The Other Art Fair

Fair Director’s Pick: Kiara Aileen Machado

In preparation for our Spring Los Angeles Fair, we ask none other than Fair Director Nicole Garton to reveal her shortlist of unmissable artists. This week, Kiara Aileen Machado is catching her attention.

Meet Kiara, a Central American-American artist based in Los Angeles and returning exhibitor to our Fair.

Machado’s work focuses mainly on the Central American perspective, with El Salvador and Guatemala as her “muse, pride and influence.” Although born in California, Machado identifies as Central American as her mother is from Guatemala, her father from El Salvador, and her great-grandmother from Honduras. In this way, Machado uses her lived experience as a Central American woman to question the absence and exclusion of Central American folx from mainstream U.S. and Latinx narratives.

Here’s what caught Nicole’s eye:

“Kiara’s richly hued paintings both confront and celebrate aspects of the Central American experience, as well as issues relating to gender and identity. She imbues portraits of her own family members—cousins, grandmothers, aunts—with the weight of a fraught history, while maintaining a kind of casual intimacy. By turn, her paintings challenge ideas of colorism in the Latinx community and explore the effects of immigration on families separated by borders.”

Make sure to check out Kiara’s portfolio for more works and background into her art.

Curious for more? Click below to visit our Online Studios, where we collect the latest Fair exhibitor highlights just for you.