Raelis Vasquez
This Brazilian cultural matrix positions Raelis Vasquez globally...
Curation
CURATION
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from this page:
by Matrix
The Integrated Global Creative Economy
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Name:
Raelis Vasquez
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City/Place:
Chicago/New York City
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Country:
United States
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Hometown:
Santa Cruz de Mao, Dominican Republic
Life & Work
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Bio:
Drawing on historical, political and personal narratives, my paintings are figurative compositions that conjure the complexity of the Afro-Latinx experience. The figures in my work inhabit a state of vulnerability that often encourages the viewer to question their positions on class, race, and geography. I immigrated to the United States in 2002 from the Dominican Republic. Today, I feel an overpowering responsibility (or calling) to the arts and towards my Black, Latinx, and immigrant communities.
I paint using oils in a naturalistic manner as a means to give clarity to the subjects I present. My devotion is to the accurate representation of the convoluted histories of the Dominican Republic. I am aiming to highlight an allegorical narrative that presents the psychological states of the figures in my works while presenting a window to the viewer of their daily lives.
More
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Quotes, Notes & Etc.
Raelis Rayson Vasquez Estrella
Born: 1995 in Mao Valverde, Dominican Republic
Lives and works in NJ/NYC
EDUCATION
2019 - 2021: MFA, Painting and Drawing, Columbia University, NY
2016 - 2018: BFA, Painting and Drawing, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago
2017: Monte Castello Painting and Studio Practice, Umbria Italy
2013- 2015 Associates in Liberal Arts, High Honors, Studio Arts, Art History, Middlesex County College, NJ
UPCOMING EXHIBITIONS
2021
Estamos Bien: La Trienal 20/21, El Museo del Barrio, New York NY
Shattered Glass, Jeffrey Deitch Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
Contemporary Domesticity, Taymour Grahne, London, UK
Frieze NYC, Jenkins Johnson Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Solo Exhibition, Sakhile&Me Gallery, Frankfurt Germany
SOLO AND TWO-PERSON EXHIBITIONS
2020
“Como Nosotros Somos” New Image Gallery, West Hollywood, CA (two Person -with Tiffany Alfonseca)
“Celebrate Longevity” Superposition Gallery, Los Angeles, CA (two Person- with John Rivas)
2019
“Both at Once” Latchkey Gallery, NY, NY (two-person- with Kevin M. Demery)
“Stateless” Baby Blue Gallery, Chicago, IL (two-person- with John Rivas)
2017
"It Takes All Kind" Studio Oh!, Chicago IL (solo)
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2020
Art Basel Miami Beach, Jenkins Johnson Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
Art Basel OVR, Jenkins Johnson Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
“Building Narratives” Monti 8, Latina, Italy
“Figurative Summer” Jenkins Johnson Gallery, Brooklyn, NY
“Everyday is Sunday” UTA Artist Space, Beverly Hills, CA
“The Cookout: Kinfolk and Other Intimacies” MoCADA, Brooklyn, NY
“One Way Ticket” Steve Turner Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
“Thy Neighbor” 1-54 Contemporary African Art Far, Latchkey Gallery, New York, NY
“TB2P” Cantica Tabacuru Gallery, New York, NY
“Parallel Realities & Unpopular Truths” Superposition Gallery, Los Angeles, CA
“The Living Room Kitchen” The Andrew Freedman Home, Bronx, NY
2019
“Syn-co-pa-tion” Ace Hotel\The Tenth Magazine, Chicago, IL
“Breaching the Margins” Urban Institute of Contemporary Arts, Grand Rapids, MI
“Both at Once” Latchkey Gallery, New York, NY
“Stateless” Baby Blue Gallery, Chicago, IL
“Remnants of Things Left Behind” Band of Vices, Los Angeles, CA
“Salon!” Rozsa Center for the Performing Art, Houghton, MI
“Don’t Be Scurred: Pathways to Liberation” Hairpin Arts Center, Chicago, IL
“Salon!” Rozsa Center for the Performing Arts, Houghton, MI
2018- “XL Catlin Art Prize,” San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, CA
“XL Catlin Art Prize,” Linda Warren Projects, Chicago, IL
“XL Catlin Art Prize,” New York Academy of Art, New York, NY
“The Latin American Contemporary Fine Art Competition” Agora Gallery, New York, NY
“Interiors”, Happy Gallery, Chicago, IL
"The Art of Awareness," Fulton Street Market, Chicago, IL
"A Remembrance of Beauty," Moody Fellowship Hall, Chicago, IL
"SAIC BFA Show," SAIC Sullivan Galleries, Chicago, IL
"Journey to America," Highland Park Art Center, Chicago, IL
"Black Love Matters," William Hill Gallery, Chicago, IL
"Buy Art Not Vices" NYCH Gallery, Chicago, IL
"Rompiendo Barrera" Carlos and Dominguez Fine Arts Gallery, Chicago, IL
2017
"Black Love Matters", SouthSide Arts Center, Chicago, IL
"Mostradarte" The International Centre for the Arts, Monte Castello di Vibio, Umbria, Italy
"Altering Realities" Fulton Street Collective, Chicago, IL
"Taking Shape" Studio Oh! Chicago, IL
2016
"Understanding Time" Ballroom Projects, Chicago, IL
"ArtBash" Art Institute of Chicago. Chicago, IL
2015
The Community Open House & Expo, 50-Year Anniversary Exhibition
2014
Perth Amboy Bi-Annual Exhibition. Perth Amboy, NJ
Annual International Summer Exhibition. Highland Park, NJ
2013
ACT-SO NAACP New Jersey Painting Competition. Newark, NJ
ACT-SO NAACP New Jersey Drawing Competition. Newark, NJ
GRANTS/AWARDS (Grants/Fellowships, Awards/Honors, Residencies, etc.)
2019
Mare Residency, SunSpot Studios with MICA, Baltimore, MD
2018
Odyssey Travel Grant, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
2017
John W. Kurtich Foundation Scholarship , School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
2016
SAIC Distinguished Scholarship, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
SAIC Grant, School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL
2015
Art Department Awards for Academic Excellence, Middlesex County College
2013
ACT-SO NAACP New Jersey Silver Medal in Painting
ACT-SO NAACP New Jersey Silver Medal in Drawing
Art Student of the Year, School of North Brunswick
Talks and Panel Discussions
2020
Panel Discussion with Schrezade Garcia and Toy Peralta, “Afro Latinos En Arte” at SVA, New York, NY
2018
Today at Apple, "Modern Meets Classic" Key Note/ Live Art, Chicago, IL
Clips (more may be added)
There are certain countries, the names of which fire the popular imagination. Brazil is one of them; an amalgam of primitive and sophisticated, jungle and elegance, luscious jazz harmonics — there’s no other place like it in the world. And while Rio de Janeiro, or its fame anyway, tends toward the sophisticated end of the spectrum, Bahia bends toward the atavistic…
It’s like a trick of the mind’s light (I suppose), but standing on beach or escarpment in Salvador and looking out across the Baía de Todos os Santos to the great Recôncavo, and mindful of what happened there (and here; the Bahian Recôncavo was final port-of-call for more enslaved human beings than any other place throughout the entirety of mankind’s existence on this planet, and in the past it extended into what is now urban Salvador), one must be led to the inevitable conclusion that one is in a place unique to history, and to the present:
Brazil absorbed over ten times the number of enslaved Africans taken to the United States of America, and is a repository of African deities (and their music) now largely forgotten in their lands of origin.
Brazil was a refuge (of sorts) for Sephardim fleeing an Inquisition which followed them across the Atlantic (that unofficial symbol of Brazil’s national music — the pandeiro — was almost certainly brought to Brazil by these people).
Across the parched savannas of the interior of Brazil’s culturally fecund nordeste/northeast (where wizard Hermeto Pascoal was born in Lagoa da Canoa — Lagoon of the Canoe — and raised in Olho d’Águia — Eye of the Eagle), much of Brazil’s aboriginal population was absorbed into a caboclo/quilombola culture punctuated by the Star of David.
Three cultures — from three continents — running for their lives, their confluence forming an unprecedented fourth. Pandeirista on the roof.
That's where this Matrix begins:
Wolfram MathWorld
The idea is simple, powerful, and egalitarian: To propagate for them, the Matrix must propagate for all. Most in the world are within six degrees of us. The concept of a "small world" network (see Wolfram above) applies here, placing artists from the Recôncavo and the sertão, from Salvador... from Brooklyn, Berlin and Mombassa... musicians, writers, filmmakers... clicks (recommendations) away from their peers all over the planet.
This Integrated Global Creative Economy (we invented the concept) uncoils from Brazil's sprawling Indigenous, African, Sephardic and then Ashkenazic, Arabic, European, Asian cultural matrix... expanding like the canopy of a rainforest tree rooted in Bahia, branches spreading to embrace the entire world...
Recent Visitors Map
Great culture is great power.
And in a small world great things are possible.
Alicia Svigals
"Thanks, this is a brilliant idea!!"
—Alicia Svigals (NEW YORK CITY): Apotheosis of klezmer violinists
"Dear Sparrow: I am thrilled to receive your email! Thank you for including me in this wonderful matrix."
—Susan Rogers (BOSTON): Director of the Berklee Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory ... Former personal recording engineer for Prince; "Purple Rain", "Sign o' the Times", "Around the World in a Day"
"Dear Sparrow, Many thanks for this – I am touched!"
—Julian Lloyd Webber (LONDON): Premier cellist in UK; brother of Andrew (Evita, Jesus Christ Superstar, Cats, Phantom of the Opera...)
"This is super impressive work ! Congratulations ! Thanks for including me :)))"
—Clarice Assad (RIO DE JANEIRO/CHICAGO): Pianist and composer with works performed by Yo Yo Ma and orchestras around the world
"We appreciate you including Kamasi in the matrix, Sparrow."
—Banch Abegaze (LOS ANGELES): manager, Kamasi Washington
"Thanks! It looks great!....I didn't write 'Cantaloupe Island' though...Herbie Hancock did! Great Page though, well done! best, Randy"
"Very nice! Thank you for this. Warmest regards and wishing much success for the project! Matt"
—Son of Jimmy Garrison (bass for John Coltrane, Bill Evans...); plays with Herbie Hancock and other greats...
I opened the shop in Salvador, Bahia in 2005 in order to create an outlet to the wider world for magnificent Brazilian musicians.
David Dye & Kim Junod for NPR found us (above), and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (he's a huge jazz fan), David Byrne, Oscar Castro-Neves... Spike Lee walked past the place while I was sitting on the stoop across the street drinking beer and listening to samba from the speaker in the window...
But we weren't exactly easy for the world-at-large to get to. So in order to extend the place's ethos I transformed the site associated with it into a network wherein Brazilian musicians I knew would recommend other Brazilian musicians, who would recommend others...
And as I anticipated, the chalky hand of God-as-mathematician intervened: In human society — per the small-world phenomenon — most of the billions of us on earth are within some 6 or fewer degrees of each other. Likewise, within a network of interlinked artists as I've described above, most of these artists will in the same manner be at most a handful of steps away from each other.
So then, all that's necessary to put the Brazilians within possible purview of the wide wide world is to include them among a wide wide range of artists around that world.
If, for example, Quincy Jones is inside the matrix, then anybody on his page — whether they be accessing from a campus in L.A., a pub in Dublin, a shebeen in Cape Town, a tent in Mongolia — will be close, transitable steps away from Raymundo Sodré, even if they know nothing of Brazil and are unaware that Sodré sings/dances upon this planet. Sodré, having been knocked from the perch of fame and ground into anonymity by Brazil's dictatorship, has now the alternative of access to the world-at-large via recourse to the vast potential of network theory.
...to the degree that other artists et al — writers, researchers, filmmakers, painters, choreographers...everywhere — do also. Artificial intelligence not required. Real intelligence, yes.
Years ago in NYC (I've lived here in Brazil for 32 years now) I "rescued" unpaid royalties (performance & mechanical) for artists/composers including Barbra Streisand, Aretha Franklin, Mongo Santamaria, Jim Hall, Clement "Coxsone" Dodd (for his rights in Bob Marley compositions; Clement was Bob's first producer), Led Zeppelin, Ray Barretto, Philip Glass and many others. Aretha called me out of the blue vis-à-vis money owed by Atlantic Records. Allen Klein (managed The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, Ray Charles) called about money due the estate of Sam Cooke. Jerry Ragovoy (Time Is On My Side, Piece of My Heart) called just to see if he had any unpaid money floating around out there (the royalty world was a shark-filled jungle, to mangle metaphors, and I doubt it's changed).
But the pertinent client (and friend) in the present context is Earl "Speedo" Carroll, of The Cadillacs. Earl went from doo-wopping on Harlem streetcorners to chart-topping success to working as a custodian at PS 87 elementary school on the west side of Manhattan. Through all of this he never lost what made him great.
Greatness and fame are too often conflated. The former should be accessible independently of the latter.
Yeah this is Bob's first record contract, made with Clement "Sir Coxsone" Dodd of Studio One and co-signed by his aunt because he was under 21. I took it to Black Rock to argue with CBS' lawyers about the royalties they didn't want to pay (they paid).
Matrix founding creators are behind "one of 10 of the best (radios) around the world", per The Guardian.
Across the creative universe... For another list, reload page.
This list is random, and incomplete. Reload the page for another list.
For a complete list of everybody inside, tap TOTAL below:
TOTAL
Ex Terra Brasilis
Susan Rogers
Julian Lloyd Webber
Clarice Assad
Kamasi Washington
Randy Brecker
Matt Garrison
RÁDIO MATRIX