“TEMPORARY MASTERS and RUNAWAY DISASTERS”

JASON CRUZ / AMERIKAN BLACKHEART

September 10 – October 3, 2009

“TEMPORARY MASTERS and RUNAWAY DISASTERS”

Born in Los Angeles in 1974, AmerikanBlackheart is painter and musician Jason Alexander Cruz. Scrawled with apocalyptic odes and enchanting mod-pop iconography, his paintings evoke an ominous nocturnal tension: a clustered menace of Kalashnikov-slung Tuareg warriors, a hauntingly violet-tinted Twiggy, and the patent leather-wrapped talons of an impeccable trench-coated courtesan tidily folding away a bloody pocketbook full of crows.

Cruz’s portraits emerge as a flirtatious, reckless army of the bar, the battlefield, and the urban alleyway. His female figures are fey, enchanting and ferocious within their glossy haute couture – his men ravaged, deranged, and disruptive. Yet within their insouciant violence run threads of sorrow, isolation, and grief.

Deborah Martin Gallery