Octubre 2004

JULIAN A. TOUCEDA: a great Hondurean American artist in New Orleans

The paintings of Julian Touceda reach back to the natural beauty of his native Honduras and forward to a time of social harmony, when humankind has evolved beyond its cultural walls and won the struggle for freedom. His brightly colored works deserve careful scrutiny; in them, symbols like mangos, hummingbirds, flags and bilingual graffiti carry clear meanings that point starkly to the violence, greed and betrayal of the modern world and place these works squarely within the realm of social realism. 

Julian, a full time artist, emigrated with his family to New Orleans at age 6, yet his ideals of truth and beauty refer back to his earliest years in Tela, Hon-duras, where he gathered mangos in his grandmother's back- yard and freely wandered behind it to the shores of a river and the Caribbean Sea. These images, along with exotic birds, plants, and memories of his childhood, appear in all of his works. 
Despite the beauty of Honduras, it was controlled by foreign plantation owners and political dictatorships. The Touceda family, part Creole Spanish and part Mestizo indian, landed in New Orleans and the suburbs of Kenner in 1960. Unable to speak English, Julian communicated in school by drawing beautiful pictures of his homeland. Through a program for gifted children, he spent haft of his high school days studying art at Delgado Community College and graduated in fine art from (UNO) The University of New Orleans in 1980. 

While studying Eurocentric art, Julian grew out of his cultural roots. In the 1980s and early 1990s, he relearned the Spanish language and his cultural identity while living in New Orleans, New York, and Miami. Along the way, he picked up the self confidence and courage to speak out about injustice. In 1996, Univision Spanish Network aired throughout the U.S. and Latin America a documentary on Julian's artwork, focusing on his willingness to make political statements and the not so subtle demand, in his paintings, for social justice. 

In 1992, the year of the Quincen-tennial, Julian’s paintings shifted into the vibrant primary colors of Latin America and the American flag. "I didn't intend to contrive a color pattern," Julian says. "Rather, after the process of Hispanicization, I was combining with Americanization to blend together into one culture and that is the culture of art." 

"The Courtship"

Other interesting notes include the artist's use of large squares to focus on a storyline and small square patterns that greatly add vibrance; his use of matte board to apply subtle texturing; and the graffiti messages that add verbal dimensions to the paintings and clarify their message. A quick note about the presence of writing: In some paintings, huge vertical or horizontal words are titles of a series, like Arte America, a visual trilogy based on the artist concept of Art, and Culture that focus on the social history of the Hispanic race in the United States, and their Pan American commonality in the Americas.

 

"The Secret Garden"

TOUCEDA has had exhibitions of his paintings throughout the South. Many of his works are in private collections in the United States, Spain, Germany, and Latin America. He has garnered enthusiastic reviews for the many notable exhibitions he has held at prominent galleries and art centers.
TOUCEDA's works convey his mastery of the technical skills of his profession as well as the fullness of his individual experiences. His astute and illuminating impressions about his cultural ancestry are powerfully exhibited in JULIAN TOUCEDA's works. His creations convey ingenious and penetrating perceptions of both current and time honored subject materials. His creations are very direct, 'up front', and timely, complementing his forceful use of color and his imaginative comments on Nature vis-a-vis our late modern age.
Because of his versatility we included Julian’s work as the best exponent of the Central American Independence.

Julian Touceda: a great artist and a great poet or our times.

An Island To Far

How long the clock wonders from now till yesterday. In all my beginning and my endless tribulations. To reach these shores and gazes across the misty span of Time. And I long for moments of solitude as I cross the lost memories. To have you in a love song or a dream that faded in the lost Night. How far the vision spanning across the ages and the Days of Lights. When the cold night whisper and the Moon descending from the Sky. And this evening but recalls some enchanted moment in my arms. And I but wrote into the Night with kisses and pages of passionate lines. As I recalls a hundred times the movements of your body and your eyes. As I undress the night and we cuddle in each others undying flame. But here I stand admit the rage and the storms on an Island To Far. And so the hours pass as the midnight stars gather across the firmament. And all its left but the corpse of a Love that knew the light of day. The pinions of my heart and the unwritten letters barren of things to say. The current of my soul as I utter my lines to the barren whispers in the stars. And none know the emptiness in this passing hour as the clock wonders. And with these hands I hold this wounded bird of past illusions. And into the myriad ocean I caste these pages for the winds to carry. Upon distant shores and empty streets, in paperback and canvases of glory. In songs of love, and in Books of Poems I write the lines to this endless story. On Tela?s virgin shores and Espana?s batter coast my songs for lips to read. Upon the fields of America and the shaded Oaks on the Avenues of the Dead. For here I undress the days and hold my candlelight on an Island To Far. And so I thought of you today, and wonder if life is but the same. And if flowers are placed by your door each day. That draws the Sun and the bees to play. But I think of the miles that separate our souls. Each passage is another passing before our hearts. That such a day could be eternity or a single forgotten heartbeat. But I am here my sweet lost love, among the hackles and the City?s groaning cries. Where citadels of bricks and mortal cover these unspoken lies. Where broken men stare from lonely room and broken hearts. And these streets no longer bear the heavy burden of humankind. For those un-tatted feet once rule the avenues of some distant past. As silent Oaks have known the passage of Time, and deadly Death. So twisted as they are, shedding their leaves for each passing generation. And so the City groan away as sunlight filters thru the tall facades. And man will pass these streets, shadows in waves long before I sleep. But I believe its the same where your heart does dwell. That a city of millions would speak as if one heart. And that night turns into day as quickly as you awaken. That we be as nation, separated by borders on this march thru Time. And so across the Ocean the Sun plays its music upon your shores. As the New World sways in the breeze of a Jazz player?s horn. But my heart does laugh and writes as sunlight crosses the noon sky. And my thoughts are very far as I write these words to you. And none could bear such loss and my hands hold these photographs And the memory is by far the shingles on an Ocean of Pain. But I write as in love admit the storms and the endless falling rain. So here I stand as before upon these footprints on An Island To Far. But we are Lovers lost between space and passing time. And you are my sunshine when the evening draws the stars. That words be as wine, sweet with love, drunk upon my words. For this a poem of new love, lone to be read before your eyes. But where do we find the keys....to these two heart?s so lost and lonely. If not in the heart of the Poet but in the man who sings his song to you. That I might hold you in the night and love again, and again. And awaken to your kisses and fall in love again, and again. That these days and these nights pass before the passing Sun. And know the pleasure of holding you in my arms again and again. But so it is with words, said so many times, that sorrow come with each rain. And here upon my shores I paint the so skies blues, for this a brush of words. That I may sing to you the love that makes you smile, on each awakening morning. That I may know your passionate kisses, and feel your deepest ocean as we love. And so ?My Dear?, a hundred times in verses written. This Poem of you. I walk alone these empty streets as if to hear your far away voice. I search each face within the hordes as to find a reminder of your face. The shuffling of the pages as words scatter across the bridge of time. As I walk aside our footprints, our memories of what we were. But I am lost in the hues of the days, wondering of a future that will never come. And so I write my pains as if to show that lovers are but fool to fall for love. And yet so blissful the kisses, the loving that come from loving you. And so I write across the face of the clock, knowing well the passage of Time. But I close my eyes to see the moment spent, and the hours scatter alone the avenues of forgotten Time. And yet the world spins amid the choate and the turmoil. But I close my eyes to seek the wisdom buried in the dark. And scatter these tender words to that heart across the angry sea. That my memories rest upon your breast and be not forgotten. For I walk across barren lands, empty streets of broken dreams. And none but the breaths of night groans in empty anguish. As Lovers embrace beneath these jealous stars. And my pen knows the journey of the heart. And I write this last line on An Island To Far.