Christian Aaron Mendoza

Born 1972 – Managua, Nicaragua
Currently lives and works in New York City

Biography

Christian Aaron Mendoza is a New York City based Artist & Designer whose work draws from early Experiences with Nature, Architecture, Design, Art History, Fashion , Botanical Books , influences of New York City, Miami, Tokyo and his Travels. Mendoza’s style bridges the Modern, Primitive, and Organic. He draws strongly on the nature and folklore of his Latin American Heritage and his World Wide Studies while interpreting the density and chaos of daily urban life. 

In the 1980’s his family moved to The Bronx where Mendoza began to develop a style that combining Architectural Draftsmanship, Collage & with the new inspirations of Museums, Libraries, Galleries,Public & indoor Sculptures , letters, faces, and forms that then covered the Subways and Urban walls of the City. At a young Age in his Native Nicaragua, he learned Drafting and about Architecture from his father. This inspiration brought Mendoza to the study of Ancient Civilizations, Navigation Maps, Hieroglyphs, Petroglyphs, Calligraphies, and Alphabets from both past and Modern Cultures in the Americas. With great dedication he continued his study of World Alphabets, Art History, Color, light Energy and Movement, working in a range of styles that culminate all the influences of his early development. 

His paintings are grounded with descriptive line work that creates a sense of movement and energy. A Visual manifestation of the sonic combinations found in early Electronic Music, Comic Books & early Analog Hip-Hop and House Music mix tapes and performances emanate from his surfaces. Interchangeability between the sense of visual and audio is an artistic subject that has been pursued universally and historically, and Mendoza’s practice can also be positioned in that context. It is something that goes beyond an ordinary world that an individual perceives through the five senses, instead, it enables an individual to access the supernatural / mythological world through so-called collective unconsciousness. Science-fictional elements that can often be seen in Mendoza’s works function as motives to emerge such a mythological world from the mixture of ancient culture and urban life experience that are his resources of Daily inspiration.

Mendoza has been commissioned by Altoids (Brooklyn & Miami), Crispin, Porter + Bogusky for Kaiser Family Foundation (VH1), Deutsch LA, Ray-Ban (benefiting ONE SIGHT) Luxottica, NISSAN North America , Puma North America ,Marui Group Ltd ,Timberland (benefiting The National MS Society), Wynwood Walls Miami ,Goldman Properties; The Creek South Beach Hotel, Albion Hotel ,HBO,Mountain Dew for PepsiCo, Mirrorball, Colab Projects Group , H&M Hennes & Mauritz, Sony, and is in collections such as Soho House, Nissan USA, Escada US, SSTV Network, Chavez Design, Altoids,Breil Haus, People Design Institute NPO Japan; Hotcake Records Tokyo, NextidEvolution Fujiyamastore LTD Truth & Soul Records,Def Jam Records Japan , NBC Universal. Express, Scion, X-large Japan, Beams Tokyo, Ships Ltd Japan B's Point, Overthinkingwastaken Advertising Agency , New York University , Saratoga Arts ,Institute of Omoshiro Mirai Tokyo.

 Mendoza's work has appeared in media such as Abrams Books ,Harper-Collins,Mark Batty Publishers ,Rizzoli Publications ,Harper Design , Central American Modernism Ford Fine Arts Publications ,Soho Books ,V Magazine (Visionaire), Interview, STYLE and the Family Tunes, Berlin, NewYork1, The Phillips Collection, New York University A/P/A Institute, Juxtapoz Magazine, Rizzoli ,World literature Today, The Daily News , The Miami Herald ,The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, RES Magazine, Educated Community, Tokion Magazine, Warp Magazine,  Relax Magazine, Penguin Group, Bijutsu Shuppan-Sha Co,Ltd Techo,  Eleven Spring by Wooster Collective : Pearl River Mart : Calypso Times : Seidosha Publisher, Tokyo ; Ryusa Publication ,Letter Form Archive :San Francisco CA, The Amana Group Japan.

Mendoza has been in exhibitions With The Smithsonian Asian Pacific Center, Joshua Liner Gallery, New York ; Museo de Arte, San Juan Puerto Rico; White Box Gallery, New York; Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, Winston-Salem; Museo de la Ciudad de Mexico; Museum of San Diego; Cindy Rucker Gallery; Fuse Gallery; Transport Gallery, Los Angeles;  Dyezu-Exp Gallery, Tokyo; Gallery Lombardi,Texas; Stolen Space Gallery, London; Galeria Carlos Irizarry; Rojas Ford Fine Art ,Delray Beach ;Power Studios Miami Design District , Modern & Primitive Gallery , Atlanta ,GA ; Shooting Gallery, San Francisco; Kyoto Zokei University; Calm and punk Gallery, Japan; WAG Gallery ,Tokyo; Dupont Underground Washington DC; Pearl River Gallery Tribeca, Ny .Tibet House ,NYC ; The Alley Gallery, Rutland Vermont; The Elizabeth de C. Wilson Museum :Southern Vermont Arts Center; +81 Gallery , New York ; Latin American Masters Pavilion, Philadelphia Armory Fine art fair; Rutgers University Newark ,NJ. NowHere Gallery: Soho, NY.

Artist Statement

My paintings & Works on Paper are grounded with non-narrative descriptive and/or Iconographic line work that creates a sense of movement, energy and abstract stories. Much of my symbolic information is my visual experimentation with different sounds, research, reading books, Sketching,Collage Construction, taking photographs, the noise of the city and its broken symphony and musical performances I attend. Music plays a vital role in my creative process. To me, drawing is a blue print for all things to be able to exist. This is the way I have a dialogue with myself , A way to write down, Create blueprints charged with ideas that come to me in the daily act of living. By drawing, visualizing and composing abstract concepts in my mind, and on paper I am reminded of my daily habits, a common thread of the human condition. Time Changes and Every Second Becomes An Indelible Light Mechanism , An indelible Memory with determined Exactitude .

Christian Mendoza, "Second Nature" exhibition at Plus 81 Gallery in New York City, January 11 - February 11 2018

By RICHARD S. CHANG

In his ink drawings, Christian Mendoza evokes the great civilizations of ancient history: Egypt, Maya, Sumeria. Executed with laser precision in free-flowing improvisation, the drawings resemble compelling and intricate blueprints to mythological worlds, incorporating humanist ideals of engineering and the strong influence of ancient glyphs, those lasting cultural shadows from vast empires that long ago lost their power.

And therein lies the duality to Mendoza’s work. With his superfine lines combined with nature references — insects, birds, fish, crystallite and stalks of vegetation are embedded within the mesmerizing latices — Mendoza hints at the fragility of humanity and its institutions, no matter how grand and structurally complex, bringing awareness to a poignant fact: Empires and all the greatness that man has wrought through engineering and technology do not last forever.

Born in Nicaragua and raised in New York City and Miami, Mendoza was heavily influenced by his father, an architect, and exposed at an early age to graffiti and hip-hop music. As a teenager in Miami, he joined the Inkheads graffiti crew and began writing on walls. After coming across the Japanese science-fiction animation series “Space Battleship Yamato,” which originally ran in the mid-1970s and references the demise of a modern empire, Imperial Japan, Mendoza embarked on developing his signature ancient futurist style. “I wanted to do my own ship ... I’m making it more ancient, like an ancient ark,” he explained a decade ago in Envisioning Diaspora (Timezone 8 Editions, 2008).

There are more than a dozen ink drawings, two pyramid canvases and three collages in “Second Nature.” A few of the larger drawings play with perspective. In one, a large gateway resembling the ancient and mysterious city of Petra is the centerpiece to an equally mythological world of small darting ships or insects, which are often the same to Mendoza. “If you look at a close-up of an insect, it’s like a weird spaceshiplike robot… And if those insects were enlarged to the size of a small helicopter, it would be intense.” (Envisioning Diaspora).

While harkening past empires, Mendoza also articulates the current conditions of the world, where modern civilizations are battling for a global stronghold. Almost moment to moment we are witnesses to shifts in the balance of power, making us perhaps more keenly aware than ever that existing powers could fade or even be extinguished. The pieces in “Second Nature” do not just present the delicate nature of life but also the transience of large communities. In this way, Mendoza’s works can be seen as imaginings of what might have been or as maps of what could be. While Mendoza does not dwell on disaster, choosing instead to construct over destroy, he does reveal all the greatness that is at stake and if we are not careful as a collective all that could be lost.

Originally published on Plus 81 to accompany an exhibition at Plus 81 Gallery in New York City.