{"id":421,"date":"2007-10-26T14:48:00","date_gmt":"2007-10-26T19:48:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/the-bomb\/2007\/10\/26\/alfredo-martinezdrawing-from-prisonoct-12-2004\/"},"modified":"2007-10-26T14:53:59","modified_gmt":"2007-10-26T19:53:59","slug":"alfredo-martinezdrawing-from-prisonoct-12-2004","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/the-bomb\/2007\/10\/26\/alfredo-martinezdrawing-from-prisonoct-12-2004\/","title":{"rendered":"~ALFREDO MARTINEZ\/DRAWING FROM PRISON\/OCT 12, 2004"},"content":{"rendered":"

. . . while we were searching for the STEVEN PARRINO PHOTOS – we happened across these photos, taken in Oct 2004, of an early 2003 ALFREDO MARTINEZ PRISON DRAWING smuggled out of prison through the U.S. POSTAL SERVICES – i.e. the regular mail – which is why it’s got all those fold marks – it arrived at the Lower East Side – artlovers office – in a 8 x 10 in. manilla envelope. <\/p>\n

It depicts Alfredo as he saw himself, as he was strapped down to a gurney – going through forced feeding, in jail – the MDC (Metropolitan Detention Center) – in Manhattan. Alfredo was put away for a good couple of years for forging JEAN MICHEL BASQUIAT paintings. (and successfully selling them on the open market !!)<\/p>\n

Being a control freak, and an ‘art diva’ in his own ‘humble ways’, and thus, initially unable to deal with incarceration – he went on a hunger strike for quite a few months, supposedly because they would not let him make art. (a little dicey – since his main chief d-oeuvre\/ and subject matter is making – working – guns out of recycled materials, no less). Needless to say the authorities finally figured out he wasn’t dangerous and put him to work in the .. KITCHEN !! – which solved that problem. (hunger strikes) <\/p>\n

Alfredo used foodstuffs from the kitchen supplies, i.e. little bags of coffee and jello packages, to come up with color pigments to draw with, and a fellow (Russian) inmate showed him how to make sturdy homemade drawing paper out of torn book pages – or – in this case – using letters he was receiving from friends – mixed with flour paste. Alfredo rose to the occasion and switched subject matter – and started making portraits, for the first time – first of himself – being force fed – and then later turned to making portraits, of his fellow inmates – a ploy that catapulted him back on top of the social heap in prison – no mean feat – as being seen as a prisoner with some very threatening skills (i.e. being able to manufacture homemade guns or weapons – out of anything, and we mean a-n-y-t-h-i–n-g) – he was in lock down with some pretty heavy characters. <\/p>\n

\"Alfredo<\/p>\n

\"Alfredo<\/p>\n

\"Alfredo<\/p>\n

ALFREDO MARTINEZ, Prison Drawing, on homemade paper made from letters, and
\nfoodstuff pigments,
\nsigned: FNS … with his inmate number…MDC 2003.
\nPHOTOS: NANCY SMITH, OCT 7, 2004<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

. . . while we were searching for the STEVEN PARRINO PHOTOS – we happened across these photos, taken in Oct 2004, of an early 2003 ALFREDO MARTINEZ PRISON DRAWING smuggled out of prison through the U.S. POSTAL SERVICES – i.e. the regular mail – which is why it’s got all those fold marks – […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/421"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=421"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/421\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artloversnewyork.com\/zine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}