Judy Sarup is a copywriting intern at our brand strategy and creative services firm Project X Media. She likes art. She likes to write. She gets to review.
Project X Gallery current show, "Surf Sacrifice" by artist Chris Martino.
On the surface, artist Chris Martino’s current exhibit at Project X Gallery will resonate with surfers, a subgroup of popular culture. On a much larger scale, it will resonate with mankind’s universal experience of grappling with the shock of loss when family members and friends die—and at times public figures and victims of disaster, either singly or in groups, perish.
Martino uses surfboards, either whole or broken, as his canvas for codifying loss and encouraging us to consider our religious beliefs and cultural traditions in mourning. The gallery visitor can expect a gamut of emotions to strike while studying the works-ranging from awe to laughter in observing cultural and religious elements practiced around the world at time of death, resulting in the possibility we might question our ethnocentrisms and, in turn, develop a heartier, profound respect of other cultures’ mourning practices, including even the exercise of superstition, considered taboo by many.
Martino’s use of broken surfboard sections echoes altarpiece design created centuries ago, as in the famous Giotto examples of the Late Gothic period. Color choices sometimes suggest Fauvism. He gravitates toward Mexican design in some of his works exemplifying the respective mourning practices, and titled in Spanish.
The "Surf Sacrifice" collection is repetitive in theme but so is mourning itself! People must mourn until reaching a state of emotional catharsis and peace.
There is no sacrifice depicted in "Wind Dragon," but why the dragon?
At first glance, "Wind Dragon" suggests the calm, compositional arrangement and organic beauty of Japanese art—but the eye darts to the ominous-seeming, yet comical, dragon’s head at the center—and then outward to the copper strip borders anchored to the wood frame with numerous nails. Martino’s dragon is a type of spirit guide, not really a mortal enemy, and easier to gaze at because of the caricatured style.
The floral stencil/tattoo-like designs in the background call attention to Asian heritage, or cultural history. The Kirei board background is made of compressed sorghum stalks and reminds us of the exemplary wall hanging or straw mat we see often in Asian décor.
"I’m not all here," the Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland said—and Martino’s "Surf Dragon" echoes this. The dragon is more of an elemental sea creature here, like a dragon/fish/crab. Placement of yellow tattoo-like flowers scattered in the background is for mourning the loss of surfers on menacing appendage-like waves below. That we see light outlines only of the surfers and their boards makes them faded memories, and causes us to wince and feel a sense of dread, or loss.
Public, or collective mourning, along with personal grieving is a theme in most of the "Surf Sacrifice" works. Well, they say it takes a village to raise a child. So, it must take a village to mourn a loss or group of losses, too.
"Requiem for a Right Pointbreak" tells a story of loss from the top down to the bottom of a surfboard section. It begins with a graph that is actually an enlarged tide chart used by surfers to tell when the waves are best for surfing. There are famous surfers of yesteryear depicted at the top, newspaper or family photographs.
We read old news lines intended to be meaningful for a group of mourners: "Try and find war and bird-watching in such close proximity;" and "Napalm doesn’t figure into any gold legend." There is a small black picture frame attached to the top section, again, with a picture of a surfer’s outline on black-and-blue water.
A thick black horizontal line breaks up the vertical space of the space. It consists of caulking painted black and delineates the metal (sanded aluminum) section below.
The bottom section contains a black-outlined drawing of the Hindu god Ganesh. There might be candles or other lights sitting on his hoofs, with three blue wave lines running across. The meaning of the thick nails hanging from the bottom of the work is open to interpretation--for ornament, as an add-on for a shrine, as markers for each surfer lost in the story, etc.
"North Swell Petition" is a black triangular altarpiece replete with primitive (tikis) and Christian religious imagery. The culture combination represents the idea of surfing as its own kind of secular religious pursuit.
Orange strips on both sides of the top represent the sun. Wax combs painted blue (for conditioning the wax on a surfboard) represent the ocean waves and look like ears placed near the tiki’s head. The tiki appears to as the supreme one here, representing the spirit of surfing.
The nailed-on midsection is part of a wetsuit, using a material related to surfing as the primary material of the shrine. Another dragon/sea serpent is here, this time in white and outlined in black.
The sand-lined bottom section of the work is a shelf of Christian symbols, containing Madonnas holding white roses, candles and a Jesus figure in gold. The figural positions of worship are familiar but appear helpless, as death has already occurred.
"Big Game" is of a whitened deer head (white because of decay of flesh and bone calcification), with gold antlers pierced with "Wild Bumps" surf wax blocks. Gloss white spray paint was the medium.
The piece represents the "hunting" of large waves and the trophies sought by surfers as they ride these large waves.
"Zen and the Art of Surfing," is more of a Japanese/pop inspired shrine, with bright colors, crazy stickers—"hyperactive surf post-Pop art," Martino said. His elements of a wetsuit portion, a wax comb, and nails reappear. Now there’s also a ram’s head at the top, and beneath it is a section of bright skull stickers and hearts, moon and rainbow ones, There’s a white Buddha, plus gold ones. A surfer’s outline is filled in with blue, not hollow as before.
"Taboo Yellow" is of a tiki head framed with a nailed silver-colored box, and the eyes are open. The nail heads could represent one death each. The background is of a cheerful Polynesian floral pattern, again to mourn loss.
"Taboo Purple" is of a tiki head with shut eyes, and a tense mouth. Once again, loss is painful.
"Tiki Nui Nui" is a primitive imagery work, with a white (white gloss spray paint) tiki head and nails piercing the top. Blue is the major color but the lost surfers are in white. The statement of mourning is more direct now, with white surfer figures placed next to the tikis on the bottom shelf, and candles for mourning. Stenciled koi fish look playful in the center section but the blue tiki faces don’t—and white surfer figures flank both vertical sides of the work. This is the largest number of figures to mourn thus far in Martino’s works.
Martino indicated this work is more like a modern semi-ironic take on the Polynesian art style.
"Ocean Kings" is a two-part work. In the top portion, Ocean Kings are "born to rule." Shark fins, a tiki outline placed over ocean waves, and skulls along with hearts and a multi-colored hand for palm reading indicate death. Three rows of nails suggest collective death.
The bottom section has Buddhist figures on two shelves.
"Blue Madonna" most resembles a traditional altarpiece. Rays at the top provide somewhat of a halo effect for the work, even with coins on them. The Madonna is in blue, for the ocean, and inside a tiki god head.
These relate to the "humble nature of surfing, just you and the ocean," Martino said.
Nails at the bottom with the surf combs hanging are ornaments for the shrine.
Pairs of dice flank the work, with an ocean wave below. The Madonna appears powerless even while praying because of a phony-looking crown on her head and the dice placed near her.
"Surf Retablos," (4 in all), are in homage to Mexican votive paintings. done by modern Mexican street painters.
The exhibit placard reads: "Typically dedicated to a favored saint or holy protector, retablos serve as primeval acts of faith for prayers answered and calamities avoided or escaped."
Colors are bright in these works, the gratitude expressed at the bottom of them profound (even comical), and with Catholic religious imagery. The retablos remind us that following patterns and practices is a huge part of our lives, in general activity and in worship.
"Surfbertos," could be a Mexican family memorial, and the date is 1964. Perhaps this work benefits the current family as something tangible for recalling their great-grandparents. It looks like it could be a memorial of a famous person and that person’s respective family for others, too—a drawing of a gentleman in a sombrero appears below the family portrait and could suggest a cultural icon, especially with the "Original" label at the bottom and the memorial candles on the shelf.
Cultural misunderstanding is also a featured theme of some of Martino’s works in this collection.
In "En Route (Mahalo)," Martino examined the "cliché expectations of mainlanders associated with the typical ‘Hawaiian Paradise.’"
Most prominent here are the pink tattoo-like heart with "Mahalo?" written on it, and a topless island dancer depicted on a billboard being carried away by men in grey work clothes. Obviously, we have contaminated island cultures with our presence there.
And, satire flavors some works, too.
"Surfline Circa 1377 A.D.," was a "sly wink to current ability to forecast surf conditions using satellites, Internet, email, etc.—how they might have done it 700 years ago," Martino said.
Most exceptional are the black "8" ball on the bottom altar shelf, and candle-head monkey figurines. "Yes" is below one, and "No" below the other.
Black shark fins flank the dark tiki figure above. Without technology in the past, people used the information they had plus some reliance on fortune telling and other cultural crutches.
"Lowtide Mojo" depicts "the element of chance associated with going surfing," Martino said.
"Sometimes it’s great, and sometimes it’s not.
"Not so much fortune telling as rolling the dice and hoping for the best (a good session)," Martino said.
"No," near the top, implies the surf is bad.
Red "X’s" near the bottom imply "not happening." Mexican themes flavor the work, with four tarot-like cards (one of a devil) placed under "low tide" graphics. The hands of playing cards and dice at the bottom cement the themes.
"La Virgen de la Fonda" is a full surfboard, with bull’s horns—that depicts a fictional Madonna based on the Virgin of Guadalupe, with her womb containing the ocean and sky above. There is a ram with a red "X: at the bottom, and jail cell bars over a skeleton. This is "because of the danger of surfing in Mexico/third world environment/banditos," Martino explained.
Bull’s horns mean to charge—like bullfighting, get in the ring and face the danger. This is a response to "Las olas estan Esparando"—the waves are waiting.
"Tiki Migration" has "Aloha" in stenciled letters on the memorial shelf, with the "A’s" in the word partially covered with orange candles, and a wooden crate placed before the "O." Does this mean fitting a square peg into a round hole?
"Vaya Con Dios" is made of corrugated tin with a number in red, resembling the shanties in Tijuana’s slums. "El Fin del Mundo" is the end of the world—this is the term for a dump outside Tijuana where gangsters dump dead bodies.
Because of kidnappings and murders that occur in Baja as a result of the Mexican drug war, Baja and its great waves are off limits to surfers. Note the bullets above the Madonna figure.
The show’s namesake is a showstopper.
"Surf Sacrifice" is the one example in Martino’s show of a full-length surfboard work. A tiki figure splits it in the center, perhaps suggesting caution for the surfer figures on either side of it—and there are stenciled tiki masks elsewhere, too.. This work is rich with aesthetic appeal, graced with copper bands and floral fabric sections.
Turning the board vertically places the tiki figure as the altarpiece "shelf."