LOS PAPERS DE EL OTRO OJO
LOS PAPERS DE EL OTRO OJO
CRUZ ORTIZ
c/s
El Otro Ojo
Yo tengo un otro ojo —---- where chemicals mix- where brushes glide and scratch across canvas—- in a desperate sensation of looking without seeing —- painting is ceremony – burning sage y palo santo con linseed y safflower oils — fumigating the studio —----- im letting go —
como jack whitten:
“#1 objective:
Remove the european significance of touch in painting”
Ive been painting on rock walls and skins for generations — aligning my approach to working without the euro centrists’ smock – and once again i embrace my indio —who knows the stars at night—- knows where the river is shallow and where it is deep —--the shift is how i'm reassigning components of portraiture – making something out something else — rasquache gestures towards a new method of portraiture - focused on the in-between — nepantla ojo device to see the energy of form - —-gente — mountains —s k y —-- sol —-r i v e r s —- come alive in the new otro dimension
These new works are still wet —- oils are fresh – most of these are excavated from street style point-and-shoot photography - quick flashes burning 35mm film - that get developed in darkness —-the self portraits are pulled from direct observations from looking into a black sheet of plexiglass —-- tezcatlipoca —- the smoking mirror —- im painting into the earth and into the stars — making marks from cosmic ruptures —-- paying close attention to the collisions —
“Coatlicue is a rupture in our everyday world. As the Earth opens and swallows us, plunging us into the underworld where the soul resides, allowing us to dwell in darkness.
Coatlique is one of the powerful images, or “archetypes,” that inhibits, or passes through my psyche. For me, La Coatlicue is the consuming internal whirlwind, the symbol of the underground aspects of the psyche. Coatlique is the mountain, the Earth Mother who conceived beings out of her cavernous womb.”
—----g.anzuldua
I used to think of my paintings as pictures - but now i see them as symbols — coded marks of color and shape – scraped into surfaces to convey new understandings —or lighting talk —- these symbols together are rotating in and out almost without any horizon - as if floating all around me — telling old forgotten stories and peering into futures at the same time —-
co
La facultad is the capacity to see in surface phenomena the meaning of deeper realities, to see the deep structure below the surface.
—GLORIA TALK
(GLORIA AZALDUA)
Digging up espejos
Excavation
The shift
Painting into the earth blindfolded without a head
(“WHITE SHAMAN”----- Los peregrinos
)
Symbols —- not narrative but a map of symbols
Cosmic ojo
Painting as ritual
Pecos river and rio bravo dream
As i remember it - walking thru dry rocky tierra - which feels like shifting thick hard glass under my feet - trying my best to stay focused on the winding brush trail - the warmth of the sun fights the chilled wind on my seco face - i keep looking up and to the sides of me - nothing is moving - but my legs are scissoring enough to know that what i'm experiencing might not be real but then is obviously so real - the canyon’s large black winged guardians dive up and out of the gray rift that cuts thru the sage green landia - this one doesnt have a river anymore - the dark blue and beige bed has been caked over for possibly generations - but i can still hear the voices of the big waters - the ravine now has trees - they look big from the top of the canyon ridge - i stop - and notice that they are moving - as if the once cold water taught them how to sway - i sit down ----- and now everything is moving - the wind - the leaves - the dust - the rocks - the sun - the thin clouds - the big black birds - the small animalitos -----all moving at the same time - then i notice my lungs - my blinking ojitos - my fingers drawing what im a witness too - smiling really big in the sun - im home once again