Kick-Off Party July 29, 2016
KÅ« (Rafael/a Luna-Pizano) is a proud two-spirit descendant from Pilipino and Mexica ancestors, stringing altars between the past and present to reconnect with the future. KÅ« plays with words, movement, song, and installation design to sculpt space, experience and dreams. He is a capoerista, danzante and wanna-be dancer who desires audiences to come together and realize themselves center-stage, performers of life and leave with agency back in their palms. KÅ« is currently working towards a masters in the Native Voices program at UW, focusing on uplifting QTPOC lives and creating seeds of advice for the coming generations of black and brown trans revolutionaries. He thanks the Duwamish and Coast Salish ancestors for allowing him to live on these lands.
On the Edge: Contemporary Latinx Performance Art Friday, August 5, 7-9pm RSVP Here
Vicente Montanez
Vicente Montanez has been a resident of the Pacific Northwest for the past 20 years. He was born in Morelia, Michoacán, Mexico on 1964. Since he was 13 years old on 1977 he joined his first company, Compañia Los Clásicos del Teatro, and performed musical and children theatre. In 1978 he was invited to create a mime company, Compañia de Pantomima Yesterday, and for six years with both companies he traveled around the country performing and participating in mime and theatre festivals.
In the 1980s, he met two of his most influential teachers, Sigfrido Aguilar and Rodrido Villamil. As an art student in CEDART school Morelia , Mexico he met Rodrigo Villamil and they founded the Taller de Investigacion y Experimentacion Teatral, honored nationally and internationally as one of the most innovative groups in Morelia, Mexico. The group toured for fifteen years around Mexico and Europe
Santiago
"half of the time he thingz heez krazee,
the other half he knowz it"
Xavier Lopez Jr.
Xavier Lopez received his MFA from the University of California, Davis, where he created the theoretical/artistic thesis the "Soft Cyborg." A Post-Pop Surrealist, he is part of a young group of artists who are seeking to move beyond "Pop," mixing sculpture, performance, theory and painting to create something enticingly new. He has shown artwork on both coasts as well as in Germany and France, he has come to be known for his own brand of “pop surrealist” painting and post-pop sculpture, especially his ghosts and tin foil mountans. “Cool,” “Urban,” “Goth,” “Kawaii,” “Pop Surrealist” or whatever definition you might want to come up with, Lopez’ artistic style crosses over many boundaries and unsettles them all.
Most recently, Lopez’ work has been described as “gleefully disturbing”--a cross between very old Fleischer cartoons and their animated nightmares, giving us a glimpse into the disquieting world that we all invent for ourselves before we have a chance to make sense of the universe and its vast contradictions. Within Lopez’ world there are many landscapes: caves, a vast ocean, snows-capes, living trees, and always the sense that one has crossed over into the deep end.
“I want viewers of my work to feel as they do just before going over the cliff at Splash Mountain.” Still, Lopez’ work is all smiles. “That smile,” he adds, “that is what draws people to my work, it is complex with just a hint of evil, that tells the viewer that there is something else going on here.” It is the smile of the Muse and the multi-armed skeleton and it is the childlike darkness behind the Kawaii. Xavier Lopez’ work is not just cute, there is always more. Continually, growing and evolving, fans of his work never know what to expect from the artist--there is always wonder, innocence and experience, but mostly a sense of fun that keeps drawing more and more viewers to play in the “Deep End” of his imagination.
Xavier Lopez’ work can be found at various art galleries in the Seattle area, including Gargoyles Statuary and Echo Echo in the Greenwood Collective as well as appearing on many murals, posters and prints. He is also the author of a blog that covers the Alternative to Alternative Art Scene in Seattle for the online newspaper, the Seattle Post Intelligencer. Xavier’s work has been shown in several publications and magazines including Hi Fructose, Catapult Magazine, Dark Beauty, Vex , Mad Magazine and two issues of Studio Visit Magazine.
