BIO
Leeanna Chipana is an up and coming artist based in NY. She grew up in Central Islip on Long Island and is the daughter to a Quechuan father and and American mother. She is a graduate from the New York Academy of Art and the Grand Central Atelier. While at the Grand Central Atelier she practiced 19th century academic drawing. As Leeanna studied classical painting she began to re-imagine the figures in the paintings she studied as women who looked like her family in Peru. It was at the New York Academy of Art where was introduced to narrative figure painting. After graduating from the NYAA she continued exploring her own Quechuan identity through the act of painting itself.
Leeanna paints the individual faces she sees in Moche Portrait Vessels bringing them to life and to the here and now. She paints these ancient warriors and nobility standing alongside current South American immigrant men and women to remind them of their ancestors and offer them strength.
Her portraits of contemporary women with Mayan, Incan, and Aztec ancestry seek to highlight the beauty and strength she sees in these figures and faces. She synthesizes classical composition with indigenous iconography.
Over the past year Leeanna has started teaching drawing and painting remotely at F.I.T. College and continues to paint in her home studio and study Incan mythology and the language of Quechua.
She is currently working on a body of figurative paintings of contemporary native women. Her work mixes classical realism with surrealism.
Contact
631-334-2197