High Noon
When consuming the work of the De La Torre Brothers, one is well served to ponder the unusual fraternal wellspring from which this richly dripping trans-cultural aesthetic and sharp-societal critique flows.
Two distinct yet symbiotic brains speak in the overlapping visual languages of a mashed up cultural construction. Like a co-joined fascination at the freak show, their four hands pass ideas and materials lovingly and mercilessly back and forth to amplify the excess until it vibrates just right. When the collaboration is complete, it is irrelevant where one brother’s influence ends and the other’s inspiration begins. The pervasive themes of duality, tragic humor, double image and contradiction present a conversation interrupted that defies our desire for simple conclusions.
In 1998, the brothers produced a show at UrbanGlass titled, 11:58 PMAD that presented a dystopian view of the approaching turn of the century. In a country under the incompetent rule of a benevolently evil W. and gripped by the irrational fear of a flipping decimal, few could imagine a future more dire. The brothers could and did. With their usual fatalistic humor, they kept us laughing to satisfy our need to cry.
Now twenty years into the 21st century, HIGH NOON displays the prescience of that dark vision. We now find ourselves floundering in the “pastopian” responsibility of an Anthropocene reality where we clumsily juggle the fate of our planet with every lurch towards global meltdown. We look to our mad, amoral berserker-in-chief, glowing bright orange atop his glistening pile of big macs, and miraculously summon nostalgia for the bumbling of our simpler past.
Through the optical magic of luscious lenticular images and super saturated three-dimensional wallpaper, the artists have invited our modern-day Boschian beasts to romp around in a hyper-sensory garden of earthly delights. Our wits are subjected to a state of psychedelic overload that draws us deeply into endless layers of excess and macabre opulence. The archeological layering of ubiquitous digital emoji over an ancient mandala made of disposable dollar store bling serves to remind us of the timeless nature of these struggles.
UrbanGlass
Established in New York City in 1977, UrbanGlass fosters experimentation and advances the use and critical understanding of glass as a creative medium. UrbanGlass is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. Exhibitions at UrbanGlass are supported by Agnes Gund, Capital Group Companies Global, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, the New York State Council on the Arts, the Robert Lehman Foundation, the Seth Sprague Educational and Charitable Foundation, and many generous individual donors.
Einar and Jamex De La Torre: High Noon
Curated by Ben Wright
Curatorial Statement by Ben Wright
Photos by by Blaine Davis, De la Torre Brothers
September 25 – November 1, 2019
Urban Glass, 647 Fulton Street, Brooklyn, NY 11217
UrbanGlass.org
