Narsiso Martinez
Narsiso Martinez was born in Oaxaca, Mexico, and came to the United States when he was 20 years old. His work is deeply rooted in his personal experience as a farmworker. Taking inspiration from artists as varied as Jean-Francois Millet, Thomas Hart Benton, and David Alfaro Siqueiros, he portrays, with great economy and depth of feeling, the largely invisible group of people responsible for putting food on America’s tables: immigrant farmworkers. The fact that he represents them on discarded produce boxes harvested from local grocery stores amplifies his critique: it encompasses not just the U.S. commercial food industry but American society at large. His latest series, titled Superfresh, consists of paintings, drawings and sculptures—from personal portraits to large-scale scenes that recall John Steinbeck’s Great Depression novel The Grapes of Wrath—that materialize the faces and bodies of people who are among the nation’s most essential workers, this despite their near total disenfranchisement.
— CVF, USFCAM
“I included Fresh Cut (The Beginning of a New Day) as a response to my experience for the pandemic and the lockdown. Besides reading and writing, during this staying at home times, I spend much of the time in the studio. This piece is one of the latest drawings I did. The original image comes from one of my former coworker from the asparagus fields who I keep in touch with. It was taken during this current picking season, and I noticed while the worker is wearing safety goggles and gloves, the worker is not wearing proper boots nor a face mask. Since Farm workers are now deemed essential workers, they should be provided with the proper personal protection equipment. This really made me wonder what the future holds for farm workers here in the United States. Is it gonna improve because of the recognition of their important contributions or is it gonna be business as usual after the noise goes away?”
— Narsiso Martinez
“My drawings, prints, and mix media installations include single or multifigure compositions in agricultural landscapes. Drawn from my own experiences as a farmworker, I pay homage to the people who toil in the fields picking the produce we consume. In an attempt to highlight their plight, my curiosity for materials led me to discover that an effective way to add context to the figures was to portray them on discarded produce boxes many times collected from grocery stores. This allows me to reflect upon the disparities of socioeconomic lifestyles, that of the farmworkers and agribusiness owners.”
— Narsiso Martinez
Narsiso Martinez. Photo by the artist.
About Narsiso Martinez
(Oaxaca, Mexico, 1977)
He lives and works in Long Beach, California.
Narsiso Martinez’s drawings and mixed media installations include figures set amidst agricultural landscapes. Drawn from his own experience as a farmworker, Martinez’s work focuses on the people performing the labors necessary to fill produce sections and restaurant kitchens around the country. His portraits of farmworkers are painted, drawn, and expressed in sculpture on discarded produce boxes collected from grocery stores. In a style informed by 1930s-era Social Realism and heightened through the use of found materials, Martinez makes visible the difficult labor and onerous conditions of the “American farmworker,” itself a compromised piece of language owing to the industry’s conspicuous use of undocumented workers. He was awarded the prestigious Dedalus Foundation MFA Fellowship in Painting and Sculpture. His work has been exhibited at the California State University Long Beach University Art Museum (Long Beach, California), Art Space Purl (Daegu, South Korea), Angels Gate Cultural Center (San Pedro, California), Palos Verdes Art Center (Rancho Palos Verdes, California), Los Angeles Municipal Art Gallery (Los Angeles, California), and National Immigration Law Center (Los Angeles, California).
Gallery website: cjamesgallery.com
Artist Instagram: @narsisomartinez
Artist Twitter: @narsisomartinez