FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 2021
Contact: Colter Ruland
Email: colter.ruland@prforartists.com
Phone: (520) 370-4602
Look What You Created: Patrick Martinez Examines Systems of Power in New Exhibition at Tucson Museum of Art
Tucson, AZ – The Tucson Museum of Art (TMA) presents Look What You Created, the first solo museum exhibition in the American Southwest by Los Angeles-based artist Patrick Martinez.
The events that transpired in 2020 changed our world forever. America grappled with the pandemic, presidential election, tragic events, and systemic injustices faced by people of color to unveil a deeply divided nation. Through social media, protests, marches, and calls for accountability and equity, a new urgency arose, and artists across the United States responded with a profound reaction and message.
In Look What You Created, Martinez explores personal, civic, and cultural loss in communities of color, discrimination, displacement, and demands accountability and transparency. Look What You Created, both the title and work in the exhibition, is an ambiguous phrase addressing both past challenges of fixed power systems and the present examples of democracy in action.
Martinez’s art takes on various forms in a variety of media, including mixed-media painting, neon signs, and cake paintings. Expanding his practice over the last year, Martinez explores socially engaged and accessible forms of work such as mass-produced lawn signs, a charitable art initiative folder project, and clothing. Captivating and provocative, Look What You Created exemplifies Martinez’s ability to invoke conversations about equity, empathy, humanity, and connection.
While alluding to the 1992 Los Angeles riots and former Los Angeles Times senior staff photographer and photo editor Kirk D. McKoy’s photograph that features the phrase “Look what you created,” Martinez’s work reveals the startling analogies between such imagery and events and recent nationwide protests and demonstrations. “The messages that were in the air then and are echoed now have influenced the exhibition and title of the show,” says Martinez.
In Look What You Created, the “past is the present,” with works that reverberate a sense of urgency, immediacy, and, ultimately, an ongoing demand for action.
Exhibition Details:
November 4, 2021 – April 24, 2022
On view in the Kasser Family Wing of Latin American Art.
Look What You Created is accompanied by a full-color catalogue published by the Tucson Museum of Art with texts by Jeremy Mikolajczak, exhibition curator and the Jon and Linda Ender Director and CEO; Dr. Kristopher Driggers, Schmidt Curator of Latin American Art; Dr. Marianna Pegno, Director of Engagement and Inclusion; and Hunter Braithwaite, Brooklyn-based writer and editor.
Museum Hours:
Thursday – Sunday
10:00 AM – 5:00 PM
About Patrick Martinez
Patrick Martinez, (b. 1980 Pasadena, CA) earned his BFA with honors from Art Center College of Design in 2005.
His work has been exhibited domestically and internationally in Los Angeles, Mexico City, San Francisco, Minneapolis, Miami, New York, Seoul, and the Netherlands, at venues including the Studio Museum in Harlem, the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, El Museo del Barrio, the Tucson Museum of Art, the Madison Museum of Contemporary Art, the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, the Cornell Fine Arts Museum, the Vincent Price Art Museum, the Museum of Latin American Art, LA Louver, Galerie Lelong & Co., Movimiento de Arte y Cultura Latino Americana, the Chinese American Museum and the Euphrat Museum of Art, among others.
Patrick’s work resides in the permanent collections of Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, the Tucson Museum of Art, the Crocker Art Museum, the Cornell Fine Art Museum, the Pizzuti Collection of the Columbus Museum of Art, and the Museum of Latin American Art, among others.
Patrick lives and works in Los Angeles and is represented by Charlie James Gallery, Los Angeles.
About Tucson Museum of Art and Historic Block
As an institution built upon the original territories of the O’odham, the Tucson Museum of Art and Historic Block (TMA) acknowledges the Indigenous Sonoran Desert communities, past and present, who have stewarded this region throughout generations.
TMA connects art to life through meaningful and engaging experiences that inspire discovery, spark creativity, and promote cultural understanding. Founded in 1924, TMA encompasses an entire city block in historic downtown.
TMA is committed to developing quality exhibitions, expanding, and diversifying its collection and presenting relevant and innovative programs while broadening public access to the arts.
The museum features exhibitions of Modern and Contemporary art, Latin American art from ancient to today, Indigenous arts and Art of the American West. A permanent collection of over 12,000 works of art spans continents, centuries, and media. TMA’s campus includes five properties listed on the National Register of Historic Places, an art education center and research library, the Museum Store, and the highly acclaimed museum restaurant Café a la C’Art.
TMA is a private 501(c)(3) charitable arts and education organization. More info: TucsonMuseumofArt.org or (520) 624-2333.
