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Patterns and Rhythms: Paintings
by Anita Rodriguez
March 16 - May 20, 2007
The Harwood Museum
of Art of the University of New Mexico presents the exhibition Patterns
and Rhythms: Paintings by Anita Rodriguez. The exhibition opens
March 16 and will be on view through May 20, 2007. It features some
thirty paintings by Anita Rodriguez including both new works and a selection
of earlier paintings borrowed from local collections that explore a variety
of themes.
Anita Rodriguez is a native Taoseña who now lives
and works in Guanajuato, Mexico. In addition to being a renowned painter,
she is a writer, activist and expert on adobe construction. Her intensely
colorful and complex images draw from a rich mix of cultural and spiritual
traditions using skeletons as the protagonists who act out the real, surreal
and fantastical scenes she imagines.
Rodriguez was immersed in art from a young age. Her
mother, Grace Graham King, was a Taos artist so her daughter grew up running
in and out of the 
studios of
such Taos notables as Victor Higgins, Emil Bisttram and Bert Phillips. Rodriguez
later studied at the Taos Art Association with Ward Lockwood and Emil Bisttram. She
has noted, however, that despite her close relationships with these artists,
it was the Hispanic religious folk art of New Mexico that affected her most
deeply. Rodriguez went on to major in art at Colorado College and the
University of Denver. In her early twenties she became interested in
the traditions of the enjarradoras-the women in the New Mexico villages
and pueblos who did the adobe plastering and finishing work. She eventually
became a specialist in traditional adobe construction, winning awards particularly
for her innovative fireplace designs. Rodriguez also is an outspoken
activist who has always been deeply involved in political and social issues
and her writings have been published in Arrellano, La Herencia,
Women of Power and New Mexico Magazine, among others. (right:
Anita Rodriguez, Hora, acrylic on masonite & board, 2006)
In 1989, Rodriguez decided to return to painting, and rapidly
found it all-absorbing. Since that time, she has had one-woman shows
at New Directions Gallery in Taos in 2001 and at the Roswell Museum of Art
and R. B. Ravens Gallery in 2002 among others. She also has participated
in numerous group exhibitions including Cinco Pintoras at the University
Art Museum in Albuquerque (1996) and the New Art of the West exhibitions
at the Eiteljorg Museum in Indianapolis in 1996 and 2000 as well as Ofrendas
Para Los Muertos: An All Souls' Day Exhibit at Hacienda de los Martinez
in 2002. She has been commissioned to create book covers for Rudolfo
Anaya and Jim Segal through the University of New Mexico Press, and to create
a series of prints for the Women of the West Museum. Her paintings
can be found in the permanent collections of the Albuquerque Museum, the
Millicent Rogers Museum of Art, the Harwood Museum of Art and Alholdigas
de Granaditas in Guanajuato, Mexico.
Rodriguez' works explore the zone where cultures mix and
often collide -- a zone she came to know well growing up in multicultural
Taos as the daughter of an Anglo mother and Hispanic father. Her work
draws from personal interests and beliefs as well as themes that have intrigued
her throughout her life. They include indigenous Mexican Indian beliefs,
shamanism, the Crypto-Judaism of Northern New Mexico, Catholicism and the
unique aspects of border life as well as low-rider culture, Tarot cards
and gourmet cooking. She is particularly fascinated with secret traditions
and hidden identities. Rodriguez states: "My paintings are full
of humor, puns and hidden jokes. They are layered with political, mystical,
and psychological meaning." By turns intense, humorous, tragic,
joyful, fantastical or erotic her works explore the shared experiences and
anxieties of the human condition.
Rodriguez' primary characters are skeletons, a longstanding
motif from Mexican art and popular culture. She has said of their appeal:
"Skeletons have always been paramount in my workBones stand for my
belief in deep democracy-everybody has the same bones, and death comes to
us all." For Rodriguez, stripping her figures to their skeletal
frames equalizes them and allows her to address issues that reach across
ethnic, religious, cultural and other boundaries from a common starting
point. They are, for her, symbols of life not death, expressive and
vital. Coyotes, wolves, bears, rabbits, stags and masked dancers also
make frequent appearances in her paintings carrying both literal and symbolic
meanings.
Vibrant color and lush landscapes are hallmarks too of
Rodriguez' works. She has stated: "I just love color. The pleasure
that I take in color is physical; it's like eating" and her glowing
palette reflects the colors of both Mexican and New Mexican culture. These
cultural influences and her lifelong love of Hispanic religious art also
are expressed in the forms of her work. Often, the frame is a continuation
of the painting and they are carved in forms that echo nichos and
retablos.
Patterns and Rhythms: Paintings by Anita Rodriguez opens Friday, March 16, 2007 with a public reception from 5-7
pm. The exhibition continues through May 20, 2007. R. B. Ravens Gallery
will also be hosting a related show of Anita Rodriguez' work from March
15 through April 30 with an opening reception on March 23 from 5-7 pm at
the gallery.
Also opening concurrently at the Harwood Museum sare Paper,
Skin, Air: New Drawings by Gretchen Ewert and Northern New Mexico
Carvers, curated by Gustavo Victor Goler. A gallery talk is scheduled
during the exhibition.
rev. 3/7/07
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