Hey everyone,

         My name is Alejandro Hincapie and I’m currently a junior perusing a major in Art History and potentially a minor in Journalism / Media Studies. My older brother is an artist so I've consequently had a front row seat to someone’s own artistic development through out my entire life. This is what undoubtedly fostered my own interest in and appreciation for art. I myself have dabbled in pseudo-architectural drawings and renderings since I was a little kid, but I've always been far too interested in many other things to really focus on honing down a single interest and developing any tangible skills. Appropriately enough, what really interest me now are the intersections of art, design, architecture, film, music, fashion, and culture at large. How these different modes of expression and cultural commodities converge and influence one another. How they coevolve and develop simultaneously. New movements, new styles, new isms, new genres, new approaches, new trends, new methods, etc. have never truly appeared out of nowhere; it’s all been one continuous line where the present and the future are dictated by the past – and at times, the dictating past is that of a completely different medium.

         This awareness about the junctures that exist between all these creative fields and how important the past is to where they are today is what led me to become an Art History student. I want to eventually work as an editor or artistic director for an arts / design publication of some kind. A publication like Interview Magazine started by Andy Warhol would be more than ideal. It would also be great to actually work in the production of any sort of artistic / creative output, but it seems like that’s a much less clearer path given my major. We’ll see.

Keith Haring. Ignorance = Fear. 1989. Poster. 

         As for politics and societal conditions influencing art and culture – this is something that’s always been present in art making. From the larger-than-life-size proportion of ancient Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius in an equestrian bronze statue meant to assert his grandeur and power to Keith Haring creating art in the 1980’s that called attention to the growing AIDS epidemic in a country’s whose government was largely ignoring the crisis, the politics and societal conditions of the times have always been reflected in the art and culture being created. And often, it's been creative mediums that have worked as the impetus for political and societal change or have come to be symbolic of change that occurred.