She started caring for others at the age of 7, when her mother financially abandoned the family. Aponte would dig through the trash of her neighborhood in Spanish Harlem to feed her brother and sisters, immediately taking it upon herself to provide for the household. Her grandmother, a dancer, costume artist, introduced her to a world of creativity that changed her life forever. As an adult with three children, Aponte decided to leave a career in nursing for a lifetime of parenting, and art, intricately bound together. One project, a series of wine bottles she designed, tells the often-tragic stories of the children she's nutured.
Wine bottles create images that tell a story, and they're also very fragile.
Deeply imbedded in Aponte is the love for parenting and the need, always, to provide for those who surround her. Whenever he got angry, I'd hold him tightly, until he calmed down. If he couldn't, I told him he could throw any thing he wanted, just as long as he didn't hurt any of the other children. Her voice thickens as she remembers, as tears well up in her eyes. Before he died, he told me I was the best mother he ever had.