Various Small Fires (VSF) is pleased to present Descarga Heavy, a solo exhibition of new paintings by Alex Becerra at the gallery’s Los Angeles location. This is Becerra’s first solo presentation as a VSF-represented artist.
Descarga Heavy–Spanish slang for a music jam session–encapsulates the exhibition ethos: a rhythmic constellation of oil and acrylic paintings that demonstrates the intersections of Becerra’s background and influences. The textured works bring together his passion for music, a fondness for Abstract Expressionism, and an homage to Los Angeles and his upbringing as a Mexican-American in Southern California. Exploring freedom and energy, Becerra’s paintings are unbound by rules, solely guided by the desire to animate a flow between abstraction and figuration.
Becerra, who grew up in the small farming community of Piru, California, and later attended Otis College of Art and Design, makes works that contend with a range of visual histories. His Mexican-American heritage inspired his fascination with lowrider car culture, as seen in his performance and outdoor sculpture Garage Fanfare and his paintings’ custom-made chrome frames. Quiet renderings of telenovela-like dramatic scenes of intimacy, as seen in Novia Hippie, juxtapose thickly-painted nudes across the canvas.
Becerra’s art historical training and the months he lived in Germany early in his career are evidenced in his style. Influences from Expressionists, Colorists, and Modernists painters in Europe such as Jörg Immendorff, Jonathan Meese, Werner Buttner, Édouard Manet, Vincent van Gogh, and Francis Bacon appear as muddied and dynamic explorations of the media. Thick layers of paint, sometimes straight from the tube, mix figuration with his observation of the world around him.
