A jaguar stalks the edges of myth and movement in Anna Ortiz\u00019s paintings, mirroring the Mesoamerican nagual\u0014d\u0014da shape-shifting guide crossing between realms. Drawing on her Mexican-American heritage, Ortiz renders remote, jungle-like landscapes with a tightly edited yet vivid palette. Subtle modulations of tone and saturation in blues, greens, and pinks pull the eye through terrains that feel at once lush and otherworldly, a place where the familiar slips into the fantastic.<\/p>\n
With Shapeshifter, Ortiz extends her ongoing exploration of the borderlands and of what unfolds when time and space seem to collapse. Across the new body of work, recurring images\u0014dan explosive volcano, a double moon, and reflective pools of water\u0014dcast the setting as an uncanny zone where multiple realities coexist and change is a constant. The concentrated color choices sharpen this sense of simultaneity, heightening the mythic charge in each scene.<\/p>\n
Among the works presented are pieces titled \u001cLa Fisura,\u001d \u001cInundada,\u001d \u001cJaguar Reflejado,\u001d \u001cEspejo Obsidiana,\u001d \u001cEl Corredor,\u001d \u001cFloracion,\u001d \u001cLas Garzas,\u001d \u001cEquilibrium,\u001d and \u001cUn Eclipse en Doble.\u001d Together they sketch a mutable topography where reflective surfaces double skies and seismic forces roil below.<\/p>\n
Ortiz\u0001fs vision resonates with the writings of feminist author Gloria Anzald\u0000fa\u000140a, whose thinking on mixed heritage, the borderland, and the nagual finds a visual analogue here. Anzald\u0000fa\u000140a\u0001fs 1992 essay \u001cThe New Mestiza Nation\u001d offers a touchstone passage for the work: \u001cCertain aspects of identity don\u0001ft disappear, aren\u0001ft assimilated or repressed when they are not in the foreground. Identity is a changing cluster of components and a shape-shifting activity. To refer to a person who is changing identity I use the N\u0000e1huatl term nagual \u0001a We shift around to do the work we have to do, to creative the identities we need to live up to our potential.\u001d<\/p>\n
Shapeshifter is on view through October 31 at Chart Gallery in Tribeca.<\/p>\n