Julio Alejandro is a 27 year old self taught artist living in Denver, Colorado. Julio was born in Juarez, Mexico in 1991, his mother moved to Denver in 1993. Julio’s mother would buy him markers, crayons, etc to encourage his love for art beginning at a young age. In his teens he wanted to put his drawings on t-shirts so he went to a boutique called The Work Shop that was attached to The Other Side Arts in LODO. He was just looking to print some t-shirts but upon seeing his art they offered him his first exhibit at the age of 15. Through out his teens into his early 20’s he created art and played music with his best friends. After countless group shows and a couple solo shows in the Denver area Julio was offered a great opportunity in 2016 to work with the Denver Museum of Contemporary Art that would provoke him to stop playing music and focus solely on his art.

“Rocket Man But Smooth Jazz Emoji Here™”
July 2022
—
“I’m Feeling Healthy I Want To Be Around”
July 2021
—
“Sometimes I Feel Like I’m Losing My Mind and That’s OK”
Exhibit runs March 14th – April 4th 2020

Black Book Gallery is pleased to announce “Sometimes I Feel Like I’m Losing My Mind and That’s OK,” an exhibition of new works by Julio Alejandro. The exhibition opens on Saturday, March 14th from 7-10pm and runs through April 4th. Drawing on the success of Alejandro’s inaugural show with the gallery last spring, his latest body of work continues to remix symbols of ancient and contemporary urban cultures.

Alejandro combines primitive abstraction and corporatized branding in his mixed media, collage-style paintings, reflecting the organized chaos of late-capitalism’s hyper-commercialization and its impact on his own psyche. His work is aggressive yet playful, sophisticated yet childlike. “Sometimes I Feel Like I’m Losing My Mind and That’s OK” is a kind of Taoist response to the cultural schizophrenia of our collective reality. By interspersing scrawled, handwritten text with bright, often primary colors and repeated symbols, Alejandro’s style balances between the punk rebellion of youth and an almost philosophical wisdom. As with his previous works, Alejandro’s compositions are laden with art historical references, among them the automatic drawing of the French Surrealists, which was meant to tap into the collective unconscious, and the painterly techniques of the German Expressionists, who exorcised their demons through intense and frenzied mark-making.

Alejandro’s aesthetic is perhaps most reminiscent of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s, and for good reason. Like Basquiat, another street-smart autodidact who gained widespread recognition in his twenties, Alejandro has created his own semiotic visual language, born of the urban landscape and viewed through a multicultural lens. He layers text and painterly abstraction with loaded references to the sirens of pop-culture, cartoon mascots and logos so recognizable they’ve become entrenched in America’s cultural fabric. While these paintings may appear primitive at first, they touch on sophisticated themes, such as the relationship between brand logos and class identity, for example, or the disparity between the United States’ self-proclaimed democratic ideals vs. its controversial actions across the geo-political stage.

Also like Basquiat, Alejandro is of Latinx descent and grew up in a family of immigrants. Born in Juarez, Mexico in 1991, Alejandro moved to Denver with his family in 1993. His mother encouraged his art making from a young age and he had his first solo exhibition at the age of 15. Since then, his work has been shown frequently across Denver and received press from outlets including Westword. Alejandro’s work is in private collections in both the US and abroad.
—
“Apple Eaters”
March 16th – April 6th 2019

We kick off our 2019 gallery exhibits with a solo show featuring new work by Denver based artist Julio Alejandro. “Apple Eaters” will be Julio’s first exhibit with us, we think his strong work ethic and artistic diversity is a great match with the work and artists we exhibit.

“Apple Eaters” is a visual exploration of Julio’s memories, influences and daily life. Within his studio you will find history, science and drawing books alongside cats, loud music, photographs and personal effects that find their way into his paintings either literally or figuratively.

Using canvas and paper as mediums Julio melds text and drawings with abstract patches of paint and primitive scratch marks. Textual elements from book titles, quotes, song lyrics and playlists interact with popular cartoons, brands, historical icons and various artistic elements to both reinforce and reinterpret their original meanings. In one instance a childishly scribbled sentence describes a samurai obscured by layers of house paint. In another, an instructional phrase for tying your shoes “loop, swoop and pull” shares a composition with a simplistic drawing of the Michelin man.

It is not unusual to see a nearly completed piece one day almost entirely recomposed with only a sliver of its previous incarnation visible a week later. The process of creating without a formula or expectations allows Julio to genuinely reflect on his state of mind and inspirations without hesitation.
Exhibit runs until April 6th 2019