This month, in addition to listing some of my recommendations of what might be worth seeing in the various art spaces scattered throughout the town, we at "Providence Monthly" will begin to feature one Rhode Island artist, gallery director, or curator. We will interview that person in their studio or space, take a look at their work and goals, and hopefully continue to build upon our state´s awareness and appreciation for its wealth of creative innovators in the visual arts.

      This month´s featured artist is painter and educator, Raphael Díaz, who born in Havana, Cuba. In the wake of the cuban Revolution, Raphael Díaz moved with his family from Cuba to Spain in the early´s 60s. He was three years old at the time. Years later, at the of 12, he moved to New York City with his family to continue his education, later receiving his formal arts education at the Cooper Union. He graduated from Cooper Union in 1989, relocated to Rhode Island in 1990, and has brought with him the richness of artistic expression, as a result of his life´s experiences, from which he draws.

      Perhaps his best known work, work that reflects the more than 33 years that constitutes Raphael´s life of experiences, depicts the unsettled circumstance humankind has created for itself. Looking at his "Boat Series", these large-scale paintings masterfully describe a feeling of uncertainty, isolation, a child´s fear, a man or woman´s commitment to the struggle for a better life. The boats, formed in the way a child folds yesterday´s paper into a playful ship become vehicles of that very uncertainty. In his Providence studio, Raphael spoke to me about migration, the whole of Latin American and Carribbean seeking a better life in the United States. The boats, fragile, in which one must swim or sink, set out. In his most recent work, the boat appears to melt in the water... paper boats, ink fading, trailing off into the water, leaving family, roots, traditions for an unknow future.

      Internationally recognized for his vivid paintings, his exhibition credits include:

• The University of Puerto Rico.
• The Museum of Modern Art, Santo Domingo,Dominican Republic.
• The Providence Art Club.
• The Rhode Island School of Design Museum.
• The Rhode Island Foundation.
• The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

      He has traveled a major exhibition of 24 works from his "Windows Series" throughout Latin America and Europe, showing in five countries. I know Raphael Díaz, not only as one of the state´s leading hispanic artists, but also as a sincere individual and proud father. Currently, he is working on a new series which deal with the sense of "machismo". One of these pieces, 4 panels 15"x 15" each, question the issues of control and manipulation that exist across gender boundaries throughout mankind.

      In addition to his professional status as a painter, Raphael is an art teacher in the Providence School Department where he brings his wealth of life experience to hundreds os students each week at the Alfred Lima Elementary School. He is also continuing his studies at Brown University where he is completing a Master Degree in Education. His images tell a story of friends, of relationships, of political consequences, and of life.