April 21 - September 30, 2023
From the Art Museum of South Texas:
“Collidoscope: de la Torre Brothers Retro-Perspective makes the first stop on its national tour at the Art Museum of South Texas, which opens Friday April 21, 2023, witha special Member’s Preview, Thursday, April 20, 2023, and will remain on view through September 30, 2023. Organized by the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Latino and The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture of Riverside Art Museum, the exhibition features art by the internationally acclaimed artist duo (and brothers) Einar and Jamex de la Torre. The 40 mixed-media works include blown-glass sculptures and installation art, plus some of the artists’ latest lenticulars with imagery that changes as the viewer moves from side to side.
The de la Torre brothers will be in the Coastal Bend for the exhibition’s opening on Thursday, April 20 at the Art Museum of South Texas. Attendees will have the opportunity to hear the artists speak about the exhibition and their creative process. Representatives from the Smithsonian will also be in attendance.
Collidoscope first premiered at The Cheech Marin Center for Chicano Art & Culture of the Riverside Art Museum, affectionately known as The Cheech, during its grand opening in Riverside, California on June 18, 2022. AMST director, Sara Sells Morgan and curator of exhibitions, Deborah Fullerton were in attendance. After Collidoscope closed at The Cheech, it was staged and scheduled for its national tour, managed by Corpus Christi native, Melissa Richardson Banks through her firm CauseConnect. Banks coordinated the Art Museum of South Texas as the first stop.
“When Melissa contacted us about the exhibition, we didn’t hesitate. AMST has a longstanding relationship with Cheech Marin,” Morgan states. “Melissa has worked with Cheech on other exhibitions that we’ve hosted in the past, which have always resonated with our visitors. We expect Collidoscope to be no different. The de la Torre work poignantly explores the collision of culture, medium, and boundaries and does so with boundless substance and humor combined with exemplary craftmanship.”
Born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, México, and now living both in San Diego and Baja California, Einar and Jamex de la Torre have navigated life on both sides of the border since their youth and have inherited their own unique vision of the Latinx experience and American culture. Their work is visually complex and infused with humorous elements exploring art, history, and material culture. Working with glass, resin, lenticular prints and found objects, the brothers create work inspired by Mexican folk art, popular culture, religious imagery, consumer culture, and mythology. Many elements of the exhibition, including the title and curatorial framework, try to echo the creative process of the artists, serving as an allegory of their intellectual pursuits, their technical use of materials and media, and their use of wordplay and poetic riddles.
Einar said he and Jamex don’t exactly consider themselves glass artists, but treat glass as one component in their three-dimensional collages. The result, he said, speaks volumes about the Latino experience in America.
“The complexities of the immigrant experience and contradicting bicultural identities, as well as our current life and practice on both sides of the border, really propel our narrative and aesthetics,” Einar said.
The Art Museum of South Texas understands the experience of being bicultural. Nowhere is our blend of cultures more present than in the architecture of the Art Museum itself. Originally designed by Ohio-born architect Philip Johnson in 1972, the Art Museum of South Texas has stood as a landmark on the edge of Corpus Christi Bay. The three-level facility constructed of poured white concrete and shell aggregate blends beautifully with its environment. The windows give way to sweeping views of the bay creating living art. In 2006, an expansion lead by Mexican architect, Ricardo Legorreta added to the Art Museum’s beauty and functionality by doubling the size of the space, creating the distinctive 13 roof-top pyramids as well as creating a stunning use of color and light in homage to Johnson’s original work, and Legorreta’s Mexican roots. A beautiful marriage of their unique perspectives, the two buildings come together as one incredible masterpiece proudly representing cultures from the United States and Mexico.
Purchased with funds from the Windgate Foundation for the Art Museum of South Texas Permanent Collection, The Art Museum of South Texas acquired Mitosis by Einar and Jamex de la Torre. “The art museum has a growing collection that includes craft,” Fullerton explains. “The work titled Mitosis, fit not only in the area of contemporary craft, but very fittingly it depicts art of this time; and in the case of these collaborating brothers, reflects their bi-cultural identities.””
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