MPA is a contemporary artist working in installation art and various modes of performance that examine behaviors of power. View her latest tongue-in-cheek commentary, “Series Collapsed” at Night Gallery in Los Angeles. Don't miss a performance by MPA herself on Saturday, July 29th, especially for Gallery Weekend 2023, July 27th-29th. The show will be up until September 13th, and MPA will perform every Saturday during gallery hours until its close, with the closing performance held on Wednesday, September 13th. RSVP for the closing performance with an email to rsvp@nightgallery.ca.
Upon entry, you are confronted with a not-so-innocent pile of rocks. At first glance, it's shaped like an infinity sign, then the piece breaks away with a leg busting out of it. Through the exhibit, a taxidermy bird suspended on a rod jutting out of the gallery wall plays witness to an animated rope snaking up from the ground. All under the critical watch of a glistening eye made from iPhone screenshot palindromes. What does it all mean? The artist playfully engages with themes like land politics, species collapse, cycles of violence in our society, the pandemic, all food for thought.
MPA engages with themes of the cosmos, the apocalyptic, the otherworldly. She has been coming to LA as an artist since the early 2000s: “LA has meant a lot of different things to me at different times. LA as a city for an artist…the biggest stand out is its light and space. The influence of Southern California and LA specifically on my work has been around something cosmic, even new age– the way that those ideas are more welcomed and even propagated here than in other cities like New York, Paris, or London. As a queer person, LA had an incredibly validating underground club scene that meant life licenses to many of my friends and to myself.” She also thinks about the politics that are just beneath the surface of each piece of sunbathed Southern California land, asking questions like, “What does it mean to be a borrower, or a visitor to the lands that feed us rather than a conqueror?” Here are three of MPA’s spots for inspiration, problem solving, and art in LA:
Although a bustling, entertainment and art driven metropolis, LA’s proximity to the ocean washes the city in a sense of calm, healing connection to water. MPA says, “Even though I don’t live on the West side, I do go to the ocean often for the idea that the waves will cleanse me.”
