Powerpaola’s North American debut traces the lives of young women during Columbia’s violent drug cartel warfare era of the 1980’s-90’s.
"Powerpaola has a gift for expressing an entire world with a thin black line, building up textures and details that are a joy to get lost in. In Virus Tropical, her memories of a unique family life are so vividly portrayed that you feel like you are living through all the laughter, joy, tears and door-slamming right along with her. It's a treat of a book."—Sarah Glidden, author of How to Understand Israel in 60 Days or Less
Powerpaola's Virus Tropical uses a series of vignettes to transform the simplicity of middle-class family life into a thought-provoking narrative that would have been inconceivable prior to Colombia's sexual revolution. Focusing on the lives of a family of women in the eighties through the nineties, Powerpaola's tale highlights the excitement, danger, and struggles of a country in the midst of radical change.
Powerpaola was born in 1977 in Quito, Ecuador, and, at a young age, moved to Cali, Colombia. Years later, she and her friends founded a collective space of expression, Taller 7, in Medellin and was granted a scholarship to develop her art in La Cité Internationale des Arts in Paris, where she adopted the name Powerpaola. She is currently working on an animated adaptation of Virus Tropical and lives in Buenos Aires, Argentina.