ARTS & CULTURE
Kimberly Marsh
Photo, Courtesy of Zadith Rodriguez
Tulsa artist Zadith Rodriguez is reimagining a greener Tulsa through her artwork, hoping to inspire future generations while connecting to her South American roots. Rodriguez is a native of Peru.
She started with an artwork called Green North Tulsa, a collage of downtown greenscapes, community gardens, and living rooftops featuring abundant growing plants. She uses the canvas to piece together tiny bits of shiny paper repurposed from local magazines into a mosaic, reflective of our city. This medium brings the city alive through vibrant colors and intricate design. If you look closely, you might find the bow of a cruise ship or the wing of an airplane integrated as a vertical panel for a local structure.
Rodriguez, 29, has lived in Tulsa nearly all her life but returned to Peru in 2024 to examine her roots. She connected to nature in a new way and brought back to Tulsa a desire to emphasize the importance of natural, environmentally friendly, community spaces that foster connection and regeneration.
In Green North Tulsa, Rodriguez wanted to bring the art to life through a three-dimensional effect using the texture of paper. She sketched it out and began to add to it using a collection of different colors, tree parts, and shapes from magazines, such as Tulsa People, to create the designs of brick-and-mortar.
“I like to create movement. When you look at it, your eyes are kind of shifting.”
An Artist’s Journey of Self-Discovery and Regeneration
Rodriguez was seven years old when she arrived in Tulsa with her mother, leaving their home in Tarapoto, in the northern part of the Peruvian jungle, she said.
“I’m Peruvian, but I’m not sure what that means. So coming here (to Tulsa) is kind of just like essentially a culture shock, and it’s been a little bit difficult for me to acclimate to this environment. Even at 29 years old.”
She returned to Peru to find out more about her heritage and connect with her homeland.
“I needed to find a balance within myself to see what that is, how I can identify myself, who I am. And, I came back just knowing I have a lot of American traditions in the way that I go and move about my life. So I exist now as an American Peruvian woman. I feel confident in allowing myself to be grounded here, whereas before, I felt like I was almost floating, not really knowing where my roots are.”
Rodriguez said she now believes that natural environments call out to and honor our ancestors by returning our attention to the earth and connections to each other.
“So that is essentially what I was really wanting to implement in those community spaces as well, is just bringing people together. Oftentimes, when you go to the supermarket, you’re just doing your own thing. You’re not having conversations of like, ‘Hey, check this out…I’m gonna pick this tomato. Or what do you think about this?’ We’re not communicating with each other. So community spaces, I think, are very important living in Tulsa.”
The artwork also points to ways humans can create more environmentally friendly spaces using regenerative designs that give back to the space through heat or cooling as well as beauty and that feeling of peace found in nature.
An Artist’s Beginning
Rodriguez started creating mosaics when she was a junior in high school. Pleased with the outcome, she knew it was unique in the market, so continued to experiment with the medium.
“I got into printmaking when I was in college at TCC (Tulsa Community College), and I really enjoyed it. What I love about my art, what I love for myself is working with my hands. I love being put into a meditation state, or kind of where I feel like I’m in my essence. And printmaking and mosaic collage building just really helps me with that. It makes me feel at peace with myself when all the things are happening in the world.”
Rodriguez’s work will be exhibited at the Painted Moth Gallery, 427 S. Boston Ave., on Jan. 15. A collection of her work can be found at her Fokal profile, and she can be contacted by email at [email protected].
