Meet Santiago Cohen

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Santiago Cohen. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Santiago, we’re thrilled to have you sharing your thoughts and lessons with our community. So, for folks who are at a stage in their life or career where they are trying to be more resilient, can you share where you get your resilience from?
Resilience is a loaded word, it is difficult to bounce back from constant failure as an artist. You really can’t be an artist if you don’t have thick skin. What keeps every day your mental sanity is the love for art, and the need to tell stories. I spent 7 years creating my Exvida project I created 1150 small paintings to tell the story of my life and during all that period I never doubted of the importance of that piece.
That project brought me several shows in galleries and museums. Nobody told me to do it or paid me anything to make it. Is that a success or a failure? I think it is successful even if I never see the end of it.
My resilience comes from believing in what I do. Every single painting, book or idea.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?
I was born and raised in Mexico, where I fell in love with visual arts. Mexico is one country that everybody is creative and expresses their aesthetics with visual elements, the food trucks, the bakeries, buses, trucks, churches. Everywhere you go you see toys , handcrafts, paintings. You gasp at everything with beauty. Initially I wanted to be a photographer, and had my darkroom. later I wanted to be a cartoonist and had a comic strip on the newspaper every week for a year.
I fell in love with film animation with the work of Norman McLaren of the National Film Board of Canada. I wanted to be an animator and taught animation in a University in Mexico for 3 years. Later I came to New York to do my masters in Communication Design. I became an Illustrator for different magazines, and a designer for animations at a Animation Studio called “Ink Tank” under the wing of R.O. Blechman. In there I designed a lot of shorts and a children’s series called “Troubles the Cat”. After that I became a children’s book illustrator and writer. I’ve done 20 children books and 3 graphic novels.
During all those periods I was always painting in my spare time, and at the end I decided to just paint.
I did my biography/ graphic novel in 1150 paintings; it took me seven years to complete and I called it Exvida. I published the first part of that in 2014, and the second in 2023. I’ve had art shows in a lot of galleries in New Jersey, New York and Mexico.
When I moved to Jersey city from Hoboken I became the artistic director of the Day of the Dead Parade and it’s been happening every year for 9 years, an it has become bigger and bigger every year. Last year we received a grant from the state of New Jersey , and was nominated for one of the best neighborhood events in the area.
I feel very excited to create art for my neighborhood with the help of my neighbours and friends. This year I am going to show paintings of my second book of exvida in the Jersey City Artist Studio tour, and I am going to participate in the Art Fair 14C in the train station near Ellis Island. Every event excites me.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
THe most important thing I’ve learnt is that the best critic of your work is yourself. You are the only one can tell if your work is good or not. Only time will be the judge of that. Enjoy what you do, Don’t expect to succeed in everything you do, Never stop creating, even with the worst rejections.. Believe in your work and your vision. Try to do the best work you can do.

Alright so to wrap up, who deserves credit for helping you overcome challenges or build some of the essential skills you’ve needed?
The most helpful person has always been my wife Ethel , who has always encourage me to aim high and never give up. my friend Elena has encouraged me to have better skills and we praise each other with each other’s creations.
My mentor and ex animation boss R.O.Blechman has always supported my work. He always praises my work, and I adore his work.

Contact Info:

Image Credits
all photos done by Santiago Cohen and a couple in the Atrium of the Morristown courthouse of me were done by Phil Huling, they all have permission

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