ART OF THE MATTER
Meet the illustrator behind the portraits of Hue’s visionaries
The portraits and related symbols in this issue by illustrator Carlos Aponte, MFA ’21, BFA ’17, are perfect representations of his style: Elegant. Bold. Graphic.
But they’re far from his only style. This particular drawing technique, Aponte says, owes something to the original poster for the Broadway show Evita (1979), which made an impression when the native-born Puerto Rican first came to New York.
He has drawn for The New Yorker, Wall Street Journal, and Google, among others, and teaches Illustration at the college.
Aponte’s most authentic artist self can perhaps be found in the children’s books he’s illustrated, which feature a luscious color palette, sinuous line work, and more than a whiff of his lefty political sensibility. “I tend to speak to things that need to be corrected,” he says. “My work is always in your face.” Across the Bay (Penguin, 2019), won the New York Public Library’s Pura Belpré Award, given to a Latino writer and illustrator whose work best portrays the Latino cultural experience. Preciosa (Penguin), which follows a little Boricua boy after a devastating hurricane, will be published in May. Whether Aponte is sketching something in a notebook or rendering a highly polished image for a corporation, every subject is enshrined in his radiant creativity. “I tell my students that nothing is boring,” he says. “Every object you see has a character. Even a cup full of pens.”
