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Aporia at TOA Presents
Lindsey Scharold
“Baptism (Distressed)” is a tapestry of leather scraps, stitched together and scarred with the image of a ribcage, spine, or nervous system—the body abstracted. But even in this laying bare, the drawing is hard to see in full, due to the large scale of the leather surface and the variation in contrast between the mark-making on different tones of patchworked leather.
Eight drawings, in four pairs (a figurative drawing and an abstract “emanation”) are etched with barely-visible illustrations. In order to zero in on any sense of what might be there (A fish scale? A Maya glyph?) you must shift your physical perspective, so that from your view the light catches the lines, making them visible beneath the thick layers of mottled paint. Can you make out a signal coming through the static?
In what Pérez calls his “emanations,” concentric designs assert themselves behind the paint, like a sonic boom. “OMW, 515,000 MPH Towards Sgr A,” a swirling emanation designed with tape-resist on furry leather beneath azure splatter, undulates like a chakra. Perhaps “OMW, 515,000 MPH Towards Sgr A” is to soul as “Baptism (Distressed)” is to body. The dyadic pairs of abstract emanations and representative illustrations function as two faces on the same coin in Pérez’s work.
Intimacy is the thread holding Aproia together. Evoking the body and the psyche in direct reference to its wounding is to render the self intimate. Calling upon the willingness of his viewers to discover “what lies beneath” the painted surface is a reference to intimacy. Will you take the time to really consider or understand what is before you? And, if you do, what—if anything—might reveal itself to you?
Aporia is a game of hide and seek.
Logic of Disorder (Odyssey). Acrylic. 30 x 22 ½ inches (paper)
Primera Hazard (I Wanna Be Primitive). Acrylic. 30 x 22 ½ inches (paper)
Primera Hazard (I Wanna Be Primitive). Acrylic. 30 x 22 ½ inches (paper)
Cuatro Vientos. Acrylic, cotton paper. 33 ½ x 26 inches (framed)
Ante-Post (El Gallo Olmeca). Acrylic, cotton paper. 33 ½ x 26 inches (framed)
Ante-Post (El Gallo Olmeca). Acrylic, cotton paper. 33 ½ x 26 inches (framed)
We all carry with us stories and wounds that may be partially witnessed—or maybe even expressed against our best instincts. Might our whole, cobbled-together selves ever be understood in their entirety, seen clearly, by another? And do we really want them to be?
If the process of abstraction breaks something down into its composite features or qualities, decontextualising it from some original state, then obscuration occurs upon reassembly. In this deconstruction, this reduction, something is lost—or perhaps, if intentional, something is obfuscated. Through abstraction an artist might remove all superfluous language with the sparseness of a poet, sharpening their reader’s focus on a few essential, impactful things. Or they might hide a part of themselves inside of a metaphor.
This function of abstraction feels related to opacity—a term culled from Édouard Glissant by way of Fred Moten which was on Pérez’s mind as he worked on the pieces in Aporia. When we regard something as opaque, we view it as something we can’t see through, or past, or into. In Aporia, these are the things we can half-see and partially-understand—like metaphors which point us in the direction of deeper understanding without giving their meanings away at first glance. In fact, they might never fully reveal themselves for the gaze of another (as in Glissant’s “right to opacity”—a subjects’ right to remain outside of the confines of the colonial, categorizing gaze).
In Pérez’s work, what feels accessible on the surface are cultural motifs, nods to heritage, and gestures toward indigeneity: tanned hides like brown skin, leather stretched taught across wood like a drum, all utilizing a trade passed down from his upholsterer father. It’s no accident these racial and cultural symbols are readily available—much like they are when we encounter another person. But there is certainly more to the work than meets the eye.
The term “aporia” relates to opacity and draws upon the curiosity we feel when we encounter something we can’t grasp. On one hand, aporia is the doubt which makes us turn away or shuts us out. On the other hand, aporia is the instinct to comprehend the thing which evades our understanding. And Pérez has done a great job of instrumentalizing this tension—contrasting what is surface-level and what lies beneath throughout the body of work that makes up Aporia.
Aporia is paradox, is contradiction. It is soul expressed through bodily metaphors, which can never be directly seen or experienced by another. It is the image drawn then doused in paint because it would be too intimate otherwise.