Body Language

The Monk Project - 005 - Willie Middlebrook

Louie Metz Willie Middlebrook Andrés E. Montoya Jose Lozano Judithe Hernandez

Opening Night Reception: Saturday, February 13, 2010 from 7-10 pm

The Avenue 50 Studio is proud to present Body Language, an exhibition of works by artists who use the human form as story teller.

Judithe Hernandez began her career in the midst of the turbulent 1970’s as part of the vanguard of Chicano Art.  Hernandez was the only female member of the important Chicano art collective, Los Four.  Working together with East Los Angeles youth, she created murals reflective of the times, exploring political and cultural topics while also incorporating personal narrative.  Judithe is most know for her pastels on paper.  Using lush colors, she continually draws creative inspiration from her cultural inheritance.  Judith has exhibited extensively in the United States, Europe and Mexico, including the ground-breaking first exhibition of contemporary Chicano Art in Europe: Les Démon des Anges.  Her exhibition with the Avenue 50 Studio marks her return to Los Angeles after a 30-year hiatus.

Louie Metz, born in an army hospital in San Juan, Puerto Rico, moved with his mother to Los Angeles at the age of nine. At the age of fourteen, Louie and friends, responding to the world around them, formed Mad Society, a punk band. He received his B.F.A. from Otis Parsons in 1990. Louie’s subjects reflect an inner psychological reality. He conveys a classicism that is complex and straight forward - brutal yet beautiful.

Willie Middlebrook, obsessed with the need to communicate in an honest and direct manner, uses photography to reflect the ideals and the integrity of being Black. His work speaks to an African-American sensibility that is always centered on his community. Willie produces strong sepia toned images of his people; not necessarily in a positive light, but always in a true light.

Jose Lozano lived in Juárez, México during his youth. There he found many of the cultural touchstones that continue to influence his work today - bad Mexican cinema, fotonovelas, ghost stories, comic books, and musical genres such as bolero and ranchera. He creates revealing, yet not always flattering, works about his neighborhood and its residents - parties, quinceañeras, strip clubs, weddings, and baby showers. Lozano prefers to work in a series, and focuses on particular themes and topics. In his series for the Avenue 50 Studio, Lozano focuses, in a wry manner, on the numerous strip clubs scattered throughout Juárez.

Andrés Montoya utilizes the landscape and figure as a metaphor for the human condition, exploring personal experiences through thoughts, dreams, realities, and absurdities. Born in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, yet growing up in Los Angeles, Montoya’s bi-cultural reality merged and blended, transforming his truth into patterns of subdued color and reflective composition.

February 13 through March 7, 2010