“The Ends”

Parker’s Box
2005-10-01

Patrick Martinez continues his surreal manipulation of elemental forms in his bizarrely elegant solo show. A layer of smoke hangs in the main gallery, slowly spewing from three black garbage bags, creating the illusion of thinly veiled walls delineated by a hanging rectangle of tape. Together, they generate an atmospheric room within the gallery where two bass speakers dance around to a sub-audible signal. In the back gallery are several drawings that like the dancing speakers, seem to be about creating patterns and spaces out of nothingness. Martinez coyly titles the show The Ends, referring to the systemic means employed to generate the drawings and cloudy, illusory space. In between Martinez creates an inky void having emptied a can of black spray paint on a single spot. Martinez deftly conjures a beautiful nothingness out of signals and noise.

—William Powhida