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During the day, Boris Lopez works for a company that flushes out
radiators. But when the sun sets, the self-taught artist trolls
neighborhood strip joints for inspiration.
“He has a foot fetish and uses the dancers as models for his
paintings,” says Steve Meeks, owner of the Miami Center for the
Photographic Arts. “Boris says he can often judge a person just by
looking at their feet.”
Lopez’s luminous paintings of saintly virgins wearing flip-flops and
ruby-red toenails are on display as part of the “21st Annual NAEMI Art
Exhibition” at Meeks’ Little Havana gallery.
Organized by Juan Martin, executive director of the National Art
Exhibitions by the Mentally Ill, the eye-opening show consists of 50
works by 17 artists with mental illness from the United States,
England, Spain, Chile, Peru, Bolivia, and Paraguay.
NAEMI is an international organization dedicated to discovering,
promoting, and exhibiting work by artists with mental illness. “We are
also trying to educate the community on outsider art, help eradicate
prejudice against mental illnesses, and reaffirm the creative capacity
of mentally ill patients,” Martin says.
The mostly mixed-media works on display sell for $200 to $400. All
proceeds go directly to the primarily self-taught artists. Some of them
use the money to buy art materials, but in many cases, the money goes
for food and clothing, Martin says.
Lopez, who battles depression, sold four of his paintings to a
Pennsylvania collector on opening night, each for $1,200. He has
painted mystical figures brandishing AK-47s or wearing sumptuous
see-through frocks over bras and panties and continues to evolve his
richly ornate style.
In La Virgen Cubana, the patron saint of Havana is cloaked in
a lavish blue and gold gown flecked with what appears to be sparkling
gems. Lopez has densely clotted the background with undulating swirls
and amoeba-like shapes that seem to vibrate and are reminiscent of
Australian aboriginal paintings. As the virgin cradles a red-clad
Christ child figure in her arms, two black, bat-winged angels sporting
mango-hued dancer’s unitards joyously flit about her head.
Texas-based Roger Sadler, another featured artist, has shifted from
working with photography to creating arresting mixed-media sculptures
using found objects.
In Quan Yin, he pays tribute to the Buddhist deity associated
with compassion, employing a toy cash register, a soldier, and the
decapitated head of a porcelain statue of the Buddhist goddess. The
piece is designed to be a commentary on rampant capitalism and war.
Sadler also turns the head with a piece titled Outrigger in
which he has cobbled together costume jewelry, canceled postage stamps,
an empty candy tin, a wooden box, stone animal figurines, and a
petrified sea horse to create a whimsical 3-D wall collage.
Billy Malone, another Texas-based talent, pokes fun at the
contemporary art world with his marker and pencil drawings on paper.
Santa Clause depicts a muddy, child-like rainbow at the upper
left corner of his composition while the words modern art are
printed across from it. As an insect-shaped face buzzes at the center
of his drawing, a pair of disembodied legs bristling with
caterpillar-like appendages dance a sprightly jig below it.
“Billy Malone is one of the most authentic individuals we work
with,” says Martin. “He often sends us these incredible drawings on
torn or dirty paper without regard to form or format and is very secure
in what he’s creating.”
One of the most haunting images on display is Mario Mesa’s untitled
painting depicting a green-eyed female Cyclops dripping blood from her
maw and clutching an extracted molar in her talons. Mesa, who suffers
from schizophrenia, has sandwiched his unsightly vision between glowing
Christmas trees.
Equally discomfiting is Fred Soler’s acrylic on board Ghost in
the Machine, which depicts another one-eyed creature with a purple
noggin floating against a tarry, squid ink void. This marks the first
time the Miami Beach artist has exhibited with NAEMI.
One artist whose visions hew to the fanciful is Carlos Abela.
Abela’s painting Regando Magia (“Spreading Magic”) features a
creature whose lower extremities are fashioned from an open umbrella.
The winged, fairy-like figure appears holding a water can and
irrigating a field of sprouting flowers.
Martin reports that during his recent trip to Asuncion, Paraguay, a
neighborhood center for budding outsider artists called “Unidos en el
Arte” was inaugurated due to NAEMI’s efforts in the region.
“Professional artists and dancers volunteered their time to assist
people at the margins in developing their talents,” Martin says. “Next
we will be organizing a show of local and international Hispanic
artists to take on tour to Latin America and Spain.”
At the MCPA Gallery, NAEMI’s commitment to promoting unique work
rarely seen in a commercial gallery peels back the veil on less visible
talent and places it front and center in an evocative and unforgettable
fashion.
