Jim Reitz

Hand Colored Silver Gelatin Portrait Photograph of a Casual Male Figure

2011

Contemporary photograph on collotype by Houston, TX artist Delilah Montoya. Photograph shows a young woman wearing a dress and a shawl over her head. The photographed subject holds an infant, a visual reminiscent of the Madonna and Child. The same subject, while surrounded by lit candles, sits against a graffiti backdrop with the word "time" in the bottom left standing out. She looks directly at the camera, confronting the viewer's inquisitive gaze. Titled, signed, and dated by artist. Framed and matted in a red and gold wooden frame. Dimensions Without Frame: H 17.25 in. x W 16.125 in. Artist Biography: Although she was born in Texas and lived in Nebraska into her twenties, photographer and printmaker Delilah Montoya has deep roots in northern New Mexico through her mother's family. Raised by her mother, Montoya observes that women have empowered her family for five generations. Montoya studied photography and printmaking at the University of New Mexico, where she received her bachelor's degree, master's degree, and master of fine arts. She works in a variety of two-dimensional photographic and printing processes as well as creating larger installations. The artist describes her approach as postmodernist and uses documentary strategies to interpret her own distinct vision. Politically, Montoya is committed to exploring issues of identity in terms of a Chicano cultural context:"In my own evolving ideology I question my identity as a Chicana in occupied America, and articulate the experience of the minority woman. I work to understand the depth of my spiritual, political, emotional and cultural icons, realizing that in exploring the topography of my conceptual homeland, Aztlan, I am searching for the configuration of my own vision. " (Montoya n.d.) Montoya is committed to the expression of Chicana experience and history, but she does not consider herself as a feminist. Indeed, Montoya rejects identification as a United States-style feminist because she believes that "Feminists don't give us solidarity. As a Chicana my issues are multifaceted, not just gender, but class, race. " The border, for Montoya, is a politically imposed construct, a part of a United States colonialist enterprise that was forced upon the Chicano community. It is the environment in which Chicano life and history unfolds. Montoya's work explores contemporary and historical issues, sometimes win a humorous twist. Her artist's book for the 1992 Chicano Codices exhibition organized by the Mexican Museum in San Francisco, Codex Delilah: a Journey From Mechica to Chicana (including text by poet Cecilio Garcia-Camarillo), traces the imaginary journey of Six Deer, a character who embodies the contact between indigenous and Spanish culture in her trip "pal norte" towards Aztlan, the "spiritual homeland of her ancestors." As she journeys to the north, the character also journeys forward in time, meeting important Chicanas from the past, including La Llorona...

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An artist who puts his life on the line for his art. Chris Burden was at the forefront of the conceptual art movement in the early 1970s. Prelude to 220, or 110 is one of his most important works where the artist puts his life on the line for his art. Burden voluntarily lays on his back. His neck and wists are have copper bands that bolt him to the floor. To his immediate left and right are two buckets of water with a 110-volt line inside. If the buckets were compromised in any way by a passerby or an unexpected event - Burden would have been electrocuted in a literal shocking performance. Art history is replete with artists who put themselves in harm's way to accomplish their art. Michelangelo risked a misstep to a certain death as he elevated himself over 60 feet to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. Francisco Goya's "The Disasters of War" may have put him at odds with a governing orthodoxy. Picasso walked a very narrow line with during the Nazi occupation. Gutzon Borglum dangled himself off the face of Mount Rushmore and War Photographer Robert Capa, landed on Omaha Beach during D-Day. But it was Chris Burden whose art spotlighted...