're doing it to be obnoxious or to be rude, then I'll know when they are and when they're not.

But otherwise, I take people's ideas and I use them.

I like to see someone come up to me and say, I don't know about that because people today don't even think about it or they don't even deal with it.

But I like that.

I use it.

I use it in my artwork.

I use a lot of people's views in it too.

I think it's neat that they come up and say, it's just talking about the pregnant, why is there someone pregnant in here and why is there violence? Yeah, we got a lot of that.

They didn't want to see that.

They wanted to see the sweet things of the world.

They didn't want to see what's happening.

That's the impression I got.

Now were these people your age or teachers and administration? One teacher and the rest of them were my age.

Most of them were my age.

I don't know about the older people.

They haven't seen it.

When it goes up, when we actually display the mural probably in about two more months and then I'll be able to see other people's reactions.

I don't know how they're going to be, but it should be something positive.

I think it's a mural that you should look at and interpret.

It's something that you won't stay and look at and say, I wonder what it means because it's so obvious.

It's something you think about, success.

Success is written all over it.

It's not really written there, but that's what you think of.

That's the thing you should think of when you look at that mural.

I'm trying to help everyone.

I'm trying to help the students just be someone.

I see so many people just going away.

It's something you have to do something about it.

That's what I'm trying to do.

Hopefully if I do get more murals to work on or things like that, that's what I'll do.

Anything else you want to tell us about at this particular time? What can I say? We don't have to.

We just thought we'd been asking so many questions.

Hopefully if you guys see the rest of my artwork, if I keep on building it up, maybe you will see what I'm trying to say.

Maybe you won't hear it, but you'll see it.

You'll see the difference in what I'm trying to do.

That's it.

I'd really like to come see them.

Are there any images that you use a lot that you didn't work on? What images do you find that you will stop and do well? I use a lot of hand gestures.

Before in my artwork, when I first started, I would use the fist or a hand open or clutched or something to show an emotion.

A fist would have to do with something powerful.

My hand being like this shows tension and something's bothering me.

That was one thing I would use a lot.

Then I started using the expression on people's faces a lot.

Right now, what I'm starting to use in most of my artwork is gesture.

A lot of people, different gestures.

One gesture will tell you a lot about the person.

Even if it's a few lines, you'll see what they're doing and how they feel and the pain that they're in or the pain that they're not in.

I think the symbol that I would use the most was the hands and the eyes.

It's actually a really interesting point because so many people's hands are a lot in the mirror.

It's really true.

Hands can be painful.

That's what I would always use.

You keep talking about how you're different than with pain.

Why is there so much pain? Most of my artwork has to do with pain because when I was younger I went through a lot.

Everything that I went through was the most painful thing that I think I'd ever go through.

Everything that I draw has to do with that.

Even if I don't want it to, something has to be there having to do with pain.

If I have happiness, I don't know how, just somewhere there if you look at it and you interpret the strokes it'll look like something pretty anxious or painful or something.

I don't know if that's good or bad right now.

I'm trying to make it look different.

I'm trying not to use my strokes so rough and to give that impression.

I think inside of me that's what I get.

Not that I'm a mad person every time but I'm always in a cheerful mood.

Even if I'm in the best mood in the world, somewhere in there you see the tension.

Anything I draw you see the tension, especially in the eyes.

I try to draw a real happy eye but you can see the tension in it.

Maybe subconsciously, maybe I'll do it without even knowing.

Is this pain from really personal things that have happened to you or is it something that you share with a lot of people? It's personal.

A couple people my age know about it.

If they see my artwork, they'll notice it.

My best friend notices it all the time.

She'll look at my artwork and people won't notice it but she'll detect it, she'll point at it and she'll say, Sandra, she'll point it out.

I can't say anything about it.

I'll just agree with it or I won't agree.

Sometimes I just hide it in.

But it's there, something there.

Maybe one day it'll go away.

Maybe one day it'll stop bothering me.

But my artwork isn't like that anymore.

It's not as painful or whatever you want to call it.

It's slowed down.

But you also said that you see pain in a lot of the older girls.

Yeah, I tend to do that.

I tend to see it.

I think that a lot of people went through that.

When I think about it, my mom, my family, other people's families, they went through so much.

Whenever I look at a mural, that's what I see, the expression in their eyes.

I see the hands.

I see people kneeling down and begging a lot of times.

They'll look at you straight in the eye but you see it in their eyes.

You see the expressions in them.

Most of the murals I look at, that's what I see.

Except the ones that younger kids do.

That's what I tend to see.

Hardly any are not like that, that I know.

So when you say they went through a lot, for someone who isn't familiar with that area, what are you talking about? What did they go through? I don't know what they went through.

I think maybe having to do with the poverty or maybe having to do with the freedom they didn't get.

Maybe that put them through a lot of stress and they were trying to fight for their freedom and that could be it.

Because I look at books on murals and that's what I see.

I've never really seen books on Puerto Rican murals though.

Barely ever in the north side.

I'm not sure if that's what they are but the few that I've seen, it's like that.

That's the interpretation I get from it.

I do think that's in a lot of Mexican murals.

A lot of pain.

Okay, well that's my question.

Unless you have something else you want to talk about.

That'll be fine.