Stories Told Through Paint

by Diego Mora

I was born in 2007, in Venezuela, but have been living in New York City for almost 8 years now. My family moved to New York during the economic and political crisis haunting Venezuela for more than 20 years, under an authoritarian regime which has been at the center stage recently, following the capture of dictator Nicolás Maduro.

When choosing which high school I would go to, I wasn’t aware of the importance of choosing the right one. Fortunately, I ended up at the High School of Art and Design. Art and Design has such a wonderful community, and it’s how I was introduced to the League. The relationship between the two might not be known to many outsiders but to their alumni it’s beyond special. Shared instructors, many opportunities, and students going back and forth.

In 2025, while in high school, I was one of the eight art students in the U.S. awarded a Gold Medal from Scholastic. Two of my paintings got to be shown at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, one of them as part of the P.S. Art city-wide competition. These were two very motivating moments for me.

I’m currently attending FIT, where I’m entering my second semester in the Illustration department. While at FIT, I made it as a finalist in the 18th International Art Renewal Center (ARC) Salon, which was also motivating and unexpected for me. The organization advocates for the revival of classical painting, mostly centered on the 19th century French academic tradition.

At the League, I’ve been honing draftsmanship and oil painting since 2022 thanks to the Seeds of the League Scholarship available to students. Today, I’m happy to be working with the same program as a Seeds Teaching Assistant in after-school and summer art classes at different schools throughout New York City. It’s a great way to introduce art to children who might not be into it otherwise, which is important.

Parallel to these things, I’ve mostly been focused on building my own body of work outside of school, painting what I care about or subjects I feel I must paint. Finding these stories to paint has been my main drive and focus since graduating high school. This is what feels right for me to pursue. Something true to the human condition, which is diverse and can be somewhat undefined. These can be told in the form of real-life events or allegories and symbols. For example, in my painting Icarus, space rockets about to crash symbolize the progress of civilization and how sometimes, this “progress” can be more harmful than it is beneficial to us.

My subjects can also be related to me and my background, for example in work about the Venezuelan crisis and the Venezuelan diaspora, in which case my interest is not an autobiographical painting but instead the people’s struggle as a whole. In my painting Persecuted, characters in a concentration camp are being forced into a structure marked with Hugo Chavez’s eyes, a graphic spread all over Venezuela by the regime in an attempt to further idolize the previous dictator and make it so he’s always “watching.” I wish this sort of story was only fiction, but as a result of repression in the country, much worse things happen. Take a look at El Helicoide, one of the largest, if not the largest torture center in the Americas. I avoided making the story about me or my experience fleeing the country but rather made the painting about something that can very much happen and is happening in the country. The only reason why the main figure is me is because I don’t like using photos, and I’m the most readily available model in front of a mirror. It’s not a self-portrait in the traditional manner.

I don’t want my paintings to speak of me in depth because I feel they will fall flat as they make their rounds. It’s opening them up to make a broader point where I find a story enjoyable, in hopes that people can feel them too.

An example is a painting I recently finished, where there are figures throwing rocks at a mango tree to collect the fruit from it, as it’s far above them. I found the story in my memories, because I used to do this as a kid at my uncle’s job. However, I don’t intend the painting to be about me, nor does it include me anywhere. My intention is to take this memory, which for me, feels joyful, and make it broader. I’m sure a lot of people have probably done something similar before, maybe not with mangoes, maybe you went apple picking, maybe you remember enjoying a fruit with a loved one or feeling satisfied after harvesting your crop. Anything similar, really. In my mind, this scene can be an allegory of joy.

You can view more of Diego’s art @diegonmora on Instagram