Who Am I But a Heights Kid

ExhibitionPast

Apr 16

Devin Osorio
Who Am I But a Heights Kid

961 Chung King Road
APRIL 23 - JUNE 4, 2022

SHOW CATALOG (PDF)
PRESS RELEASE (PDF)

Charlie James Gallery is delighted to present a solo show of Mexico City-based artist Devin Osorio titled Who Am I But a Heights Kid, opening April 23rd at the gallery from 6-9pm. This is Osorio’s first solo show with the gallery.

Devin Osorio (b. 1993, New York) grew up as a first-generation Dominican American in the northern Manhattan neighborhood of Washington Heights. Osorio takes inspiration from Dominican culture and folkloric traditions, including a strong emphasis on textile patterns. These cultural influences merge with biographical details from Osorio’s lived experience, yielding paintings that function as secular reliquaries, commemorating a life lived between cultures.

Who Am I But A Heights Kid is an exhibition of paintings, installation, and works on paper executed by Osorio as a means of both self-introduction and self-examination. The works investigate moments of elation and trauma in Osorio’s life, and they contain the array of complex emotions Osorio holds for Washington Heights. The paintings and works on paper employ a folk art structure to fuse ritual and personal history. Tinges of Magical Realism operate within the works, as Osorio revisits the games, stories and nursery rhymes of his youth, and soars in and out of landscapes within the works.

Words from the artist on the exhibition:

“Throughout this work, I fell in love with the ways in which Betye Saar organizes and reflectively combines objects such as one does with pen ink and a journal page. Henri Rousseau’s insanely active imagination and fearlessness to articulate allowed him to travel the globe never stepping foot out of France, and the ways in which Pepin Osorio is able to create work that makes me feel at home and question those exact notions. When I was a child, I came across Faith Ringgold’s Tar Beach and for the first time saw my community and myself depicted in something important - a book, thus making me feel as though I was important as well. Ever since I began creating work that was dedicated to my neighborhood I’ve hoped to make Ringgold proud and, if lucky, make someone else feel as I did when I stumbled upon her book and devoured its beautiful and joy-inducing contents.

Overall this show is an act of growth and an act of love. Throughout this process, I’ve learned about the material, the process of painting, and how to modify my daily acts in order to be my best self during my studio time. This show will be the first time I showcase large-scale works on paper, which is now a practice that I’ve learned to love. The texture and the absorbency of the painted paper remind me of frescos and make me feel as though I am painting a mural rather than on a piece of paper taped to the wall. Connecting me to an art history that I truly admire and am grateful that it’s venerated deeply in Mexican soil and its diaspora.”

Devin Osorio (b. 1993, New York) is a multi-disciplinary artist based in Mexico City, Mexico. Using shared and self-reflective symbolism, Osorio honors Dominican culture through shrine-like paintings that incorporate plants, animals and glyphs to create a visual vernacular of and for the Dominican American community. Osorio’s work has been exhibited in New York, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Mexico City, and Madrid, at galleries including Calderon Gallery, Wave Hill, REGULARNORMAL and Charlie James Gallery. Osorio is current Artist in Residence at New Wave in West Palm Beach, FL. Osorio earned a BFA from Savannah College of Art and Design. Osorio lives and works in Mexico City.