The title of Mario Ayala’s latest solo exhibition, on view at the Los Angeles-based gallery SADE LA, comes from the saying “como un perro mojado, curtido y avergonzado” (like a wet dog / experienced and embarrassed.)
The dog motif proves to be more literal than metaphorical, with the artist’s own dog’s faeces cast in bronze and scattered around the exhibition space. On the other (figurative) hand, Ayala works through this idiom by way of biographical linguistic images and traditions with an acute awareness of the multiplicity of perspectives.
Wayne Dickey’s 1966 Chevy Impala lowrider is recreated as a barbecue grill in the Violet Rose while Medium Rare offers an illustrative version of the title’s translation. With works ranging from sculpture to painting, Ayala showcases a diverse and unique command of colloquial and cultural forms of expression and images through a style that is all his own.
“Seasoned And Embarrassed, Like A Wet Dog” is highly conscious of the neighborhood in Chavez Ravine, a canyon north of downtown Los Angeles, where the exhibition’s works were made and are displayed.
Ayala, born in 1992 in Los Angeles, received his BFA at the San Francisco Art Institute. His works, much like the rest of his practice, use historical references as a fusion with his own identity and a collective cultural history.
Mario Ayala, “Seasoned And Embarrassed, Like A Wet Dog” is on view at SADE LA, 204 South Avenue 19, Los Angeles, CA, 90031, from February 26 – March 25, 2017.