Gabriela Ruiz

When entering the downtown Los Angeles studio of artist Gabriela Ruiz, I was struck by a painting of an eye. Not just any eye, but a puffy, surreal orb that turned out to be inspired by a horrific ocular infection, which resulted in an obsession for looking at eyes and how constrained and odd they could be. It’s her gift, thinking beyond, designing an opening and pushing the idea into strange places. She brings these concepts to life through zany Postmodern painting, sculpture, video, installation and performance. 

 

Gabriela Ruiz: I wanted to be a fashion designer. Fashion was a shield of protection because I was bullied during elementary school because of my weight. 

 

I feel like television was my babysitter a lot of the time. You know how we have iPad kids? We had television and I was fixated on music videos, analyzing them and wanting to be what was portrayed on the screen. I wanted to make clothes. I wanted to make cool stuff that would make me look cool. In middle school, I realized it’s better to wear something cool that people wanted to wear than have them pick on you. 

 

I went into high school and started exploring; I didn't grow up with any money and would go to flea markets with my dad. He would give me ten bucks and I would have to make things I bought from that, so I’d bargain, like, “Can I get this cheaper?” I started making my own stuff and I got more into style and dressing myself. I was also getting kicked out of class for wearing odd stuff like little headbands with pill bottles, and my teacher would be like, “You need to get out of class, you're promoting drug usage.” I’d shrug and say it was just Smarties.

 

After high school, I went to Valley College, which was across the street from my high school. I remember taking this one art class where I loved learning from my professor. But I realized you have to take General Ed to get into college. I hated taking General Ed! I just wanted to do creative stuff, so I was bouncing back and forth with fashion and art. I took some fashion classes at Trade Tech, but had failing grades. I thought, “‘You know what? I'm just going to get out and do my own clothing brand,” so I started Leather Papí. I started meeting people in the nightlife, and partying really got me where I'm at. 

I think being in a studio space at the time in the Little Tokyo Art Complex. Watching those artists was inspiring, seeing them go and do their nine-to-five, then come to their studio and make stuff. Also being friends with a lot of artists was beautiful. My friends were down to make things, like Derek Holguin who I've collaborated with for maybe 10 years now. We obviously didn’t have any money at the time. We just wanted to make things, and that was cool. Now he makes sick 3D stuff. He's the one who helps me with all my visuals. I remember being really into it, making videos. I wanted to be able to use myself as these different characters and explore. Even before performance, I was making videos with him and dressing up and doing his outfits. That's how I really got my beginning in art. I never thought that I could make a living being creative.

 

I majorly credit the internet and Instagram for a lot of my success. Being able to create this persona online and showcase work is cool because, especially when you don't come from a background of all of this and all that. Like how are you able to show your work? Online is a resource where you utilize what you have.

 

It’s like warping reality. I think it’s inspired by creating pieces that are very powerful, utilizing color, shape and form. To me, that comes back to childhood, from what I saw on television and became really obsessed with. Now I have words to describe this sort of style of work, which is wacky Pomo, wacky Postmodern. It's children’s cartoons or advertisements. The nineties and early aughts were heavily that, like Spy Kids. 

 

I think maybe my inner child is still really into these colors, shapes and forms. I've been messing with a nod to the idea of the spiral from the ouroboros, the snake eating itself. My friend helped me do a 3D rendering of myself as a snake, eating myself. It plays with that idea and thinking of time, past and present, and new change. It’s a thing that's a constant. 

It's the forgotten part of LA, I feel. There are so many parts of LA from end to end, like Pomona to Palmdale, that we forget. When people think of LA, they think of Hollywood, they think of downtown, they think of Silver Lake, but they don’t think about what really makes up LA and what makes this place what it is. You know, who the hell lives in downtown like that?

 

I was born in Sylmar at Olive View Hospital, and for most of my life, lived in Van Nuys. All I know is the valley. I would hang out with friends, and would be such a menace when I was a teenager, going to parties, doing crazy stuff. It was all in the valley. There was a lot of walking at the time because I didn't have a car. I remember getting on the Orange Line with my high school friends, we would menace and party throughout the valley. It’s such a special spot because it's the place that created me. Being so kind of far away from where the “cool things” are happening downtown, you have to go on missions, so it makes you explore the city more. 

 

It's also in learning so much history of the valley. You're like, wow! It is predominantly a brown neighborhood, but when people think of the San Fernando Valley, they think of this white valley girl image. Frank Zappa was made popular by making this image. I mean, I sometimes talk like a valley girl, but we forget what really makes up the valley—that’s a lot of brown neighborhoods. You think about Studio City and Sherman Oaks, but you forget passing Van Nuys Boulevard. What's there, you know? 

 

Memory is important to me. Going back to the beginning of my life, my first memory was my parent's wedding. I was maybe a year old. I can remember my cousin and I were in the room at the wedding, and I was looking at her ear, which seemed so tasty. I took a bite out of her ear, and I got in so much trouble! My uncle smacked my butt and I remember yelling hysterically. But my mom doesn't like cameras or anything that captures the moment, so it’s just a memory. It's odd because my mom was adopted, so I don't really know a lot of her history, just by word of mouth and what she's passed on to me. When I've asked about my baby photos because there aren’t any baby photos of me, it’s something that's stuck with me. My mom hates keeping memories, but I was the one able to steal all the photos she had because she kept them in a bag. 

I was trying to discover who I was through these images. I’ve been analyzing and looking at them. I think about my relationship with memory now. One of my biggest fears is losing it. I think about how technology helps with that. We've developed such a short attention span that we forget things, relying on technology as a crutch to save memories. I remember looking at my phone and being, like, I totally forgot about this. I remember taking my phone out and recording, thinking I'm that type of person who takes out their phone and starts recording instead of being present in the moment. But it's also thinking about such a special time that you want to preserve and don't want to let go. How do you keep these? 

I used to do that! That's interesting because when I was in elementary school, my favorite place to be at was the nurse's office. During lunch, I would hit myself or throw myself so hard that I would make a scratch. They'd be like, “Oh, you again?” And I was like, “Yeah, it’s me. I wanted to escape, and I had a good time with the nurse.” I used these imaginative moments to help me cope with the realities of my situation.

 

In the clubs. I was partying and a friend of mine was doing a lesbian night at Los Globos called Club Clit. They asked if I wanted to perform and I was like, “I'm not a performer,” and they'd tell me I just had to come and just be weird and dance on stage, and they paid a hundred dollars. A hundred dollars? I got this quinceañera dress I found in the thrift store that didn't even fit me. I tore it up, did all this shit to it, and I was dressed up. I was being crazy, people kept seeing that, and they were asking me to perform. I discovered I like performing. 

 

Through performance, I started making sculptures and Nao Bustamante was doing Pacific Standard Time [Live Artists Live: Simultaneity] at USC. One of the artists had backed out, she called me and I got a chance and was able to execute something cool they liked.

 

My approach to art was never this intentional way. It was more like curiosity and something I’m  drawn to. I think that’s been great for my practice because it's allowed me to not focus on the rules and approach it in this way that I understand, which I feel other people would understand who don't really get what art is. It’s also incorporating my family into my performances or in my installations. They would have never been able to connect with art if it wasn't for my relationship to it because it's very intimidating to someone who doesn't come from that background.

 

What I think is beautiful about art is, at the end of the day, you let the viewer make their own interpretation of what it is, and they're not right or wrong. The reality is that you don't have to be right or wrong. It's more of an expression. 

When I first approached art, I was coming at it from a financial standpoint, and I thought about ways I could make things that were accessible to me. Thinking about the materials, going to Home Depot to find all the materials I needed, but also thinking about if I went anywhere, I could find lumber, I could find plywood. This was the beginning of the found objects with foam.

 

I felt like the materials started evolving, and I was exploring the things I could afford. The more I can afford now, I feel like the more I'm able to explore. Now I'm like, I can work with steel, I can work with Plexi, I can work with technology. I love that about the practice, how it has evolved. 

 

What was your experience participating in At the Edge of the Sun at Deitch Projects?
When I was first brought on to At the Edge of the Sun, I was at Jeffrey Deitch’s house shooting Mario Ayala’s video that played inside his Trucker’s Chapel installation. I was happy to collaborate with my friend and help Mario create his vision. We shot at this auto mechanic’s in Chinatown. He’s like, “Sit there and act like you're waiting for your car.” I came with this big ass dress [laughs] and was just sitting. The next scene we're going to shoot at Jeffrey's house and Mario’s asked me to pretend like I was laying down. So I lay down, get up, look out the window, and it's crazy because the wind hit me perfectly. It was the first shot, and I remember Mario getting excited, lowkey emotional. We did a couple shots and then for the last scene, he wants me by the pool. I thought, “Why not get in the pool?” So I'm walking and then, boom, I get in the pool, and I did this beautiful scene. 

 

Afterwards, I was about to leave, but he wanted me to stay because they were going to talk about the show. I thought it was a show that Mario was curating in New York that was conjoined with this, but no, it wasn’t. It was about a show coming up, and Jeffrey actually asked if I was going to be in it. Come to find out, it's like the beginning of the whole conversation. 

 

As we progressed, we talked about who would curate it. They were all thinking it should be a collective thing, that the artists should curate it. We were already making things together. We were all close, but this bonded us artistically.

 

When I was thinking about the show, I was thinking about my connection with artists there. A lot of them I've met through queer nightlife. During that time of my performances, I was dressing up as this little devil, being mischievous. I thought about bringing this character back and playing with it. I took a piece from Digital Engrams and changed it to fit the concept of that show. I thought about that spiral, and thought that this was perfect. I'm thinking about time, connections and memory again. Before it was At the Edge of the Sun, we were thinking about the title, Landmarks. Ozzie Juarez brought it up and we were thinking about a subtitle, so we thought up At the Edge of the Sun, later deciding that was a better title. 

 

I was thinking about landmarks, I was thinking about the whole entity of Los Angeles being this beam. It's this breathing entity that's alive. I thought about the part of the city I'm connected to, the San Fernando Valley. I was doing a lot of research, and I came across images from the Northridge earthquake. I wanted to incorporate it in some way and there was this one specific image that was the connection. It was broken asphalt, and at the edge it was like a kind of red angel that someone had placed. It was beautiful. I was like, oh my God, it's so perfect, the devil. And then the angel, it's red. This little character can live in all these three pieces. I recreated it and made myself like the little devil. Even the colors I used in space go back to like the wacky Pomo-ist thing, that's what the work was about.

I want to keep exploring the multimedia aspect of the work. If I'm making paintings, I don't want to make flat paintings. I want to make sculptural paintings. I haven't done much, but research, which is like my favorite part, that's where the inspiration comes. Thank God the internet exists. I love going on the internet and researching. I have bad ADHD, so I go from learning about one subject and next thing you know, I'm seeing what the Titanic people were wearing. 

There is, but this came out a while ago, I think it was Samsung, it's a flat screen. But it's like a piece of paper, like a screen that shows everything. It rolls up and unravels, and it's flimsy. I want to use that. I've been doing a bunch of AI stuff and I like drones. 

 

I check out stuff in the valley. That’s my favorite thing.