Born in Mexico, Hernandez migrated to the US at the age of nine. “My whole family moved from Nuevo Laredo, it’s a border town with Texas. Moving to the U.S. was a seismic culture shock,” he said. Not knowing any English, Hernandez began to become taken with art. “I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t creating something. I think I retreated into my imagination to cope and try to make sense of this new life. I never took art classes in school when I lived in Mexico but when I moved to the US it was part of the curriculum. There is no language in art. I could say things that I didn’t have the words for, I could vent my frustrations and celebrate my joys. There was no right or wrong answer.”
In high school, he picked up a camera and started shooting black and white portraits. “I became intrigued with capturing a narrative in someone’s face, in constructing and manipulating a different world, perhaps because that’s the only way I felt like I was in control,” said Hernandez. He later attended Indiana University where he pursued a degree in photography.
In Houston, he ran a knick-knack shop called Santeria where his fascination with masks began. “I would sell found treasures from estate sales that I altered in some way. While I was doing that I started collecting all sorts of wooden masks from around the world. What I found so special about the masks was the power they held, those masks were storytellers and rites of passage and warnings and celebrations. We tend to look at old wooden masks and say that that was in the past, we don’t hide behind masks anymore, but I feel like all of my life I’ve had to put on a different face at different moments that have helped me navigate and explore the spectrum of life. Those tactics at first were meant to help me disappear into the crowd but somehow tenuously left me with the desire to belong somewhere. My masks are meant to address those needs around tribalism, pageantry, and everyday struggles,” he said. Masks like Truth/Deception, Broken Heart, and Lying to Ourselves, toe the line between macabre, whimsical, and poignant, whilst taking cues from the Mexican folk art Hernandez grew up with.
