#ERNESTOORTIZLEYVA #Y2EYES
Etching and Aquatint on Paper
7.5 in x 5.25 in
11 x 14 in
Vinyl Acrylic, Gouache, Ink,
Glitter and Gesso on Canvas
Etching and Aquatint on Paper
10 in x 14 in
11 x 14 in
Vinyl Acrylic, Guache, Ink,
Glitter and Gesso on Canvas
Etching and Aquatint on Paper
7.5 in x 5.25 in
16 x 20 in
Vinyl Acrylic and Gouache on Canvas
12 x 12 in
Ink and Gesso on Canvas
6 x 6 in
Ink and Gesso on Canvas
6 x 6 in
Ink and Gesso on Canvas
24 x 20 in
4 x 4 in Individual
Ink and Gesso on Wood
16 x 20 in
Vinyl Acrylic, Gouache and Gesso on Canvas
Vinyl Acrylic, Gouache, Ink, Glitter on Canvas
40 in x 40 in
Collage, Mixed Media
12 x 9 in
Etching, Aquatint on Paper
5.25 x 7.5 in
Flashe, Acrylic, Glitter, Ink on Canvas
19 x 16 x 1 in.
Etching, Photo-etching, Aquatint, and Drypoint on Paper
12 x 12 in.
Vinyl Acrylic, Gouache, Ink, Plaster, Glitter on Canvas
19.5 x 15.5 x 2 in
Flashe, Acrylic, Glitter, Ink, and Gesso on Canvas
12 x 12 in
Flashe, Acrylic, Glitter, Ink, and Gesso on Canvas
13.5 x 11 x 1 in.
Flashe, Acrylic, Glitter, and Gesso on Canvas
11 in x 13.5 in
Acrylic and Flashe on Canvas
5 ft x 5 ft
Etching and Aquatint on Red Foam
5.25 in x 7.5 in
Etching and Aquatint on Paper
7.5 in x 5.25 in
Acrylic and Flashe on Canvas
11 in x 13.5 in
Flashe, Acrylic, Glitter, and Gesso on Canvas
10 in x 10 in
Etching, Aquatint, Photo-etching on Yellow Foam
9in x 12 in
Etching, Aquatint, Photo-etching on Paper
11 in x 17 in
Etching, Aquatint, Photo-etching on Orange Foam
9in x 12 in
Etching and Aquatint on Purple Foam
9 in x 12 in
Etching and Aquatint on Fuschia Foam
9 in x 12 in
Collage, Acrylic, Gouache and Ink on Board
12 in x 12 in
Etching and Aquatint on Yellow Foam
12 in x 12 in
Etching and Aquatint on Paper
5.25 in x 7.5 in
Ink, Etching, Aquatint, Acrylic on Wood
11 in x 15 in
Mixed Media, Wood and Board and Paint
6 ft x 5.5 ft x 1 ft
Photo-etching and Aquatint on Paper
6.5 in x 9.5 in
17 cm x 24.5 cm
Ink, Etching, Aquatint, Acrylic on Wood
11 in x 15 in
Flashe, Gouache and Acrylic on Wood
12 in x 15 in
Etching and Aquatint on Purple Foam
12 in x 12 in
Photo-etching and Aquatint on Yellow Foam
Acrylic, Flashe, Ink and Phosphorescent Paint on Paper
20 in x 31.5 in
50 cm x 80 cm
Flashe, Gouache and Acrylic on Wood
12 in x 15 in
Etching on Paper
6 in x 4.5 in
Mixed Media on Board
20 in x 27.5 in
51 cm x 69 cm
2016
Screen Print on T-Shirt
Size Variable
Ink and Flashe on Canvas
40 in x 30 in
88 cm x 64 cm
2016
Ink and Flashe on Board
59.4 x 84.1cm
23.39 x 33.11 inches
Etching with Aquatint on Paper
12 in x 16 ½ in
31 cm x 41 cm
Acrylic on Board
16 in x 16 in
Vinyl Acrylic and Ink on Paper
4.5 ft x 5.ft
Acrylic and Airbrush on Paper
18 in x 18 in
Ink on paper
24 in x 24 in
Ink and Acrylic on Paper
9 in x12 in
Ink, Airbrush and Flashe on Gessoed Paper
18 in x 24 in
Acrylic and Ink on Canvas
12 in x 12 in
Ink, Acrylic, and Airbrush on Gessoed Paper
18 in x 24 in
Acrylic Air Brush on Paper
40 in x 50 in
Acrylic on Paper
9 in x 12 in
Collage on Board
12 in x 12 in
Ink on Paper
18 in x 24 in
Acrylic on paper
9 in x 14 in
Animation
The etchings are part of a continuing series entitled THE GREAT CASTA WAR. It is about a fictional race war on the Mexican/ American border, with its origins in the lexicon of 18th Century Spanish Colonial paintings.
Flashe, Acrylic, Screen-print on Aluminum
Acrylic and Oil on Canvas
4.5 ft x 3.5 ft
Etching and Photoetching on Paper
15 in x 11.5 in
Etching and Photoetching on Paper
15 in x 11.5 in
Etching and Photoetching on Paper
15 in x 11.5 in
Flashe and Acrylic on Canvas
7.5 ft x 5.5 ft
Etching and Photoetching on Paper
15 in x 11.5 in
Etching on Paper
15 in x 11.5 in
Flashe and Acrylic on Canvas
7.5 ft x 16.5 ft
Etching on Paper
12 in x 9 in
Black Gesso on Burlap
7.5 ft x 5 ft
Etching on Paper
12 in x 9 in
2013
Mixed Media, Wood, Acrylic
5 ft x 3 ft
2012
Oil on Manta (lowest quality fabric used in Mexico)
3 ft x 3 ft
2012
Oil Stick on Manta (lowest quality fabric used in Mexico)
3 ft x 3 ft
Etching on Paper
2013
15.5 in x 11.5 in
2013
Oil on Wood Panel
3 ft x 4.5 ft
Oil on Canvas
24 in x 18 in
2013
Etchings on Aluminum
Dimensions Variable
Individual Etchings are 5 in x 7 in
2013
Oil on Canvas
5 ft x 2 ft
2012
Oil on Canvas
5 ft x 5 ft
2012
Etching on Paper
6 in x 9 in
These paintings were painted on Mexican manta, a type of common cloth that was purchased by my mother and aunt in Ciudad Juarez. Indigenous groups often use it to make their clothes. Drug cartels use it to leave threatening messages atop corpses and at the scene of violent crimes.
A selection of these paintings were exhibited in 2013 as part of
Evidence: Artistic Responses to the Drug Cartel Wars
at Intersection for the Arts in San Francisco, CA.
Curated by Kevin B. Chen
http://kevinbchen.com/section/381864_Evidence_Artistic_Responses_to_the_Drug.html
Oil on Manta
6 ft x 4.5 ft
Oil on Manta
4.5 ft x 5 ft
Acrylic on Manta
6 ft x 4.5 ft
Oil on Manta
3.5 ft x 4 ft
2011
Oil and Acrylic on Manta
3.5 ft x 4.5 ft
97 cm x 107 cm
Oil on Manta
12 in x 12 in
Oil on Manta
2 ft x 2.5 ft
Oil on Manta
4 ft x 4.5 ft
Oil on Manta
12 in x 16 in
Acrylic on Manta
6 ft x 4.5 ft
Oil on Manta
12 in x 18 in
Oil on Manta
3.5 ft x 4 ft
Acrylic on Manta
6 ft x 4.5 ft
Oil and Acrylic on Manta
3.5 ft x 5 ft
Oil on Manta
3.5 ft x 4.5 ft
2011
18 in x 18 in
Acrylic on Manta
Inkjet on Newsprint
11 in x 8.5 in
Inkjet on Newsprint
11 in x 8.5 in
Inkjet on Newsprint
11 in x 8.5 in
“The border, as both physical reality and philosophical entity, forms the backdrop of the paintings Ernesto Ortiz is working on for his first solo exhibition, opening on May 23rd at Golden Parachutes in Berlin. Indeed, it could be said that the U.S.-Mexican border is one of the rare places where the supposed abstractions of philosophy become manifested in physical form. At a time when relations between the two nations are at a tense impasse, it seems highly appropriate that the artist, born in the United States of Mexican heritage, would choose this moment to reflect on the self-created American myth of “the other.”
I recently visited Ortiz at his studio in the Kreuzberg district of Berlin, where I got to see several of the paintings Ortiz is working on for his upcoming exhibition, as well as other recent work. The new paintings represent a departure in terms of both style and palette for the artist. Ortiz’s last major series was a meditation on a single photograph – he made fifty paintings based on manipulated variations of Joe Rosenthal’s famous image of U.S. soldiers raising the flag on Iwo Jima, all done in a loose, expressionistic style, typically with darker hues. The new paintings use bright, even garish colors, and are often rendered in ornate, blanket-like patterns or Liechtensteinian dots.
The artist’s concern with politics and the painterly landscape, however, remains a constant. Still, Ortiz’s new series tackles a rather different form of mediated Americana – the cinematic Western. The artist became fascinated with these films when he first realized that many Europeans base their impressions of Mexico – and Mexicans – on them. “I wasn’t aware of this until I came to Europe. They’re more dependent on this image than the Americans.”
Ortiz intends his paintings to do more than merely comment on this conception of “the Mexican for Europeans.” One of the more striking paintings Ortiz showed me was Untitled (Getaway). The image, of an empty telephone pole-lined road cutting a swath through the desert, is taken from the last scene of Sam Peckinpah’s film, The Getaway. Here, Mexico figures as a romantic symbol of lawlessness and freedom – it is the only safe haven for the criminal couple who are the heroes of the film, the place where the law cannot touch them.
Of course, this conception of Mexico being synonymous with lawlessness and crime also informs the (white) American view of the land “south of the border” – and white America’s fear and hatred of the ethnic other, which informs much of the debate surrounding immigration, as well as media coverage of the recent drug wars. Acutely sensitive to these issues, Ortiz submits his scene to hot colors – a fiery orange-red and a burning blue – as though to magnify the sense of danger and mystery that accommodates this particular notion of what Mexico stands for. In two further paintings of the border, the texts GLOBAL DESTINATION and VIOLENT WORLD emerge in the midst of the landscape, almost giving us the feeling that we are looking at strange advertisements in a travel magazine, rather than the contested No Man’s Land where two Americas converge.
Ortiz’s strongest statement on identity, however, may be found in the painting Adios Amigos, a crude stereotype of a smiling Mexican man depicted in brown. As I was studying this painting, Ortiz noted that census predictions assert that by 2050, over half of the United States population will be brown, making whites the minority. “Growing up on the border,” he continued, “I saw a lot of closet Hispanics. To identify Mexico was to taint yourself. In the United States, cultural identity is all about absence. If you’re white, then you lack that identity. To have any other is to be tainted.”
It will be interesting to see how far Ortiz’s new work is able to go in tainting contemporary European notions of what Mexico represents.”
https://whitehotmagazine.com/articles/2009-ernesto-ortiz-golden-parachutes/1869
Oil in Paper
32 in x 22 in
Oil on Canvas
24 in x 18 in
Acrylic and Oil on Canvas
4 ft x 4.5 ft
Oil and Acrylic on Canvas
4.5 ft x 3 ft
