120 Essex St. between Delancey and Rivington.
(Inside the Essex St. Food Market at the South end of the building)

Opening Saturday, October 27. 4:00pm-6:00pm.
Open daily thereafter, Monday through Saturday 12:00 noon to 6pm. Closed Sundays.
On view until November 24th.

Boricua statement:

Boricua Ð derived from the Caribbean Indians' original name for Puerto Rico, the word now reflects a larger socio-political state of mind, an attitude, applied across the diaspora which is the northeastern United States, and New York City in particular. Here, where there are more Americans of Puerto Rican descent than the island's own population, the memory of Puerto Rico looms large. Unlike earlier generations of immigrants, however, today people travel casually back and forth, and the decision of where and whether to settle down is an ongoing one rather than an all or nothing proposition. This exhibit seeks to illustrate the continuing commerce of memory and interaction with the island by artists who reside both in New York City and Puerto Rico, and who choose quite different issues on which to focus in their work.

Luis Carle's photographs constitute a kind of ongoing diary of his travels between Puerto Rico, the United States, and Europe. The current series of charmingly poetic island portraits are not quite what they seem: they actually document a complex fraud perpetrated on a local traditional artist by his neighbors.

Javier Cintron's paintings play with the ubiquitous Goya label, the campbell's soup of Hispanic cuisine. Once relegated to the shelves of Lower East Side bodegas, Goya beans can now be found in every supermarket, sparking a curious mixture of pride and irritation in the artist, who depicts the carelessly tossed cans amidst a choreographed gaggle of chickens.

Alfredo Hernandez's paintings show the vivacious, even raucous, island culture of his youth in a richly illustrational mode: frenzied women in traditional village garb lift their skirts dancing to a boisterous Salsa band, while children dash between their legs and curious priests look on. In Hernandez' vision, Catholicism and superstition work side by side, fueling the fires of island culture, recharging the Puerto Rican soul.

Abnel Rodriguez' critiques the blind devotion to Catholicism which accepts dogma without accommodating a sexually diverse population beset with ills such as HIV/AIDS.

Mark Vinsun, for many years a part-time resident of Puerto Rico, has made its landscape the primary subject matter of his lyrically colorful paintings, which range from abstract to carefully-recorded notations of island life.

-Steve Mumford 2001.

Boricua will be on view from October 27 until November 24 The gallery is open Monday through Saturday, 12:00 noon to 6:00pm CUCHIFRITOS is a project of the Artists Alliance, Inc.