At Home & In The Studio With Cristina Martinez
Written by Katie Hintz-Zambrano
Photography by Manuela Insixiengmay
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The Seattle-based artist on taking the leap and building a creative career while mothering a teen, tween, and preschooler.
For Seattle-based artist Cristina Martinez, motherhood has changed the way she thinks about what is worth putting into the world.
A mother of three—Marley, Juni, and Moon—Cristina has built an expansive artistic practice (and following) rooted in identity, resilience, nature, and the stories of women. Her figurative paintings, in which women often intermingle with flowers, vines, and organic forms, draw deeply from her experience growing up Black and Mexican in the Pacific Northwest.
Her own mother was just 15 when Cristina was born. Looking back, she remembers a childhood filled with a loving village that held their family together. Now, having become a mother at different stages of adulthood—including having her youngest at 36—she finds herself questioning the cultural pressure to have children young. “I got to experience both sides,” she tells us. “I don’t know if I think that’s best, it’s just a different journey.” Being an older mother, she reveals, brought a sense of mental and financial stability—and the feeling, for the first time, of being “an adult doing it.”
In today’s profile and studio tour, Cristina shares more insights into how she took the leap into a creative career in 2018, as a mother of two. After losing one of her closest friends and realizing the brevity of life, she left her job and committed herself fully to her painting practice. Since then, her work has expanded onto an increasingly monumental scale.
Her latest project, A Soft Place to Land, is a 70-by-150-foot mural in Seattle’s Pioneer Square: a woman reclining peacefully amid flowers, an image Martinez describes as “a quiet kind of radical act.” Painted on one of the district’s few large concrete walls, the work marks the neighborhood’s first permanent mural at this scale and represents a significant public-art moment for Cristina.
“I want to put good into the world,” she says. “Having kids has just amplified that feeling and put this weight on my chest to get it all out.”
Check out Cristina’s full interview and get a peek into her vibrant home and studio, below!
Be sure to follow Cristina online at juneandmars.com and on Instagram at @sew_trill
Did you always know you wanted to be a mother?
"I didn't always know I wanted to be a mother. I grew up an only child, so it wasn't like I spent a lot of time taking care of younger siblings or anything. I spent time with cousins, but that was different. I wasn't even fully aware of the amount of selflessness it took to be a mom. I don't think I thought about it much. When I had Juni, it felt like I was born to do this. It felt like a door opened to this new part of life that I loved so much. So by the time I got to Marley and Moon, I knew I wanted more kids."
Tell us about your kids' names.
"Marley's middle name is Elle. I named her after my two best friends—Aysia and Leah—who are also her Godmoms. To honor them, I took Aysia’s last name 'Bell' and Leah’s middle name 'LaBelle' and named my daughter Marley Elle. Unfortunately, before I had Moon, Leah passed away. When we found out we were having Moon, my partner and I sat down with Leah's mom and asked if we could include her name in Moon's name, and she was so supportive of it. Every time I see Moon's middle name on her passport or on a doctor's paperwork, it's a little moment where I get to think about Leah and her spirit."
“I say it all the time: I get to be their mom another day. I get to be Marley, Juni, and Moon’s mom forever, and that feels really special.”
What excites you about raising both a son and daughters?
"I don't put too much thought into raising sons or daughters, I just really enjoy being their mom. All three of them are so different in their own ways, whether they're boys or girls, and they all have such different personalities. I base my parenting on who they are as people, not on whether they're a boy or a girl."
What has surprised you about the experience of motherhood so far?
"One thing that has surprised me is that you get through one hard phase and think that's the hardest it gets. You have a newborn and everything is relative at that time, and then you get to the toddler stage and you're like, 'Wait, this is really hard.' And then you go through elementary school, middle school, teenagers. This is my first time at the teenager stage and I'm like—oh, this is next level. It's constantly a journey, and each phase is filled with ups and downs. There's so much emphasis placed on the younger years, but they really start to become people and you have to learn them and learn how to be their parent all over again."
"I was 36 when I had my last child, Moon, and I felt the most mentally and financially stable. All the things felt aligned. And sometimes it's wild that life pressures you to have a baby earlier. I got to experience both sides, and while there are challenges to being a parent when you're older, it was the first time I felt like an adult doing it. It didn't feel as scary. Sometimes life tells you to have kids earlier and I don't know if I think that's best, it's just a different journey."
What was your own upbringing like?
"My mom had me when she was 15, and I was her only child. Of course there were ups and downs with that, but when I think back on my childhood, I have such beautiful memories—my aunts, uncles, my grandma, my cousins. It really did take a village to raise me. By the time my grandma was 38, she already had three or four grandkids. When I think back on my family and how they raised all of us, created special Easters and Christmases, and held everything together—I think that's really beautiful. My mom and my aunts were so young trying to bring us up, and I had a great life and a great childhood."
Are there things from your upbringing that you're consciously trying to incorporate (or not incorporate) into your kids' upbringing?
"I don't think I consciously try to pull specific things from my childhood into my kids' lives. I have traditions that come naturally from how I was raised, but more than anything, who I am and who I've become is such a strong reflection of the women who raised me—and I just try to be that for my kids. Teaching them to be good people is the most important thing to me. Teaching them to advocate for themselves, making sure they know they're capable of anything they want. If my kids are confident and good-hearted people who move through this world, that's the priority. I believe that when you believe in yourself, the other things—having a skill, being good at math or English—those things flow in more naturally."
You are so in touch with art, design, and creativity—is this something you're trying to infuse into your kids' childhoods?
"I don't try to infuse art into my kids' lives, but I'm very aware of how infused it already is. What's normal for them looks different because they are surrounded by art and artists. Going to the studio is no big deal. Having easels around the house is no big deal. Being able to walk into the hallway to make a sculpture or a painting is just normal for them. That comes from me and my partner, Moon's dad. We're both artists, so when we go to work, we go to the studio, and that looks different than going to an office or sitting at a computer. Art has become a natural place for them to turn when they need an outlet or want to express themselves, whether that's guitar, violin, or drawing. I just want art to be a place of comfort for them. Their journey will be their own, and that's all I could want."
What excites you most about motherhood right now?
"What excites me the most is the stages my kids are in right now. One is about to start driving, one is going into 7th grade and experiencing all the middle school stuff, and Moon is about to turn four—this is my last year before she starts kindergarten. I'm really excited to see them grow and be a part of all of it. I say it all the time: I get to be their mom another day. I get to be Marley, Juni, and Moon's mom forever, and that feels really special."
“Teaching them to be good people is the most important thing to me. To advocate for themselves, making sure they know they’re capable of anything they want.”
What makes you most nervous?
"What makes me nervous is whether I'm doing enough and doing it right. I wake up in the morning so happy, and then I go to bed wondering if I did enough that day. I hear some of the best moms I know share those same feelings, maybe it never goes away, but it keeps me on my toes."
What advice would you give to other moms—especially artist moms—about to start their motherhood journey?
"While I think it's really important to hold both identities—mom and artist—together as much as I can, those two spaces do have to be separate. When Moon was born, I tried working from home. I got rid of my studio thinking I could run upstairs to breastfeed and come back downstairs to paint and I learned very quickly that's not how I work. So I went back and got my studio space. The one I'm in now I've been in for about four years. It's ten minutes from my home, right next to the football stadium, and I can see the water. I love that space."
"At home I always have an easel in the upstairs foyer for smaller projects, but even then I work on those when everyone is asleep, because I need to be able to block everything else out. When the kids are around, you're needed and for me to really lock in and make art, those two spaces have to stay separate. I don't know if I'll ever have a home studio again. I really like to leave and be able to sit in that space for a few hours, however much my life allows at any given time."
What do you love about raising your kids in the Seattle area?
"What I love most about raising my kids in Seattle is the environment. The trees, the air, being outside, going to the beach, fishing, the mountains. The city and the water are all so close. I appreciate nature here so much. When I go other places and come back, I always recognize how beautiful Seattle is. I even love the rainy studio days."
Tell us about your path to becoming an artist.
"My passion for painting and my current approach to storytelling really developed in fashion school. I went to San Francisco thinking I wanted my own clothing line, and I realized while I was there that I wanted to be a painter instead. So I made the shift and worked a lot of jobs. I already had two kids and was navigating all of it; I was working at a radiology clinic and a bridal shop. In 2018, when I lost one of my very best friends, I made a promise to myself that I would not live another year not going after what I really wanted. Leah was a singer—incredibly talented—and I wanted to honor her by not ignoring my own passion any longer. So I quit my job. I had two kids, and it was terrifying. I thought about what I was asking my kids to sacrifice so that I could follow my dreams. But it started to make more and more sense as time went on. It was slow in the beginning and I sold a lot of hoodies and merch, but the more I put myself out there and the more time I had to really lock into my work, life started to look the way I wanted it to. Every year it's like, if I can do this for one more year, that would be incredible."
How has becoming a mother impacted your art practice?
"My time is more valuable now, and I have to maximize every hour in the studio. One thing I wish I had more of is just the ability to sit with my work. There's a little more urgency now—getting the idea from my brain to the canvas—and while that rawness has been really beneficial, I do benefit from being able to sit with a piece, and that has shifted a bit."
"In terms of storytelling, my kids have inspired me to only tell the stories that really matter. I think about not just my kids but the youth in general, whether they'll see themselves in my work. That's always at the front of my mind. Having kids and seeing their immediate reactions to what I make has shaped the stories I want to tell. I want to put good into the world. I want to make whatever positive change I can, and even if that means telling a hard or dark story, I feel like it's my job to spark something in someone. Having kids has just amplified that feeling and put this weight on my chest to get it all out."
Do you have regular hours that you try to work each day?
"I wish I had regular work hours. Since my partner and I are both artists, we've built a schedule to make sure our toddler—the only kid not in school yet—gets plenty of one-on-one time and isn't just sitting in a studio on a screen all day while we paint. Basically, Monday is my studio day, Tuesday is his, Wednesday is mine, Thursday is his, and then the following week it flips. So it's three days one week, two days the next. The weekends are work-when-you-can if we're not doing family things. We also pull the occasional all-nighter while everyone is sleeping. We tried a week-on, week-off schedule before and that was really difficult, you know, stepping away from a piece for a full week is a lot. Every-other-day works so much better. Everything is temporary anyway; eventually Moon will start school and the whole schedule will shift again. Being open to evolving is key. We've tried about five different schedules and this is the one that's working."
What's inspiring you lately?
"Lately I've been really focused on building my technique. For the first few years of my practice I was so focused on the storytelling and what I wanted to say and now that part comes naturally. So I've been turning my attention to how I'm saying it. I'm taking some of the sewing skills I learned in fashion school and applying them to my art now: sewing on linen, printing on linen, sewing pieces together, layering and adding more depth to the stories. I'm also inspired by everyone around me. We're in a really interesting moment where things are changing fast and artists are creating new blueprints for how to exist in these spaces. New things that didn't work before are working now. From social media to galleries to the internet in general, there's so much to try. A couple of years ago I introduced mini prints, thinking maybe people would like them, and they've done really well. They've opened up access to people who can't spend more on a larger piece, and that really inspires me, thinking about how to put art in the hands of people who might not otherwise have it."
Do you have any go-to creative habits or practices to get grounded in yourself, inspired, and ready to create?
"I read a lot, I love my Nintendo Switch, I play a lot of games with my kids. I watch documentaries. I love reality TV. I love anything that lets you step out of your own world for a little while with a book, a show, a game, and then come back to your real life feeling inspired. I try to keep myself in a space where I'm constantly growing or absorbing something new, and I'm really intentional about not sitting too long in feeling uninspired. Even when I feel that way, I keep drawing and making things, even if they never see the light of day. Staying in a place where I can make things just for me, I think that's really important."
With so many horrors happening locally & globally today (and everyone witnessing it 24/7 online), how have you been dealing, as an artist, person, and mother?
"It's been really difficult to witness the state of the world and feel like you have access to trauma twenty-four hours a day. To constantly feel like you need to protect your kids from it, and to try to create a safe space at home when there's so much suffering that's impossible to avoid. The older I get, the more aware I am of the weight of things, and the more I educate myself, the more I feel. I don't know if my art will ever change the world, but I do think it'll connect with someone and make them feel less alone. I know what art has done for me and the dark places it's pulled me from, so I try to give that back. That's my small way of contributing to something bigger. It's been the hardest time I've had blocking that noise out, and I think we just continue to grow and become more aware of the world we live in. I'm thankful that I have such a beautiful family and my work to help pull some of that darkness out, but it's hard, and I think it's hard for a lot of people."
Any big goals or happenings—professionally or personally—that you're excited about through the rest of the year and beyond?
"My big goals are to have a solo museum exhibition and to make a sculpture. I'd love to take my kids on a long two-week trip somewhere. I want to read more books. When I was eight or nine years old, I used to say that if I ever painted a mural, I would feel like Picasso. I recently painted a 100-foot mural in Seattle, right next to my studio, and seeing that become real was one of the most beautiful experiences of my life. That was something I dreamed about for so long. But I'm a Capricorn, so the moment something is done, I'm already thinking about what's next. I just keep working, keep making art, and try to be as happy as I possibly can."
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