Angelika Moncher

I’m originally from Moscow, Russia and throughout my life I’ve moved around 9 times.  Before living in Santa Monica, I lived in New York City for 5 years.  I can still speak, read and write in Russian and it’s still a big part of who I am in terms of food, language, culture and family.  Artistically, I am inspired by the likes of Satoshi Kon, Marc Chagall, Caravaggio, and Ronald Searle.  I love playing with strongly rendered chiaroscuro alongside stylization of the human body within the realms of Naive Art; as in mixing my formal technical training with the emulation of “amateur” art styles by those who lack training (such as using my formal training to mimic children’s art). The thought process behind my art comes from the writings of Mark Fisher, Fredric Jameson, John Berger, and Guy Debord. They have led me to a deeper understanding of why and for what I do art. Conceptually, my ultimate goals are to explore hauntology, ghosts of memories and a desperation to live.  Hauntology, this idea that the future stayed in the past, is something that I’m enamored with. Much of my personal work focuses on how memories chase us, how we chase memories, and how that relates to the human experience. When the future is forthcoming from the past instead of the present, how does that change ones’s identity? I seek to draw from the unknown, from person in relation to non-person. I love ghosts, hauntings, murky memories, and people who only live through how we remember and re-remember them. 

 

I will be attending ArtCenter for their Illustration program in the fall. I am really excited to learn and develop my art skills. I can't wait to have more precision in the execution of exactly what I have in mind without being limited by my technical skill. I am also looking forward to keeping in touch with a lot of my classmates who will also be going to ArtCenter. Career-wise, I don’t want anything in particular so long as I’m working in the entertainment industry, whether that be a character designer, storyboard artist, or color script artist. In terms of personal goals, I look forward to being able to present myself more truthfully than I can in my semi-suburban area. I look forward to dressing the way I want, acting the way I want, and looking the way I want.