Having grown up in Las Vegas, Los Angeles-based artist Tiza Maldonado has neon in her blood, a notewor- thy metaphor when talking about symbols of personal power, often the subject of her work. Taking inspiration from plants and flowers to punk rock and graffiti, Maldonado imbues her work with anarchy, pushing neon beyond the limits of itself with free form lines and radical installations. Many times neon plays the role of another brushstroke in painterly wall compositions, or takes the place of bones and blood in sculptural work. Maldonado even honors Las Vegas with homages to showgirls candidly backstage, but effortlessly moves beyond this trope and any trace of the road-side sign with neon presented as drying bouquets, cherished childhood dolls, and the carrion of dead birds. Her willingness to boldly experiment and innovate outside traditional applications for neon illustrates a passion for the craft, as well as an innate understanding of transforming emotions into sculpture.
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Pensive Eye
Contrasting the global, pandemic-enforced trend of living life through technology instead in person, Matthew Couper’s exploration of what social isolation might look like starts from an island in the middle of the ocean. For the artist, desert islands and desert proper are both metaphors for survival and reflect a bigger picture of what survival means […]
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Green Fairy Garden Gate
La Forgia started as a dream of owner Enzo Cinquegrana more than 20 years ago. A sculptor frustrated with the art gallery scene, Enzo dove head first into forging as a method to express his sculptural abilities. When he discovered forged metal could satisfy his need to create sculptural forms and his desire to have […]
