Portfolio

Apontesierra is a multidisciplinary artist (performing art, visual art, poet, journalist), and a public speaker working in South Florida.

AponteSierra during a radio show about sexual health, condom use and Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis. PrEP is a once-a-day pill for people who do not have HIV and want added protection.

AponteSierra posing with two of his visual art pieces. over his right shoulder is a Paper Manipulated Fine Art piece. He is sitting next to a one Ink on Canvas

AponteSierra’s Art and Craft is customized for different venues and events. Here is a wearable couture dress made with more of 1500 expired male condoms over a mannequin coloreaded using hundreds of confettis. This Dress was donated to the World AIDS Museum and Educational Center in Wilton MAnors, FLorida.

AponteSierra’s Detail of “MOnique”: a Paper Manipulated Fine Art piece.

AponteSierra’s reading poetry with My Favorite Poem Project by Boston University, Poetry Foundation and The Library of Congress. This project is used to teach poetry and how it change the life of Americans.

AponteSierra is known by designing and wearing his weareable art while doing public presentations, trainings or Parades where he interactua with community members educating on sexual health and social justice issues

AponteSierra’s Paper Manipulation Fine Art pieces.

AponteSierra’s Paper Manipulated Fine Art Piece at Williams Sonoma Store in Palm Beach Gardens.

COVIDA is a Public Art Sculpture created using Apontesierra’s Paper Manipulation technique along with other sustainable materials that are weather resistant. The title of the sculpture comes from the word COVID plus adding the first letter of artist last name. Also, VIDA means life in Spanish which is the artist native language. She is a woman who is mourning because she lost relatives from COVID-19. She wears a black couture dress and a colorful mask that represents protection but also hope for our future. COVIDA is part of The Commons: 15 Artist. 15 Spaces. A project financed by The City of West Palm Beach as part of its COVID Artist relief. COVIDA at 314 Clematis Street. Downtown West Palm Beach FL, USA

COVIDA is a Public Art Sculpture created using Apontesierra’s Paper Manipulation technique along with other sustainable materials that are weather resistant. The title of the sculpture comes from the word COVID plus adding the first letter of artist last name. Also, VIDA means life in Spanish which is the artist native language. She is a woman who is mourning because she lost relatives from COVID-19. She wears a black couture dress and a colorful mask that represents protection but also hope for our future. COVIDA is part of The Commons: 15 Artist. 15 Spaces. A project financed by The City of West Palm Beach as part of its COVID Artist relief. COVIDA at Mandel Public Library of West Palm Beach

COVIDA is a Public Art Sculpture created using Apontesierra’s Paper Manipulation technique along with other sustainable materials that are weather resistant. The title of the sculpture comes from the word COVID plus adding the first letter of artist last name. Also, VIDA means life in Spanish which is the artist native language. She is a woman who is mourning because she lost relatives from COVID-19. She wears a black couture dress and a colorful mask that represents protection but also hope for our future. COVIDA is part of The Commons: 15 Artist. 15 Spaces. A project financed by The City of West Palm Beach as part of its COVID Artist relief.

Visual Art: AponteSierra’s body of work is created using Paper Manipulation Fine Art – Ink on Canvas – Manipulated Photography. – Public Art. AponteSierra was so committed to his craft and his community that when he graduated high school, he earned a scholarship to Magdalena University for acting. Instead of majoring in the arts, he chose to major in Fishing Engineering with a specialty in environmental planning.

He found his art mentor, Mary Luz Giraldo Arismendiz, while he was attending Magdalena University. She was the director of a private theater company called “Corporación Los Muñecos” and admired AponteSierra’s attention to detail. AponteSierra was able to perfect his craft in Paper-mâché, Sewing, and Origami, with her guidance.

In 2020 during the COVID-19 Pandemic, he got his first public art commission: COVIDA. You can see more about COVIDA here in this link: Covida: A Public Art Sculpture by Apontesierra

Artist- Activist and Public Speaker:

Apontesierra is a Colombo- American multidisciplinary artist who holds a master’s degree of Education in Guidance Counseling. He is a certified Community Health Worker, and an International Multidisciplinary Artist that uses art as a tool of community mobilization with extensive art solo exhibits and group exhibits across United States. He creates expressive, interesting, and educational multidisciplinary art pieces within his extensive list of exhibitions nationally and internationally. He developed a Visual Art Collection for HIV Prevention Called Ribbon HIV Prevention Cards and actively offers art workshops to decrease HIV Stigma through his project Under my Skin.

Not all talks are created the same and AponteSierra talks about Social Issues within LatinX Communities in South Florida and Sexual Health including HIV/AIDS and Hepatitis C. Apontesierra had been a Panelist for the Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach, an Artist invited to the Arts Talk program of the Cultural Council for Palm Beach County and the School of Divinity and English Language of Wake Forest University. In addition, he had been featured in national HIV prevention campaigns such as “Start Talking. Stop HIV,” by CDC, and in my “Favorite Poem,” by Boston University and the Library of Congress, a project that is part of the Library of Congress’ permanent archive of poetry and recorded literature. He was named by the Sun-Sentinel as one of its 15 Latino heroes in 2017 for his work using art for community mobilization towards health promotion and HIV Awareness. Apontesierra was selected in 2020 by the city of West Palm Beach as one of its 15 artists in the project “Commons: 15 Artist, 15 Spaces” to design and bring to life a piece of public art for COVID -19 awareness. In 2021 he become part of the HIV 101 video developed by The Florida Department of Health as an official tool to share knowledge about HIV prevention and treatment. In October 2021 he was named one of the five of Florida’s most interesting, and best, artistic talents by the Upscale Living Magazine. He is the Winner of the Category of Visual Art of the HIV Is Not a Crime Training Academy 5 Art Contest- 2023 by The Sero Project.

He was granted by The Gilead Compass Initiative Faith Coordinating Center with his HIV Stigma reduction project Debajo de mi piel/Under my skin for the Learning It Together artist cohort 2022-2023 where he was selected as the Artist in Residence for the school of Divinity at Wake Forest University Faith Coordinating Center. He successfully finished this HIV Stigma Reduction art project with the creation of three safe spaces White Chapel, Winston Salem, N.C. St Mary Magdalene and St Martin Church Coral Springs, FL and Trinity Cathedral, Miami FL.  Members of those faith congregations and the wider community are integrating about God’s name, to pray, love, and be the light of the life for people who test positive for HIV. Apontesierra got a new project under this Compass Initiative for the fiscal year 2023 -2024 called Detrás de la Mascara/Behind the Mask. A Bilingual project that uses multidisciplinary art forms to create, collect and offer best practices and information that can help raise children who understand the risk of HIV along with the creation and maintenance of an online healing space to address HIV Stigma.

Poetry-Poesía: Spanish poetry is a unique breed. It’s not only beautiful to read, but it’ll equip you with romantic phrases and everything beyond while using the Spanish language, that is why AponteSierra chose to share his poetry using his native Spanish language. His upcoming Book: Fragmentos de Luz para un Amor que Amé, Amo y Amaré. 

“Soy un experimentador de las artes con una mezcla de influencias: escribo poesías, creo piezas de arte visual y plásticas. También soy un practicante del arte escénico y además poseo una multidisciplinaria imaginación con la que  materializo sueños”.–Emilio Apontesierra-Paretti