Tony de Los Reyes: Ahab's America

January 2008, Los Angeles – Carl Berg Gallery presents Tony de los Reyes’ second exhibition based on Herman Melville’s literary classic Moby Dick. De los Reyes has created new paintings, sculpture and works on paper in this exciting follow-up to his critically acclaimed 2006 exhibition. In this body of work de los Reyes deconstructs Melville’s epic by concentrating on the book as a mythic vision of America, with Ahab as the metaphorical double for the omnivorous and messianic tendencies of the United States. A lush range of reds, whites, blues, silvers and blacks, images of whaling from the 19th century, allegorical icons and pages of text from the artist’s personal copy of the book ties together the myths of American heroism and invincibility. Ships, stars, skulls and language cross-reference each other suggesting a national identity steeped in violent behavior. In the large-scale painting Breach (2008), the doomed Pequod emerges as a phantom awash in an enormous plume of red ink; in the sculpture Wake (2008), twenty American stars lay scattered along the gallery floor, an allegorical constellation of lost sailors; in Ahab (2008), a simultaneously gleaming and corroded bronze skull clasps a single star between his teeth. The series of paintings titled The Whiteness of the Whale (2008) takes an entire chapter from the book and transposes it with abstract gestures to form a sympathetic meditation on Melville’s frustration with the nature of “whiteness.” By acknowledging the continuity of these habits in American history, de los Reyes describes the seemingly karmic affirmation of a perennially ecstatic and volatile side of our national character. This body of work takes a darker turn, suggesting a country keen on consuming raw materials and evangelizing political influence: an insatiable America whose vision of action belies a euphoric rush towards self-destruction. Tony de los Reyes’ work has appeared in Art in America, The Los Angeles Times, Tema Celeste, Modern Painters and Art on Paper. He has had solo exhibitions in Los Angeles, New York and Seattle. Group exhibitions have included such institutions as White Columns, Sun Valley Center for the Arts, and the Luckman Fine Arts Gallery at CalState LA.