Ken Taylor Reynaga
'Beneath the Avocado Tree'
On view through 07/25
Come visit!
There is a particular kind of shade, soft and irregular, shifting with the wind, where time slows just enough to notice what usually slips by. Beneath the Avocado Tree begins in that space.
In this exhibition, Taylor Reynaga approaches the landscape not as distant scenery but as something inhabited, labored in, and carried physically. Fields, mountains, and domestic interiors unfold in saturated color and restless
line, shaped less by direct observation than by recollection, by the sensation of being inside a place that has already taken hold of you. The paintings resist stillness. They move between figuration and abstraction, between presence and erasure, as if the image itself were struggling to retain what cannot be fixed.
At the core of these works are those whose labor sustains daily life, figures largely unacknowledged. Forms appear and recede, elongated, fragmented, or partially absorbed into their surroundings. Cowboys, workers, and
caretakers move through the terrain, their bodies bending toward it, merging with it, until the boundary between figure and ground dissolves. A hat becomes a hill. A body becomes a shadow. The land holds their imprint, even when it does not name them.
“I think of the people,” the artist reflects. “The people who take care of our landscape. My people. The ones who clean our homes, fix our cars, grow and harvest our food, build our houses, repair our plumbing, hang our lights, and cook our meals. Beneath this tree, I think about how they remain unseen. How we’ve lived invisible within the land we cultivate, to the point that we’ve become part of it.
(Cont. in comments...)
Spring equinox. Resurrection is a story long told. Before many may believe. To die is to be free but to come back from the death. That’s some real g shit. Mother Nature is the realest and I thank the universe for the art goddess that does it every year. 🌱
