HER is a Peruvian born artist who has made Montreal her home. She was introduced to street art at the end of the 1990s when she became fascinated by the graffiti that adorns city walls, sometimes only for a short period of time. First influenced by the American style writing movement, she developed her own authentic calligraphy and progressively made a name for herself in a predominantly male environment. In recent years, HER HAS CREATED A CHARACTER SHE CALLS ‘’LA CHILLA’’, WHICH ALLOWS HER TO EXPRESS VALUES OF FEMINITY, RESPECT AND HUMANITY.
‘’My mission is to find ways to help children with my ‘Chillas’, she says, I realized it was possible to do so when I noticed children approached me while I was spray painting.’’
La Chilla represents women in all their diversity, while sharing wide eyes with stylized tears. La Chilla is not unhappy, but shue is aware of the injustices of her time. HER seeks to give young women the confidence the need to find empowerment and celebrates the beauty of women’s solidarity. She finds inspiration in her daughter, history’s great women and 90s popular culture.
Artist Biography
Born in Peru, Montreal artist HER received her “artistic” training in the city’s streets in the late 1990s. Discovering her love of graffiti, she succeeded in creating a bold and distinctive style of calligraphy that was all her own.
Her career path took a sudden turn when her father passed away. She had a child, trained in hairdressing and esthetics and became a make-up artist. That change had a big impact on the way she painted her character, “Chilla:” always colourful, with a mole and sharply contrasting white tears in her big eyes. With a smile on her lips but conscious of the injustices of today’s world, she believes it is critical to put out a positive message: uniting women and depicting cultural diversity. HER is inspired by her daughter, the 1990s and various women who have left their marks on history.
