Elsa Muñoz

b. 1983, Chicago, IL

Desahogamiento, literally translated as “the act or process of undrowning,” has always been with Elsa Muñoz . She grew up hearing this word from her mother who believed in grieving as medicine. She would describe desahogamiento as the self-directed, embodied "grief work" which makes healing possible. But it wasn’t until reading “Woman Who Glows in the Dark” by curandera Elena Avila that Elsa learned desahogamiento is a literal healing technique within curanderismo, or Mexican folk medicine. Her practice is centered in the union of intuitive ways of knowing(particularly dreamwork and storytelling), our changing climate realities, and the role of art as a somatic healing technology. In this, her paintings manifest from the act of undrowning.