Michael Martinez

The Freedman Gallery at Albright College, named after former Albright trustee and alumna Doris Chanin Freedman, is located on the ground floor of the Center for the Arts. Since its inception, the gallery focuses primarily on contemporary, living, American artists and hosts approximately twelve exhibitions each year rotating in the Main Gallery, Project Space, and Foyer Gallery. Freedman Gallery is located at 13th & Bern Streets, Reading, Pennsylvania 19612. Gallery hours are Tuesday-Friday 9 a.m. -5 p.m. and Sunday 1-4 p.m. The gallery is closed on Mondays, holidays, breaks and summer. (See Albright.edu/calendar). Founded in 1856, Albright College educates creative, curious students to become adaptable, global citizens who discover and reach their full potential. The college’s flexible interdisciplinary curriculum encourages students to combine majors and disciplines to create individualized academic programs. Close faculty mentorship, numerous experiential learning options, and a diverse, supportive and nurturing community of scholars and learners help students exceed their own expectations and graduate with a commitment to a lifetime of service and learning. Located in Reading, Pennsylvania, Albright enrolls more than 1,500 full-time undergraduates and 500 adult learners and graduate students.

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Michael Martinez has a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree exhibiting in Transamerica/n: Gender, Identity, in new media arts and interdisciplinary practices Appearance Today at the McNay Art Museum in San from the Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland, Antonio, Texas and most recently exhibited in Right Oregon. As a conceptual artist, they deconstruct false Here, Right Now at the Contemporary Arts Museum dichotomies surrounding desire, the expression Houston, Martinez has exhibited in institutions both of gender, and confront identity as a person of nationally and abroad. color with Mexican-American lineage. Currently

Text written by Alana J. Coates, Curator of Collections & Exhibitions, Freedman Gallery www.albright.edu Michael Martinez Nobody Truly Lives On Earth 1. I have used Chicano for the primary term in this essay, but Chicanx can be employed as the non- gendered version of the term, like Latinx is used today. However, Latinx is accepted as a universal July 1-Sept. 8, 2019, Foyer Gallery term in some circles of scholarship, but not all. Some prefer to reserve the term Latinx for non-binary identifying artists. Xicanx can also be used to make greater connections to the indigenous past and is perhaps most steeped in activism.

2. they/them are used as a gender-neutral pronoun preferences of the artist. All images are from Nobody Truly Lives On Earth, 2019 digital animation, 17:20 minutes Nobody Truly Lives On Earth by Michael Martinez Manilla and José Guadalupe Posada’s broadsheets a post-internet era, artists such as Martinez have Olmecs in reverence as the mother culture. Martinez’s floats up through the scene. The carved base to menus in favorite Mexican restaurants. The tale weaves a narrative of animated works that celebrate at the turn of the twentieth century. Taken from found digital art to be the new relevant art form. altered mask also suggests that a queer presence has displays a symbol for transgender people that of lovers is similar to that of Romeo and Juliet in LGBTQ individuals. Each vignette appropriates a these Mexican traditions, Chicano art often adopted Martinez did not specifically choose to work in this always existed; Chicanx have and will also persevere. combines male, female, and genderqueer symbols that it ends in a tremendous and unnecessary myriad of imagery, including the aesthetics of 1980s Mesoamerican motifs and used a figurative format medium for its ability to mass distribute, but Neo- The new wave of Chicano artists contemplate the with a center circle. Not without humor, the text tragedy. In this Aztec narrative, the gods ultimately action cinema, video games, and Mesoamerican art to easily communicate and convey narratives. Chicano artists could defiantly adopt the platform for balance of honoring tradition and cultural heritage in states, “Me on my way to steal Yo Man,” as the artist turn the humans into the mountains that shadow with a Neo-Chicano disposition. Today, Chicano artists are American-based artists who today’s smartphone world for similar reasons that the age of fantastic technological advancements, yet points to the indigenous Camp sensibility with their over Mexico so that the torn lovers could finally be prints and murals were employed in the past. The preferred medium for the founding Mexican- are politically, socially engaged, and empowering the great social ills for people of color still remain. We exaggerated regalia and equates queer fashion with together. In Martinez’s digital rendition, the image flickers to a mirror image of Popocatepetl embracing American artists of the Chicano movement in the next generations. They are highlighting social justice Another adaptation of the contemporary Chicano or are not that far from the days of needing the Boycott both the regal and resistance. Pixels flicker over the Popocatepetl, turning the forbidden love story from a 1960s were prints and murals because these artistic issues, equality, identity politics, invisible histories, Chicanx1 art form is breaking away from machismo Grapes posters by artist’s like Xavier Viramontes, sculpture of Coatlicue while wild wind sounds blow cisgender romance into a genderqueer expression. outputs were accessible and inexpensive; therefore, and the struggles of underrepresented populations roots and making space for queer, nonbinary, and and the famous Sun Mad raisins poster by Ester as if to transport the viewer again through time, space, and scared realities. The following scenes they could reach the most significant amount of people. in their work. A Chicano practice is understood as transgender people. A pixelated pride flag opens the Hernández, supporting the United Farmworker’s fight Martinez is the warrior left standing to fight a take place with infrared red footage, panning The goal of the Chicano art movement was to educate a mindset for political determination of universal video with sounds of static and synthesized game for better pay and safer working conditions. A minimal demonic invasion of the earth in the year 20X6. over the pyramids and topography that appears and empower ordinary people and unite them through human rights, rather than a strict cultural network tones. A mix of Spanish and English text uses poetry percentage of farms are organic today for example. In this computerized realm, using the program, from outer space or as if it is video surveillance of images of cultural relevance. Chicano artists worked of Mexican-American artists. The artistic language and prophecy to state, “We came out of the ground! Not to mention, the incrimination and mistreatment of MariconSoft 95, error messages appear stating to build a significant iconography that was specific to often still incorporates historical references, such as undocumented people remain a humanitarian issue, another plant. Martinez oscillates the viewer within We flourished, like wild Maiz!” The message is “Que el corazón siempre debe sentir el peso del the Mexican-American experience, just as the Mexican images from the ancient Mesoamerican civilizations as does the children and families being held in mass the digital reality and the game sphere to mirror a superimposed over passing images of Mesoamerican mundo;” the heart must always feel the weight artists had developed a visual vocabulary that was akin as Martinez does in Nobody Truly Lives On Earth. numbers in detention centers at the border. A rise of teetering of a third space in which Chicanos find art forms, including an ornate skull known as the of the world. And further, “Necesito respuestas to building a Mexican national identity in the 1900s. hate speech regarding immigrants and a vehement themselves located and that people of color can Post-Chicano or Neo-Chicano?... What does Chicano mosaic mask of Tezcatlipoca and a basalt carved head digitales, for my dilemmas IRL...” I need digital political focus has been on Mexico and its borders as also find themselves in the gay community. Post-Mexican Revolution ideologies significantly Art mean today? Martinez answers: Movimiento from the Olmec culture, the oldest major civilization in answers, for my dilemmas in real life. Many young of recent. Approaching the year 2020, a reawakening influenced the aesthetics of Chicano art. This unique Chicano 2.0, referencing a higher level as in a video Mexico. The elaborate use of the mosaic shell echoes A profound moment of Nobody Truly Lives On adults of the digital generation may be struggling of the movement is necessary. Artists such as Martinez style was steeped in the traditions formed by Los game — a renewed and improved version. Now six Martinez’s embellishments to a jadeite Olmec mask Earth references the legend of Itsuaseawatl and with this as well. Some are on the web, creating are leading the way in the digital age. Although their2 Tres Grandes, the most famous Mexican muralists. decades from the founding of the artistic movement, in a queer sensibility to include bright fuchsia colored Popocatepetl digitally melting into a new reality — other identities and living out other realities that work in Nobody Truly Lives On Earth primarily focuses Influence was also taken from the equally famed the new generations of artists have altered some of lips, heavy blush, and bright glittered eyeshadow with symbolic for the transformation of a new generation are difficult to fulfill in real life — while others are on identity politics, the call to action remains evident. workshop of printmakers, the Taller de Gráfica the original Plan Espiritual de Aztlán to include things a text caption that reads, “We have endured.” This of artists. The figurative motif of Itsuaseawatl and fulfilling a false life in the real world to appease Popular (TGP), whose traditions of political messaging like participating in the institutions that discriminated image gives reference to Chicanos looking back in In the video, the viewer enters a surrealist digital Popocatepetl have become somewhat of a clichéd family and traditions, to only act out another life, with mass distribution harked back further to Manuel the forebears of the moment. And not surprisingly in history just as the Aztecs would have regarded the realm, another dimension, as a statue of Xochipilli image that can be found everywhere from murals the desired experience in a cyber existence. Nobody Truly Lives On Earth by Michael Martinez Manilla and José Guadalupe Posada’s broadsheets a post-internet era, artists such as Martinez have Olmecs in reverence as the mother culture. Martinez’s floats up through the scene. The carved base to menus in favorite Mexican restaurants. The tale weaves a narrative of animated works that celebrate at the turn of the twentieth century. Taken from found digital art to be the new relevant art form. altered mask also suggests that a queer presence has displays a symbol for transgender people that of lovers is similar to that of Romeo and Juliet in LGBTQ individuals. Each vignette appropriates a these Mexican traditions, Chicano art often adopted Martinez did not specifically choose to work in this always existed; Chicanx have and will also persevere. combines male, female, and genderqueer symbols that it ends in a tremendous and unnecessary myriad of imagery, including the aesthetics of 1980s Mesoamerican motifs and used a figurative format medium for its ability to mass distribute, but Neo- The new wave of Chicano artists contemplate the with a center circle. Not without humor, the text tragedy. In this Aztec narrative, the gods ultimately action cinema, video games, and Mesoamerican art to easily communicate and convey narratives. Chicano artists could defiantly adopt the platform for balance of honoring tradition and cultural heritage in states, “Me on my way to steal Yo Man,” as the artist turn the humans into the mountains that shadow with a Neo-Chicano disposition. Today, Chicano artists are American-based artists who today’s smartphone world for similar reasons that the age of fantastic technological advancements, yet points to the indigenous Camp sensibility with their over Mexico so that the torn lovers could finally be prints and murals were employed in the past. The preferred medium for the founding Mexican- are politically, socially engaged, and empowering the great social ills for people of color still remain. We exaggerated regalia and equates queer fashion with together. In Martinez’s digital rendition, the image flickers to a mirror image of Popocatepetl embracing American artists of the Chicano movement in the next generations. They are highlighting social justice Another adaptation of the contemporary Chicano or are not that far from the days of needing the Boycott both the regal and resistance. Pixels flicker over the Popocatepetl, turning the forbidden love story from a 1960s were prints and murals because these artistic issues, equality, identity politics, invisible histories, Chicanx1 art form is breaking away from machismo Grapes posters by artist’s like Xavier Viramontes, sculpture of Coatlicue while wild wind sounds blow cisgender romance into a genderqueer expression. outputs were accessible and inexpensive; therefore, and the struggles of underrepresented populations roots and making space for queer, nonbinary, and and the famous Sun Mad raisins poster by Ester as if to transport the viewer again through time, space, and scared realities. The following scenes they could reach the most significant amount of people. in their work. A Chicano practice is understood as transgender people. A pixelated pride flag opens the Hernández, supporting the United Farmworker’s fight Martinez is the warrior left standing to fight a take place with infrared red footage, panning The goal of the Chicano art movement was to educate a mindset for political determination of universal video with sounds of static and synthesized game for better pay and safer working conditions. A minimal demonic invasion of the earth in the year 20X6. over the pyramids and topography that appears and empower ordinary people and unite them through human rights, rather than a strict cultural network tones. A mix of Spanish and English text uses poetry percentage of farms are organic today for example. In this computerized realm, using the program, from outer space or as if it is video surveillance of images of cultural relevance. Chicano artists worked of Mexican-American artists. The artistic language and prophecy to state, “We came out of the ground! Not to mention, the incrimination and mistreatment of MariconSoft 95, error messages appear stating to build a significant iconography that was specific to often still incorporates historical references, such as undocumented people remain a humanitarian issue, another plant. Martinez oscillates the viewer within We flourished, like wild Maiz!” The message is “Que el corazón siempre debe sentir el peso del the Mexican-American experience, just as the Mexican images from the ancient Mesoamerican civilizations as does the children and families being held in mass the digital reality and the game sphere to mirror a superimposed over passing images of Mesoamerican mundo;” the heart must always feel the weight artists had developed a visual vocabulary that was akin as Martinez does in Nobody Truly Lives On Earth. numbers in detention centers at the border. A rise of teetering of a third space in which Chicanos find art forms, including an ornate skull known as the of the world. And further, “Necesito respuestas to building a Mexican national identity in the 1900s. hate speech regarding immigrants and a vehement themselves located and that people of color can Post-Chicano or Neo-Chicano?... What does Chicano mosaic mask of Tezcatlipoca and a basalt carved head digitales, for my dilemmas IRL...” I need digital political focus has been on Mexico and its borders as also find themselves in the gay community. Post-Mexican Revolution ideologies significantly Art mean today? Martinez answers: Movimiento from the Olmec culture, the oldest major civilization in answers, for my dilemmas in real life. Many young of recent. Approaching the year 2020, a reawakening influenced the aesthetics of Chicano art. This unique Chicano 2.0, referencing a higher level as in a video Mexico. The elaborate use of the mosaic shell echoes A profound moment of Nobody Truly Lives On adults of the digital generation may be struggling of the movement is necessary. Artists such as Martinez style was steeped in the traditions formed by Los game — a renewed and improved version. Now six Martinez’s embellishments to a jadeite Olmec mask Earth references the legend of Itsuaseawatl and with this as well. Some are on the web, creating are leading the way in the digital age. Although their2 Tres Grandes, the most famous Mexican muralists. decades from the founding of the artistic movement, in a queer sensibility to include bright fuchsia colored Popocatepetl digitally melting into a new reality — other identities and living out other realities that work in Nobody Truly Lives On Earth primarily focuses Influence was also taken from the equally famed the new generations of artists have altered some of lips, heavy blush, and bright glittered eyeshadow with symbolic for the transformation of a new generation are difficult to fulfill in real life — while others are on identity politics, the call to action remains evident. workshop of printmakers, the Taller de Gráfica the original Plan Espiritual de Aztlán to include things a text caption that reads, “We have endured.” This of artists. The figurative motif of Itsuaseawatl and fulfilling a false life in the real world to appease Popular (TGP), whose traditions of political messaging like participating in the institutions that discriminated image gives reference to Chicanos looking back in In the video, the viewer enters a surrealist digital Popocatepetl have become somewhat of a clichéd family and traditions, to only act out another life, with mass distribution harked back further to Manuel the forebears of the moment. And not surprisingly in history just as the Aztecs would have regarded the realm, another dimension, as a statue of Xochipilli image that can be found everywhere from murals the desired experience in a cyber existence. Nobody Truly Lives On Earth by Michael Martinez Manilla and José Guadalupe Posada’s broadsheets a post-internet era, artists such as Martinez have Olmecs in reverence as the mother culture. Martinez’s floats up through the scene. The carved base to menus in favorite Mexican restaurants. The tale weaves a narrative of animated works that celebrate at the turn of the twentieth century. Taken from found digital art to be the new relevant art form. altered mask also suggests that a queer presence has displays a symbol for transgender people that of lovers is similar to that of Romeo and Juliet in LGBTQ individuals. Each vignette appropriates a these Mexican traditions, Chicano art often adopted Martinez did not specifically choose to work in this always existed; Chicanx have and will also persevere. combines male, female, and genderqueer symbols that it ends in a tremendous and unnecessary myriad of imagery, including the aesthetics of 1980s Mesoamerican motifs and used a figurative format medium for its ability to mass distribute, but Neo- The new wave of Chicano artists contemplate the with a center circle. Not without humor, the text tragedy. In this Aztec narrative, the gods ultimately action cinema, video games, and Mesoamerican art to easily communicate and convey narratives. Chicano artists could defiantly adopt the platform for balance of honoring tradition and cultural heritage in states, “Me on my way to steal Yo Man,” as the artist turn the humans into the mountains that shadow with a Neo-Chicano disposition. Today, Chicano artists are American-based artists who today’s smartphone world for similar reasons that the age of fantastic technological advancements, yet points to the indigenous Camp sensibility with their over Mexico so that the torn lovers could finally be prints and murals were employed in the past. The preferred medium for the founding Mexican- are politically, socially engaged, and empowering the great social ills for people of color still remain. We exaggerated regalia and equates queer fashion with together. In Martinez’s digital rendition, the image flickers to a mirror image of Popocatepetl embracing American artists of the Chicano movement in the next generations. They are highlighting social justice Another adaptation of the contemporary Chicano or are not that far from the days of needing the Boycott both the regal and resistance. Pixels flicker over the Popocatepetl, turning the forbidden love story from a 1960s were prints and murals because these artistic issues, equality, identity politics, invisible histories, Chicanx1 art form is breaking away from machismo Grapes posters by artist’s like Xavier Viramontes, sculpture of Coatlicue while wild wind sounds blow cisgender romance into a genderqueer expression. outputs were accessible and inexpensive; therefore, and the struggles of underrepresented populations roots and making space for queer, nonbinary, and and the famous Sun Mad raisins poster by Ester as if to transport the viewer again through time, space, and scared realities. The following scenes they could reach the most significant amount of people. in their work. A Chicano practice is understood as transgender people. A pixelated pride flag opens the Hernández, supporting the United Farmworker’s fight Martinez is the warrior left standing to fight a take place with infrared red footage, panning The goal of the Chicano art movement was to educate a mindset for political determination of universal video with sounds of static and synthesized game for better pay and safer working conditions. A minimal demonic invasion of the earth in the year 20X6. over the pyramids and topography that appears and empower ordinary people and unite them through human rights, rather than a strict cultural network tones. A mix of Spanish and English text uses poetry percentage of farms are organic today for example. In this computerized realm, using the program, from outer space or as if it is video surveillance of images of cultural relevance. Chicano artists worked of Mexican-American artists. The artistic language and prophecy to state, “We came out of the ground! Not to mention, the incrimination and mistreatment of MariconSoft 95, error messages appear stating to build a significant iconography that was specific to often still incorporates historical references, such as undocumented people remain a humanitarian issue, another plant. Martinez oscillates the viewer within We flourished, like wild Maiz!” The message is “Que el corazón siempre debe sentir el peso del the Mexican-American experience, just as the Mexican images from the ancient Mesoamerican civilizations as does the children and families being held in mass the digital reality and the game sphere to mirror a superimposed over passing images of Mesoamerican mundo;” the heart must always feel the weight artists had developed a visual vocabulary that was akin as Martinez does in Nobody Truly Lives On Earth. numbers in detention centers at the border. A rise of teetering of a third space in which Chicanos find art forms, including an ornate skull known as the of the world. And further, “Necesito respuestas to building a Mexican national identity in the 1900s. hate speech regarding immigrants and a vehement themselves located and that people of color can Post-Chicano or Neo-Chicano?... What does Chicano mosaic mask of Tezcatlipoca and a basalt carved head digitales, for my dilemmas IRL...” I need digital political focus has been on Mexico and its borders as also find themselves in the gay community. Post-Mexican Revolution ideologies significantly Art mean today? Martinez answers: Movimiento from the Olmec culture, the oldest major civilization in answers, for my dilemmas in real life. Many young of recent. Approaching the year 2020, a reawakening influenced the aesthetics of Chicano art. This unique Chicano 2.0, referencing a higher level as in a video Mexico. The elaborate use of the mosaic shell echoes A profound moment of Nobody Truly Lives On adults of the digital generation may be struggling of the movement is necessary. Artists such as Martinez style was steeped in the traditions formed by Los game — a renewed and improved version. Now six Martinez’s embellishments to a jadeite Olmec mask Earth references the legend of Itsuaseawatl and with this as well. Some are on the web, creating are leading the way in the digital age. Although their2 Tres Grandes, the most famous Mexican muralists. decades from the founding of the artistic movement, in a queer sensibility to include bright fuchsia colored Popocatepetl digitally melting into a new reality — other identities and living out other realities that work in Nobody Truly Lives On Earth primarily focuses Influence was also taken from the equally famed the new generations of artists have altered some of lips, heavy blush, and bright glittered eyeshadow with symbolic for the transformation of a new generation are difficult to fulfill in real life — while others are on identity politics, the call to action remains evident. workshop of printmakers, the Taller de Gráfica the original Plan Espiritual de Aztlán to include things a text caption that reads, “We have endured.” This of artists. The figurative motif of Itsuaseawatl and fulfilling a false life in the real world to appease Popular (TGP), whose traditions of political messaging like participating in the institutions that discriminated image gives reference to Chicanos looking back in In the video, the viewer enters a surrealist digital Popocatepetl have become somewhat of a clichéd family and traditions, to only act out another life, with mass distribution harked back further to Manuel the forebears of the moment. And not surprisingly in history just as the Aztecs would have regarded the realm, another dimension, as a statue of Xochipilli image that can be found everywhere from murals the desired experience in a cyber existence. The Freedman Gallery at Albright College, named after former Albright trustee and alumna Doris Chanin Freedman, is located on the ground floor of the Center for the Arts. Since its inception, the gallery focuses primarily on contemporary, living, American artists and hosts approximately twelve exhibitions each year rotating in the Main Gallery, Project Space, and Foyer Gallery. Freedman Gallery is located at 13th & Bern Streets, Reading, Pennsylvania 19612. Gallery hours are Tuesday-Friday 9 a.m. -5 p.m. and Sunday 1-4 p.m. The gallery is closed on Mondays, holidays, breaks and summer. (See Albright.edu/calendar). Founded in 1856, Albright College educates creative, curious students to become adaptable, global citizens who discover and reach their full potential. The college’s flexible interdisciplinary curriculum encourages students to combine majors and disciplines to create individualized academic programs. Close faculty mentorship, numerous experiential learning options, and a diverse, supportive and nurturing community of scholars and learners help students exceed their own expectations and graduate with a commitment to a lifetime of service and learning. Located in Reading, Pennsylvania, Albright enrolls more than 1,500 full-time undergraduates and 500 adult learners and graduate students.

Follow the CFA and the Artist on Instagram.

2. they/them are used as a gender-neutral pronoun preferences of the artist. All images are from Nobody Truly Lives On Earth, 2019 digital animation, 17:20 minutes The Freedman Gallery at Albright College, named after former Albright trustee and alumna Doris Chanin Freedman, is located on the ground floor of the Center for the Arts. Since its inception, the gallery focuses primarily on contemporary, living, American artists and hosts approximately twelve exhibitions each year rotating in the Main Gallery, Project Space, and Foyer Gallery. Freedman Gallery is located at 13th & Bern Streets, Reading, Pennsylvania 19612. Gallery hours are Tuesday-Friday 9 a.m. -5 p.m. and Sunday 1-4 p.m. The gallery is closed on Mondays, holidays, breaks and summer. (See Albright.edu/calendar). Founded in 1856, Albright College educates creative, curious students to become adaptable, global citizens who discover and reach their full potential. The college’s flexible interdisciplinary curriculum encourages students to combine majors and disciplines to create individualized academic programs. Close faculty mentorship, numerous experiential learning options, and a diverse, supportive and nurturing community of scholars and learners help students exceed their own expectations and graduate with a commitment to a lifetime of service and learning. Located in Reading, Pennsylvania, Albright enrolls more than 1,500 full-time undergraduates and 500 adult learners and graduate students.

Follow the CFA and the Artist on Instagram.

2. they/them are used as a gender-neutral pronoun preferences of the artist. All images are from Nobody Truly Lives On Earth, 2019 digital animation, 17:20 minutes