Z’otz* Collective Lost Cause, Buried Love and other Short Tales
Z’otz* Collective Lost Cause, Buried Love and other Short Tales
* Nahúm Flores Erik Jerezano Ilyana Martínez
Toronto 2007
Copyright Š 2007 Z’otz* Collective All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form without prior written permission of the artists.
Z’otz* Collective
Nahúm Flores, Erik Jerezano, and Ilyana Martínez met one day and created a new entity – Z’otz* – an amalgamation of their personalities and a fusion of their artistic styles. Each of their works of art has been created by all three members, in weekly drawing sessions. These curious souls explore the freedom of the absurd through experimental collaboration. Among their themes are ideas exploring immigrant experience, mapping, travel, translation, and urban life. These issues are addressed in a peculiar style using the language of hybrid beasts, quirky characters, and odd imaginary spaces. Z’otz* has taught the three artists to read images, forms and colours with their souls, and to respond viscerally to them. The emergence of this new beginning – Z’otz* – has been liberating, allowing them the space to let go, and play.
* Z’otz is the Mayan word for “bat”.
Drawing Installations
The Great Debate, drawing installation for “exMargins: Ideas of Collaborations� exhibition, Propeller Centre for the Visual Arts, Toronto, 2006. Collage, charcoal and pastel were applied directly to the wall.
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The Brick and the Table: A Love Story, drawing installation for the Stairwell, Art Gallery of Peterborough, Peterborough, 2007. Collage, charcoal, pastel, pencil and watercolour were applied directly to the wall.
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Drawings, Paintings, Collages
Endurance mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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The Advantage of Being Mortal mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2006
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Saving the Hero mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2006
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Involuntary Leap mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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Three Proposals for the 22nd Century mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2006
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Percentage of Reason mixed media on paper 25 cm x 33 cm, 2006
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Kiss to the Light mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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Wall of Desires mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2006
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Revolution Anniversay mixed media on paper 33 cm x 25 cm, 2006
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The Departure mixed media on paper 25 cm x 33 cm, 2006
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Suspension mixed media on paper 25 cm x 33 cm, 2006
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The Visit mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2006
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Santa Has Been Robbed mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2006
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Dogs of Tears mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2005
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Before Take Off mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2005
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Chasing the Birds mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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Something about Her mixed media on paper 25 cm x 33 cm, 2006
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With Canadian Content mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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A Nest in my Head mixed media on paper 33 cm x 25 cm, 2007
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A Disaster without Precedence mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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Imported Ideas mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2006
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Frustrated Salesman mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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Two Elegant Thoughts mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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El MĂstico mixed media on paper 25 cm x 33 cm, 2007
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Last Minute Decision mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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Dancers of the Ruins mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2005
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Inaudible Happiness mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2005
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I Saw Him Arrive mixed media on paper 38 cm x 28 cm, 2006
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The Shell Collector mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2006
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The Analysis mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2006
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The Bath mixed media on paper 25 cm x 33 cm, 2005
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Freaky Ricky and his Buddy Mike mixed media on paper 19 cm x 14 cm, 2006
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On the Tip of my Tongue mixed media on paper 28 cm x 38 cm, 2007
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The Remains mixed media on paper 38 cm x 28 cm, 2007
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Z’otz* Collective Formed in September 2004. Based in Toronto.
Selected Exhibitions 2007 The Sharp Farewell, Belgrade, Serbia Modified Inuition, Vertigo Gallery, Vernon, British Columbia The Advantage of Being Mortal, Galerie St-Abroise, Montreal, Quebec The Brick and the Table: A Love Story, The Stairwell, Art Gallery of Peterborough, Peterborough, Ontario Best of 2006, Award Winners from Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition, First Canadian Place Gallery, Toronto
2006 Toronto International Art Fair, Martin Kletzel Contemporary Art, Toronto Artwalk - St. Clair Arts Festival, Wychwood Avenue, Toronto Do Hands make us Human, Hangman Gallery, Toronto Digital Evento, Latin American New Media Exhibition, Gallery 1313, Toronto Making Rain without Bothering the Clouds, Art Square Gallery, Toronto eX Margins: Ideas of Collaboration, Propeller Centre for the Visual Arts, Toronto A Little Courtesy with the Sun, Praxis Gallery, Toronto Un/I. Harbourfront Centre, Ritmo y Color Festival, Toronto Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition, Nathan Phillips Square, Toronto
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2005 Lost Cause, Buried Love and other Short Tales, Praxis Gallery, Toronto McCleave Cross–Canada Tour, Suitcase Exhibition, ODD Gallery, Dawson City, Yukon Useless Depths, Propeller Centre for the Visual Arts, Toronto Idiomática, Lennox Gallery, Toronto smaller3 – miniature exhibition, Neutral Ground, Regina, Saskatchewan McCleave Cross–Canada Tour, Suitcase Exhibition, Ministry of Casual Living, Victoria, British Columbia The Nomad Pencil Sessions, Tequila Bookworm, Toronto
Residencies International Multidisciplinary Art Residency – In conjunction with the Loznica Cultural Center and Belgrade School of Fine Arts. Trisc, Serbia and Montenegro, Summer 2007
Reviews and Publications “Various Cities: Suitcase Galleries”, Leah Sandals, spacing Magazine, Winter 2006. “Idiomática, Lennox Contemporary, Toronto” Susan Douglas, Canadian Art Magazine, Winter 2005. Mary McKenzie, Flack 3, Fall 2005. “More to Life.” Interview with Mary Ito. TV Ontario, April 15, 2005. “Here and Now: Go-2-it Visual Arts.” CBC Radio One, April 12, 2005. “Collective art group Z’otz* unpacks its suitcase” Humber etCetera, April 7, 2005.
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Awards Honourable Mention, Watercolour. Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition 2006
Events A Space Gallery: A Conversation with Z’otz* Collective, April 19, 2007 Festival Talk, Studio Theatre at Harbourfront Centre, Sunday July 23, 2006 Art Talk: 6 collectives of visual artists speak. Shift Gallery, December 19, 2005
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Nahúm Flores
Erik Jerezano
Nahúm Flores was born in 1974 in Danlí, Honduras and emigrated to Canada at age 17, after having lived in Mexico and the US. He studied Drawing and Painting at the Ontario College of Art & Design in Toronto. In 2006, his work was selected among five other artists for the Biennale of Visual Art of Honduras. In conjunction, he participated in the Biennale of the Central America Isthmus in El Salvador, last fall.
Erik Jerezano was born in Mexico City in 1973. He is a self-taught artist and graphic designer who arrived to Toronto in 2001. He has exhibited his work at John B. Aird Gallery, Harbourfront Centre and Propeller Centre for the Visual Arts, among others. In 2005, he received a Toronto Arts Council Emerging Artist grant and his work was selected by the Drawing Center Viewing program in New York.
Growing up in Honduras, Flores was exposed to a mixture of Catholic and Indigenous beliefs reflected in daily life. His mixed media work is a fusion of drawing and matter that is intuitively processed. This mode of working gives voice to his subconscious, resulting in expressive figures and amorphous forms. Although scenes depicted are often bleak, they also reflect his sense of humour.
The work of Erik Jerezano lives in a world where the eye is constantly deceiving us yet does so apologetically, where the naivety of the pen and simplicity of paper is taken with grave seriousness. The indescribable softness of the (often) ironic reflexivity of his work binds together the two places where he has been shaped the most culturally: Mexico City and Toronto.
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Ilyana Martínez Ilyana Martínez was born in Toronto to a Mexican father and Canadian mother, and was raised in Mexico and the U.S. She graduated with honours from the Ontario College of Art & Design. Previous studies include Communication Design at the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design. In 2006, she received an Ontario Arts Council project grant which took her to San Pablito, Puebla, Mexico. Her current series of work is on amate, a bark paper handmade by the Otomí. In an intuitive working process, forms and colours emerge on the soft textured surface. Images of stones, seeds, plants and buildings scatter in abstract space. Nature refuses to die and the man-made world comes alive, as one fuses with the other. The drawings are remnants of a dialogue with her surroundings.
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