We recently connected with Aaron Aguilar and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Aaron, appreciate you sitting with us today to share your wisdom with our readers. So, let’s start with resilience – where do you get your resilience from?
I have a goal that is important to me that I want to accomplish. I want to help share and create stories centered around bipoc trans voices. I believe sharing my voice is important, especially for trans folk and youth. Sharing trans stories is important to help establish familiarity for society and to help those find themselves.
This can sometimes be a struggle in the entertainment industry. Our stories are not considered marketable, especially to younger audiences. So our stories are pushed back because they are not the next hot commodity nor a plush that can be sold in stores around the world. So this is where I get my resilience from. To tell real human stories. Compassionate stories for trans people who need representation. A child may be watching a cartoon show, see a character that they identify with and understand themselves a little better. You never know if these stories will help others to be themselves and bloom into who they were truly meant to be.
Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?
I am a Chicano artist who was born and raised in the California Central Valley/Motherlode. I originally grew up in Waterford, California and my family later moved to Oakdale, California when I was in middle school. My childhood was surrounded by almond orchards, dairy farms, and cowboys. In fact, Oakdale’s town slogan is “the cowboy capital of the world.” And there is a specific way things are done in my hometown. Everyone knew everyone where I grew up. Some kids I went to school with from preschool until we graduated from high school. Very small town, with a population of less than 9,000 at the time. So growing up as a queer kid in a very conservative area and family was a bit rough. I had to fight for most things and was crazy bullied for most of my youth. I became the weird art kid very quickly haha. I fell in love with anime, cartoons, disney movies, fandom art, and indie comic artists that were popular on the internet.
I turned into the emo/hipster kid which then turned into me hanging out with the punk band kids in high school. I would go to their garage shows at night into the boonies of Calaveras with bonfires, barns filled with bat shit and half pipes and silly fun ‘kid appropriate aged’ drinks and cigs. But even hanging out with the ‘weirdos’ I still felt like I didn’t quite fit in. I kept making art to express myself and to have an outlet from being a ‘straight-A student.’ Waiting until it was time to move on to the next course of life, college. I thought I was going to be a park ranger for the longest time. It wasn’t until my senior year that I knew I could make a career in Animation. Most careers in art were discouraged by my family. I went to San Jose State University for Animation/Illustration and graduated in 2021. In college is also where I began my transition. I now live in Los Angeles, chasing the dream of one day working for an animation studio as a Visual Development Artist. My art is heavily influenced by my roots. I love to draw high fantasy characters, it helped me escape my constricted reality as a kid. 1st generation/Chicanx/religious themes for my Mexican heritage. And I love to draw queer/trans cowboy-themed artwork for my community that I love, cherish dearly and to claim the fun parts of the countryside I was rejected by originally.
If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
I think for queer folks who are wanting to go into animation just give it all you got! The industry itself has its ups and downs. Never stop being your authentic self and just have fun with the work you are making. Have strong art fundamentals but don’t be afraid to experiment. If you are feeling downhearted about your work or if you keep getting rejections it’s okay. I’ve been there. Keep marching forward your time will come. Reach out to peers and people in the industry you might know or artists you love. You’ll be surprised how willing some people are to help and give advice. And a huge tip, please take care of yourself mentally, physically, and spiritually. Yes, we all wanna make it to the big leagues but don’t do it at the expense of your health. Treat your artist like it is precious. You’ll go further in your work ENJOYING the process then making work you think other people are going to like. Just do you! 🙂
What has been your biggest area of growth or improvement in the past 12 months?
My biggest improvement within the last 12 months has been the work I have put into falling back in love with making art. It has been a struggle trying to break into the animation industry since I graduated in ’21. 2020-2021, almost all of the internships that were available to me were canceled due to the pandemic and quarantine. Then for a year, I fell into a deep depression because of all of my back-to-back rejections after landing a good amount of interviews. I had just moved to LA didn’t really have friends or a community at the time and sorta stopped making portfolio work. Within the last year or two, I have made new friends and was reunited with my community, my found family, and I have been making artwork again. But this time around, I have chosen to make work that is authentic to me, that I love, and that I hope can reach others and touch their hearts and maybe learn something new about themselves.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.aaronuilar.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aaronuilar/?hl=en
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/aaronuilar/
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