Window Dressing XXIV: Oil Over Troubled Water, Jesus Treviño

Exhibition Dates: November 21 – 28, 2022 (visible 24 hours/day)
Artist Reception: Friday, November 25, 7-9pm

“Oil Over Troubled Water” is a window display by Texas based artist, Jesus Treviño that takes a closer look at transgenerational histories, experiences, and collective and long-term trauma in relation to his personal experience. The title refers to the calming effect that a drop of oil has on water as it spreads over the surface. This display includes a vessel made of soy candle wax that holds water from the Rio Grande River as well as various “Resacas”, former outlets of the River. This material is meant to invoke and commemorate the land as well as carry a wishful gesture to alleviate tension surrounding the Borderlands. This sculpture will inform, supplement, and create a safe space for stories to be shared in the form of painting that is also composed of and affected by the symbolic material held
within the vessel.

Jesus Treviño (b. 1995, Brownsville, Texas) received a BA in Studio Art from the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley in 2018 and his MFA in Painting/Drawing at the University of Texas at Austin. His work is rooted from his experience being raised on the U.S./Mexico border and deals with the erasure of history, displacement of people, and its residual personal, emotional, and social effects. He has had two solo exhibitions in Texas at Martha’s Contemporary, Austin (2022) and the Presa House Gallery, San Antonio (2019) as well as a two-person show at Contra Common, Bee Cave (2021). He has also organized a group exhibition at the Visual Arts Center, Austin, TX (2020) and has been included in group exhibitions at Exhibit/208 in Albuquerque, NM (2022); Las Cruces Museum of Art, NM (2022); the Lawndale Art Center, Houston, TX (2022); The Cole Art Center, Nacogdoches, TX (2021); Field Projects Gallery, New York (2021); Carlsbad Museum and Art Center, NM (2021) and the Rockport Center for the Arts, Rockport, TX (2021). Most recently he attended the Desert Door Residency through Big Medium, Austin, TX (2022) and the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture, Madison, ME (2022).