Mario López
Mario López
Mario Abidail López López was born on August 17, 1991, on Finca Oná, El Quetzal, San Marcos, Guatemala. My childhood among the coffee plantations has been one of the greatest gifts life has given me—growing up with dawns announced by the song of the mockingbird and watching the brilliant sunset dance to the tune of the clarinero. I began working on the coffee farm as a child. The morning dew would cling to my pants and rubber boots as I followed the foreman’s voice, carrying my machete, hoe, and a bag holding the tortillas my mother had made for me. My paths were dirt trails through brush and ants. In winter, they turned into muddy swamps, and those trails became my first canvases, where I would draw with my machete, tracing my first creations with the branches of chalum. In the church I attended, a drawing contest was held, and I won at only six years old. My prize was Q 2.00 (two quetzales) and half a dozen bananas. I never studied art formally; however, I don’t consider myself a self-taught artist, as my teachers from a young age were nature and the experiences I described in the second paragraph of this writing.
