Prof. Ruben Ortiz Torres and Alumnus Rita Gonzalez - 'Phantom Sightings' at LACMA

At the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the sprawling exhibition "Phantom Sightings: Art After the Chicano Movement," brings together a diverse and satisfying array of recent painting, sculpture, video, installation and mixed-media work. Sometimes the art is specific to questions of ethnic identity; often it's not. The exhibition was curated by Rita Gonzalez, a UCSD Visual Arts graduate, and included current UCSD Visual Arts faculty member Ruben Ortiz-Torres. More
http://theguide.latimes.com/general/latcl-phantom-sightings-at-lacma-article

..."A mesmerizing 2006 painting by Rubén Ortiz-Torres is emblematic. Sparkly pearlescent automotive paint, which magically shifts from smoky gray-green to noxious brown, depending on the angle of reflected light, is sprayed on a horizontal aluminum panel nearly 6 feet wide and 2 feet high. Ortiz-Torres puts gorgeous low-rider car materials at the service of revising the metaphysically tinged clarity of California Finish Fetish and Light & Space art, in a murky work aptly titled "Smog."

This knockout painting, an emphatic art object, embodies concepts and ideas, contrary to what's suggested in that introductory wall label. As far as 1970s Conceptual art goes, the king is dead. Long live the king!..."

christopher.knight@latimes.com

Complete article at LA Times ( http://theguide.latimes.com/general/latcl-phantom-sightings-at-lacma-article )