January 15 through February 26, 2022
Opening Reception: Saturday, January 22, 6-9 pm
Carlos Almaraz (1941-1989) painted murals and giant oils, works that burst with color and images of Echo Park, car crashes, and other aspects of life in LA. Most of these original works are out of reach of the common man now. But in the last decade of his life, the artist worked with printmaker Richard Duardo (1952-2014) to make some of his most lasting and accessible works, and it is a selection of these serigraphs that make up the revealing and exciting new exhibit at Bermudez Projects: Carlos & Richard: Almaraz Serigraphs from Modern Multiples, 1985-1990.
The show is a collaboration involving Bermudez Projects, Modern Multiples, and several collectors, as well as the estate of the late artist and demonstrates clearly how Almaraz not only mastered printmaking, but embraced it as its own art form.
“What made the collaboration [between Carlos and Richard] so groundbreaking was the quality that they were able to achieve took the medium from a traditional ‘graphic’ form to one that was hard to distinguish from Carlos’ original richly-layered works of art,” said Elsa Flores Almaraz, the artist’s widow, via email. “Many of the prints required up to 43 colored screens; and tools such as [airbrushes, China markers on textured sandpaper, actual pastels, and] toothbrushes were sometimes utilized to get certain painterly effects.”
Carlos Almaraz and Richard Duardo were artists and friends since the early 1970s. They were key figures in the Chicano Art Movement during the cultural renaissance of that time in Los Angeles. In the latter part of that decade, they shared studio space with a talented cadre of Chicano artists at El Centro de Arte Publico/The Public Art Center in the Highland Park neighborhood of Los Angeles, now declared by the City of Los Angeles as a Cultural Heritage Landmark.
Duardo said he introduced Almaraz to printmaking around 1978 because he wanted to disseminate Carlos’s work; and his printmaking studio eventually became, as Duardo described it, “a virtual extension of Almaraz’s hands.” During the 1980s, Duardo said, “our relationship with Carlos evolved to a zenith, with a master printer/artist collaboration that resulted in some of the most technically savvy efforts produced by a print studio and artist.”
Elsa Flores Almaraz adds, “Together with color separator Kathryn Villeneuve, Carlos’s iconic visual language and technique was mastered in this medium. The outcome was stunning, so much so that one was tempted to touch the paper to see if it was really pastel chalk or a textured paint stroke.”
Perhaps most notable is the massive diptych Mystery in the Park (1989), made in the final year of Carlos’s life, for which Almaraz was able to translate the full depth and richness of one of his paintings onto a serigraphic medium comprised of over 30 hand-painted color separations. The result is a hand-separated multiple that is almost indistinguishable from an oil painting.
In addition to Mystery in the Park, the exhibit includes 7 serigraphs created during Almaraz’s life, from the frenetic color-splashed What Ever Happened to the Incas? (1985), Fool’s Paradise (1986), and Laughing and Crying (1987), to the placid Suave Como La Noche (1985) and the enormous and iconic West Coast Car Crash (1990), one of the final serigraphs in the collaboration between these two visionaries.
The exhibit also includes two posthumous serigraphs created in the early 2000s from original works.
Carlos & Richard is as much a celebration of Richard Duardo as it is of Carlos Almaraz. Bermudez Projects is deeply grateful to Montana Mills, Richard Duardo’s nephew and current operator of Modern Multiples, for sharing works from the studio’s archive.
As Mills says, “I am thrilled to make so many screen printed works available to experience in person. This exhibit showcases not only most serigraphic editions by Carlos Almaraz, but also displays the mastery of my uncle in recreating such vibrant, organic oil pastels in a graphic medium. I am excited to highlight just how much artistry and technique went into serigraphs in a time before the digital print.”
Gallery owner Julian Bermudez says, “This is such an exciting moment. Here, we have the opportunity of presenting works by a masterful and captivating American artist who was able to expand his reach through the skills and vision of an equally talented artist. It is also a rare chance for collectors and those new to the magic of Almaraz to acquire a work by one of the most influential Chicano artists.”