"Tina La Porta's body of work 'Side Effects' is a catalyst for acceptance and awareness.
Rather than placing emphasis on the inherent darkness of mental illness, drug addiction, and social interaction,
La Porta translates a highly misunderstood and popularly fascinating condition into an elegant and powerful aesthetic."
--Miami Art Scene

Installation view of Side Effects Series, 2011

My practice is a form of detournement, reusing elements well-known to architecture combined with objects of personal use to create new work with a different message. The impact of displacement on the psyche not to mention the violation toward the body itself can easily be read into this new work. The work itself becomes an Assemblage of remnants left behind or discarded objects left over that have made it's way into my art making practice as a means with which to function and still remain an avant-garde practitioner.

Works from the 'All The Pills In My House' series, 2011

The sculptural Assemblage works are examples from a larger body of work where I combined belt buckles with tile and soundproofing samples discarded by Architectural Firms. The buckle is used as a means to express the act of being constrained. The process of fusing earrings with soundproof materials points toward a psychological state of mind which may sense a perception in the absence of a stimulus. I extended this series titled "Side Effects" by including Pills to explore the relationship between Illness, Treatment and the creative impulse. My focus on psychoactive medications within a range of visual forms explores their impact on consciousness as a contemporary social phenomenon.

Works on view from the Side Effects series during Art Basel Miami Beach, 2011

The “Tips” series extend these ideas further by using samples of wood paneling along with segments of wallpaper which is meant to recall the short story written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman titled, “The Yellow Wallpaper.” All of these works incorporate the tip of the belt buckle, again as a reference to various states of confinement, so that each “Tip” can be perceived as a whisper from an ancestor that is intended to serve as a reminder of past struggles and indignities to current or future ambiguous generations.

A collection of small works from the Side Effects series, 2012

My Works on Paper interweave personal reflections on Signs and Symptoms of illness along with suspect methods of Treatment and anxieties about Recovery. In the series “Torn” , “Wounds” , "Spirals" and "Stains" I saw the paper that I was working with as a metaphor for both the body and the psyche. The paper became a site that allowed me to express my internal emotional state.

Works from the Side Effects Series, 2012

The series “Torn” takes a more clinical approach-- examining the language used by medical practitioners to determine patient diagnosis. The physical process of ripping the paper became cathartic and symbolic at the same time.

Works from the Side Effects Series, Yellow Wallpaper works and 28 Days Installation,, 2011

The series “Wounds” took on a psychoanalytic approach loosely referencing then recombining, for my own process of understanding, text from Julia Kristeva’s classic publication, The Black Sun. In this sense, I would tear holes at various locations of the paper and write freely around the edges of tears. Again, like the series “Torn” the physicality of both the paper and my interaction with it became an embodiment of my own internal anguish.

Works from the Side Effects Series,, 2011

The “Time Out” series consists of Oil Pastels on Magazine Stock Paper from the New York magazine Time Out. This emotionally charged series of text overlaid onto the Art listings section of the weekly publication is a direct reply from the artist externalizing concerns as a multi-faceted response to loss and absence.

Works from the Hand To Mouth Series, 2012

In the series of Ink on Book Paper Stock titled “Ishihara Tests,” I have torn pages out of the book Ishihara’s Tests for Colour Deficiency. The series of Plates were designed as a test for red-green color vision defects to be utilized in a clinical setting. In this series rather than recite back what I see, instead, I inscribe my immediate thoughts and feelings directly onto each Plate.

Journaling and Jewelry Making, both staples of practice in an Art Therapy setting were made to establish insight in the early stages of diagnosis.