Beaux Mendes
Beaux Mendes (b. 1987) is an artist who lives and works in Los Angeles. They invoke the spaces and attendant conventions in which paintings are received as a way to address moments of empathy and their interruption. Their process often begins in plein-air: outlet malls, adolescent woodland, old-growth forests. Can paintings hold and deliver meaning in the way that an artifact speaks? Like a crime scene is read, the story emerges from the place. They move between contemporary and anachronistic materials and technologies – true gesso, oil paint, airbrush, CNC. By assigning and simultaneously denying the attachment of language in their work, Mendes foregrounds a trans-identity that locks meaning as it’s on the brink of resolution.
Mendes received their MFA from University of California Los Angeles (2019) and is currently finishing their second degree at Bard Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts (2021). They held their debut solo show at STARS, Los Angeles earlier this year and will have a solo show at Miguel Abreu Gallery, New York in 2022. Mendes is currently a member of Pasadena City College’s painting department.