FREDRIC SNITZER GALLERY

Emilio Perez
The Land of In-Between

October 15 - November 19, 2022

Fredric Snitzer Gallery is pleased to present The Land of In-Between, a solo exhibition of new works by artist Emilio Perez. This exhibition, composed of large-scale paintings produced over the past year, explores the artists' connection with the tropical landscape. Perez's paintings exemplify the dynamic forces of nature and lead the viewer through unfolding narratives of fictional, intimate, and emotional places.  

In the primary gallery, Perez's paintings envelop the viewer in cavernous terrains, flowing streams, and lush foliage. Organic, oscillating shapes swirl into configured compositions rendered in moody hues of robust purples, fiery reds, icy blues, and almost fluorescent greens. These environments evoke an escape from reality, a place of pure fantasy, or an idealized vision of paradise.

Although striking in their inherent beauty, the artist connects with the underlying darkness and melancholic existence not evident at first glance. Perez finds that this contradiction reflects the brutal and magical reality like the tropical landscapes of Latin America and the Caribbean. 

Within their complexity, these abundant vistas propose an escape, a place of contemplation, dreams, and altered states of consciousness. 

Emilio Perez is a current SmartStamp Artist in Residence. Working closely with the Swiss tech company beta-testing their groundbreaking technology, Perez has provided insight from an artist's perspective to help optimize the App in accordance with SmartStamp's artist-supportive and mission-driven spirit.

 SmartStamp was used to create digital fingerprints and Certificates of Authenticity that will accompany every painting in the exhibition.

SmartStamp is the pioneering new standard in identification and authentication for the art world that combines secure, environmentally sustainable, and easy-to-use technology. SmartStamp's App uses patented AI technology designed to read and record artworks' surface characteristics – offering artists, collectors, institutions, and all arts and culture stakeholders a way to link physical objects securely and immutably to their digital fingerprints on the blockchain.

Emilio Perez (b. 1972, New York, NY) attended Pratt Institute and received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Florida's New World School of the Arts. His work is currently included in In the Mind’s Eye: Landscapes of Cuba at The Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum. He has held solo exhibitions at the John F. Kennedy Center of Performing Arts, Washington D.C. (2018); Jacob Lewis Gallery, New York, NY (2017); Galerie Lelong, New York, NY(2014); J.J. Johnson Gallery, Jacksonville Beach, FL (2013); Pace Prints, New York, NY (2012); Château Lynch-Bages, Pauillac, France (2012); and Galerie Lelong, Paris, France (2011); among many others. His work has been featured at the 12th Havana Biennial, Havana, Cuba (2015); Louisiana Art & Science Museum, Baton Rouge, LA (2011); Carnegie Art Museum, Oxnard, California (2010); and the Miami Art Museum (2009); among others. Perez's works can be found in the permanent collections of the PAMM - Perez Art Museum, Miami; Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo; Fundación ARCO, Madrid and Arkansas Art Center, Little Rock; and in corporate collections internationally.