YLECARA

Aracely Pérez Beato

Email: arcoalas@gmail.com

Awards

Arte‑Laguna Prize:

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Education

• Continuing Education: Meeting Carl G. Jung: Centro Transpersonal de Buenos Aires. 2024

• Miami Dade Community College (2002-2006)

• Focus: Graphic Arts

• Elective and Personal Interest Architectural Courses

• Design Institute, Havana, Cuba (1988-1989)

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On‑Site Positions

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Activities

• 1990 - Present: Member, Cuban National Registry of Independent Artists

• 1989 - Present: Member, ACAA (Asociación Cubana de Artesanos y Artistas)

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Artist Body of Work

• 1993-2025 (Ongoing): Questioning the Shadows

• 2014: Havana Skin - Art Panels and Architectural Finishes

• 2012: Still Alive Nature - One-of-a-Kind Jewelry Collection

• 2002: Transitions - Mixed Media

• 1993: Song and Construction - Jewelry Collection.

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Lectures & Talks

2026: What Does Art Do to Us? Public lecture on art, creativity, and cognitive experience. Biblioteca Pública José Hierro (Usera), Madrid, Spain.

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Exhibitions

• 2002: Collective Exhibition - Annual Juried Wolfson Campus, MDC

• 1994: Collective Exhibition - Avellaneda Salon, Havana National Theater

• 1992: Solo Exhibition - Song and Construction, La Casona, Fondo de Bienes Culturales, Havana, Cuba

• 1991: Collective Exhibition - Acacia Gallery, Havana, Cuba

• 1990: Collective Exhibition - Casa Africa, Havana, Cuba

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Articles and Reviews

• 2012: Interview with CNN Español - Notimujer

• 2012: Featured in El Nuevo Herald - Estilo

• 2012: Featured in Miami Diario.

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Under the River: A Biography.

Introduction

Every piece of art has its roots in the autobiographical. In my case, it is not only an autobiographical work; it is an archive in symbols of a journey toward reconciliation, self-discovery, and healing. Through deeply instinctive processes, I channel my urgency toward a primal need: to belong to myself, to discover who I am amidst the rubble of a turbulent childhood and early youth. My artistic practice carries the imprint of the persecution and alienation experienced by the queer community of those years, as well as the life-altering juxtaposition of moving from dictatorship into the excesses of hyper-capitalism. These crossings forced me to gather my scattered pieces and reconstruct a sense of self—one that could hold both vulnerability and resilience, and transform survival into creation.

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Origins

I was born in Havana, Cuba, in 1966, under one of the longest and most cynical dictatorships in history. I am a descendant of a middle class of confused intellectuals who were dispossessed of all their heritage. And I’m not just talking about financial inheritance; I’m referring to the fact that their roots and history were wiped away.

Looking back, it all started when I was 12 years old during a summer vacation. I went to help a distant cousin, the principal of an elementary school. In my home, there were psychology books, including Freud's psychoanalysis and others with psychological tests like the Rorschach Inkblot Test. My father was a scientist, my mother, an artist. No one questioned why I was drawn to such unusual books or what I was doing with them.

During that vacation, I practiced psychological tests from the books with the school’s students, attended an art workshop after classes, made paper sculptures, and acted in a television program. This is how my desire to pursue art and psychology began. I never imagined that the journey would be so unsettling, provocative, disruptive, and filled with so many stops, abysses, and challenges along its landscape.

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The Immigrant:

The Privilege of Living in Polarized Cosmogonies.

In 1995, I came to live in the United States, where I still reside. Here, I have continued my research into psychology, anthropology, astrology, and dozens of other topics that bring us closer to mystery and always to the edges of limits. On the other side of my career as a designer, I have spent years researching and pursuing answers with relentless curiosity. My long exploration has not ceased to this day.

Research:

Today, my artistic practice has become the primary vehicle for an ongoing investigation into the origins of human meaning-making. Drawing from psychology, anthropology, neuroscience, philosophy, and my experience as an educator, my work explores the possibility that forms of cognition preceding verbal language continue to shape perception, creativity, and human experience. Through this long-term artistic research, I seek to create visual territories where symbolic, embodied, and pre-verbal forms of understanding can be encountered anew.