Tiger Strikes Asteroid Los Angeles is pleased to present Antonio Perez’s exhibition Carnal. Antonio Perez was one of two artists selected for a solo show from the Tiger Strikes Asteroid Los Angeles 2024 Solo Show Open Call that garnered more than 400 applicants.

As a first-generation Mexican-American born in Compton, but raised in Bell Gardens, and now living and working in Los Angeles, Perez excavates layers of identity, history, social structures, family and culture in a range of materials and modes of production. Drawing deeply from his Chicano and Mexican heritage and experiences growing up in Los Angeles, Perez’s artistic vision is rooted in his upbringing in a working-class household with immigrant parents. According to the artist, the physicality of their labor has profoundly influenced his approach to art-making, emphasizing materiality, memory, iconography, layers, textures, and a rasquache aesthetic. (“Very generally, rasquachismo is an underdog perspective– a view from los de abajo [the underdogs]. An attitude rooted in resourcefulness and adaptability yet mindful of stance and style. Turning inward to explore, decipher and interpret elements from the Chicano cultural matrix, artists and intellectuals found strength and recovered meaning sedimented in layers of everyday life practices.” - from Domesticana: The Sensibility of Chicana Rasquache, by Amalia Mesa-Bains) Additionally, Perez affirms through his art a belief in maintaining a connection to his family and cultural heritage as a way of gaining personal strength and honoring loved ones.  Weaving Meso-American motifs, sculptural and architectural elements with materials associated with manual labor both in the United States and Meso-American Mexico, Perez proposes a critical reflection on the socio-historical nature of migration, labor, family, and identity.

At the same time Antonio Perez’s work is deeply personal and intimate. The sculptural work pictured above entitled Carnal, 2023 was made by combining and composing found objects and the personal effects of his recently deceased older brother, Sats (short for “Saturnio”). The sculpture is at once heartbreakingly moving as a creative gesture of farewell and remembrance, as well as visually arresting in its materiality. Tragically the artist lost both his father and brother within the last year, so the fact that the opening of the exhibition coincides with Dia de Los Muertos (The Day of the Dead) could not be more impactful to the artist and relevant to the work. In a sense, much of the work functions like an ofrenda honoring loved ones who have passed and the conceptual legacy that their lives helped to formulate. Antonio Perez and Tiger Strikes Asteroid offer this exhibition as a testament to the enduring beauty of immigrant stories and the dreams that are made possible by the sacrifices of the families who brave the journey.

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Antonio Perez (b. in Compton Ca; lives and works in Los Angeles) Perez is a first-generation Mexican-American interdisciplinary artist. Perez is a recent graduate of Otis College of Art and Design (2024), where he earned his bachelor’s in Fine Arts, with an emphasis in painting, and a minor in credential teaching. His practice spans various disciplines, including printmaking, photography, ceramics, painting, sculpture. Perez’s work has been exhibited at renowned venues such as Avenue 50 Studio and the Museum of Latin American Art.

Additionally, the opening day of this show is significant as it coincides with Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead). This exhibition will also serve as a celebration and honoring of those who have laid the conceptual foundations for Antonio, including loved ones, family, and friends.

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