2024
Canvas scraps, used terrycloth studio rags, used studio clothing, polyester sewing threads, rolled canvas tubes, paint chips, modeling paste, acrylic paint on canvas
approx. 60 x 75 x 5 in.
Courtesy of the artist and Commonwealth and Council. Photo by Paul Salveson.
Leslie Martinez creates immersive, textural paintings that often explore themes of identity, place, and the environment. Martinez repurposes materials such as fabric scraps, sewing threads, and paint chips to evoke ideas of ruin and renewal. In The Cave of Turning Space, Martinez applies deep blacks and blues to produce a chiaroscuro effect, a technique using strong contrasts between light and dark to create a dramatic effect, which is intensified by the emergence of radiant, lighter hues that appear to rise from the dark canvas—like forms emerging from a shadowy cave. As luminous pigments surface from the darkness, the painting transforms into a sculptural field where voids and glimmers coexist in perpetual flux.