Interview by Jorge Lara

Photos by Bailey Anderson (Bandy2.1)

VIM Magazine had the opportunity to interview Artist Karla Lagunas about her recent midway exhibition ‘Kink’ which opened in March of 2024 at Grant Hall Gallery and featured some impromptu activations.

The description of the exhibition was ‘breaking into this body like a new pair of boots. Exorcizing this rite.’ The exhibition was part of UNLV’s spring’s season which featured six solo exhibitions of artists exploring diverse mediums, themes, and identities.  

Karla Lagunas is part of the three-year Master of Fine Arts (MFA) program at UNLV, a studio-based and research-focused program with an emphasis on creative practice, interdisciplinarity, community engagement, and professional development. Throughout the program students conduct practice and text-based research, presenting their work in studio visits, exhibitions, MFA Open Studios, and group critique with faculty, peers, visiting artists, curators, scholars, and community members.

At the culmination of the program, MFA candidates present a public solo thesis exhibition project at the Donna Beam Gallery their final semester. The Midway Exhibition is an advancement-to-candidacy degree requirement in which graduate students present a public, solo project in the Grant Hall Gallery during their second year in the program.

VIM: Tell us about your current exhibition KINK and how did it come about?

KARLA LAGUNAS: KIN(K) was a way for me to talk about the many convoluted ways I circumnavigate shame and access pleasure. "Kink" is simply a word to describe those rituals. Rituals like karaoke, tattooing, dancing, clowning around, and painting. I wanted to unify all those rituals in my work and therefore unify myself and my identity. KIN(K) was therefore a coming out - to family, chosen family and other "kin". By exposing myself and the ways I feel shame and pleasure, I was able to arrive as myself to my communities for the first time.

VIM: What artists have inspired you through the years?

KARLA LAGUNAS: I am inspired by Eva Hesse, Xandra Ibarra, and Sam Gilliam. Very different artists, I know, but as an interdisiplinary artist, I feel different mediums require different inspirations. I also am inspired by local artists Adriana Chavez, Heidi Rider and Bailey Anderson.

VIM: What do you want to leave on people’s minds as they take in your exhibition? Thank you. We will be featuring more artists this year.

KARLA LAGUNAS: I want people to leave my exhibition with a desire and an acceptance for the fluidity between the dualities within them.

VIM: What’s next for you?

KARLA LAGUNAS: In addition to my thesis next spring, I am working on my biggest project yet. It will be a room covered in canvas floor to ceiling I will paint live in a series of performances as both tribute and parody of action painters. I won't disclose where just yet, but I will say it's a venue I'm really excited about. I'm looking forward to blurting out more details real soon.