Women's History Month Interview Series with Tania Pomales: Artist, Woman, and recent Individual Artist Fellowship awardee

This Woman's History Month we are thrilled to interview Tania Pomales, a recent awardee of the New Jersey State Council on the Arts Individual Artist Fellowship and SJCA's Arts Administrator, about her work from the intersection of womanhood in 2026. As a writer and an artist, written word and visual representation speak true to her voice and we are excited to showcase that for her through these guided questions.

1. “Who” are you? How does womanhood tie into your work, career, and identity? 

Headshot taken by Ruben Garcia. Check out his portfolio here: https://ruben.zenfolio.com/f5987891

“Who am I?” is often an evolving experience, especially as I learn, grow, and relate to the places, spaces, and people I interact with on a daily basis.

Primarily, I see myself as a “creative,” an artist using various mediums and methods to communicate my lived experiences and also to hold up a mirror to the human condition. I am personally fascinated every day by the way this creative pull within me helps me to navigate and examine the world. 

Tania Pomales, "Death But Make it Lisa Frank"

As a woman, my work speaks to the dynamic experience of what it is to “be a woman” in my life as it relates to today’s world. I use imagery that is often associated with the feminine aspect, such as flowers, bright colors, gentle rendering techniques, and heavily emotional and introspective narratives.

I am very much tuned into my emotional landscape and have never tried to hide that or tone it down in any way. I believe it makes my work more soulful and impactful. I also love to pair these motifs and themes with more aggressive or masculine feeling elements such as skulls, gore, horror, and darker or more muted colors and perspectives. All of these combined characteristics of my art helped me create a very versatile career and expansive body of work that only continues to evolve in all directions, allowing me to explore new ideas and mediums with much more confidence and ease. 

Although being a Puerto Rican woman obviously threads through my artistic practice in terms of narratives and aesthetics, I tend to find all of my pieces floating around in the realms of what it is to be a human and what it feels like or means to confront the human condition at every moment. “What does life mean to me and for me?

What does it feel like to “be here now?” What does any of this existence mean to me, to you, to all of us? How have I changed? Who am I really, and does that change at all? How are we the same and different?” In many ways, these questions are always running through my mind like constant subroutines in a computer program, collecting data that then transforms into art. 

2. What inspires the kind of work you do? 

Tania Pomales, "The Spirit Protects Me"

My nickname in the art community is “The Skull Queen.” I earned that moniker because I am absolutely obsessed with painting and drawing skulls. My favorite movie as a kid was The Nightmare Before Christmas. I grew up watching my brother, artist Armando Medina, painting lots of H.R. Giger and horror or skull-themed artwork on cars and motorcycles. In addition, I had and still maintain a fascination with Egyptian history and culture as it relates to the afterlife. I am also deeply interested in the concept of the afterlife across several cultures. Mysticism, supernatural themes, spirituality, and the idea of consciousness and our search as humans to connect to those experiences we can feel but cannot see or grasp in terms of physicality or materialism also inspire me.

I am naturally a very introspective person, and I think frequently about the kind of life I want to live in the day to day and also about the kind of life I want to “leave behind” when I’ve departed this mortal realm. Thus, I tend to really put a heavy emphasis on love, cycles of life, aspects of growth, and the constancy and comfort of change as predominant themes in my work. I also really love videogames and Bob Ross!

When I am not actively creating work, you’ll often find me watching art documentaries, Bob Ross, or playing videogames like Elden Ring, Clair Obscur, and Baldur’s Gate 3. Art is everywhere for me, and I am always seeking to find it, feel it, and be inspired by it in any way possible. 

3. What has pushed you to move forward in your career when confronted with adversity?

Tania Pomales, "Ghost in the Machine"

Both of my parents grew up in Puerto Rico in conditions of immense poverty and suffering. When they met, married, and moved to the United States to build a new life and future together, they really had to dig deep to grasp the courage and resiliency to find their place in a land that felt foreign and extremely overwhelming.

Those qualities of resilience and courage are ones they instilled in me from a very young age. They also always made sure to teach me to embrace my Puerto Rican roots and identity. This meant that at a young age I was exposed to the idea of owning who I am fully and never being afraid to take up space and stand firmly planted in my purpose.

My dad came to the US the day after he graduated high school. His first job was digging ditches for a construction company. He later learned the art of scientific glass tooling and started a business that still operates today.

My mom used to work for Head Start, but she also made computer chips for Intel and was a travel agent, ceramist, and baker. Neither of them ran away from the concept of reinventing themselves, and that idea of reinvention or metamorphosis is a deep source of fortitude for my life and my artistic practice. 

4. What does winning the Individual Artist Fellowship Grant from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts mean to you? 

"This grant is the opportunity of a lifetime for me. "

Tania Pomales, "I Give and Recieve"

I applied before in previous cycles but did not receive it. This round, I fought myself the entire way through the application process because I kept thinking about my previous attempts and throwing myself into a loop of negative self-talk.

I share this aspect of the application process because I believe it is really important to be vulnerable about these moments. We live in a media landscape that tends to focus on the “highlight reels” of what it means to have a career, especially in the arts.

This makes these vulnerable conversations feel scary or potentially destructive to one’s career, and they often fuel a lot of the impostor syndrome we experience as artists. I am here to tell you that these conversations are actually fundamental and foundational to our growth as artists and as people because it is in these moments where we can see ourselves in the struggles and triumphs of our peers and of people we admire.

We can relate in a way that makes us feel less alone. It is really important to me to show artists who feel seen and represented in my work and my personal journey that sometimes this path can be challenging and even frightening, but ultimately it is rewarding and deeply fulfilling. It is also deeply important to the fabric of our community that we do this work and embrace this path.

The world needs artists, and it needs them every single day. I am deeply grateful to the New Jersey State Council on the Arts for awarding me this incredible opportunity to honor my county, city, and cultural identity through life changing support for my artistic practice.