The Luis Martin Arcana is my interpretation of the major Arcana or the “Fool’s Journey”. Each card represent one of the 22 archetypal emanations of our human experience. My art work and studio practice is my soul work and the best way in which I connect with the Divine. As artists we can be shiny funnels that reflect the ineffable in our own voice.
ON GOING SERIES
PAPER ROOTS
This is an on-going collage series that began after my visit to Mexico in 2021. In part an escape from the US, and need to feel surrounded by familiar places and friendly faces even though I knew no one and I had never been there. I wanted to sit in the parks where my grandmother strolled. I wanted to walk by the house my father and aunt lived in the first years of their lives. Like a scientist or anthropologist, I allowed myself to take in everything fully, but promised myself not to touch, interrupt or question the order of things.
These collages are love letters to my Mexican heritage and the Latinx diaspora. The works of art are the field notes and stories of how my roots do not allow me to just sit and watch with my arms crossed. Instead, they compel me and fill me with purpose to go beyond nostalgia and contribute to a world in dire need of love and light. These paper roots that I have found now form a vital part in everything I do, have done and will ever do.
IN THE STUDIO
Join me in the studio. I collage in real time and have a conversation with my hands and allow stories to emerge as each collage comes together.
COLLAGE AS A GIFT
Collage was a gift from my grandmother. In the tossed magazines she found at her janitorial job, she offered me an invitation into a vivid world. Tearing paper and putting it together with new meaning, personal context and making a collage as art is a revolution and an act of willful optimism. Collaging has taught me to see potential in the discarded, value in simple acts of creativity and most of all it has given me the gift to contextualize the world around me in my voice from a place of power.
- Luis Martin
HAPPY HOUR
mostly every thursday on instagram @artengineer 7pm EST
Drop in and say hello while I play with paper, hangout with the cameraman and chat with you. There is always music and sometimes AMAZING mail from friends!
I collages as a democratic act of radical optimism to explore my identity and create a narrative from a place of power.
Through art I give myself the role of protagonist and construct context for my American, Queer + Latinx experience.
At the core of my creative practice I use my work to initiate meaningful conversations and create opportunities to create in community.
ABOUT
Luis Martin / The Art Engineer
Artist's Statement
Collage is my vehicle to explore and understand the world around me from a place of power, curiosity, and agency. Unlike any other art form, collage is a democratic practice with low risks and high rewards. It allows me to make connections between the visual language of popular culture and historical context to arrive at my truth, without the weight of an imposed narrative. As an artist I get to write my own story in my own syntax as the protagonist.
Biography
Luis Martin aka The Art Engineer is a Brooklyn based artist from Los Angeles. Growing up he was surrounded by iconic works of art in his role of museum educator at institutions like MOCA in L.A. and MoMA in NY. As an Artist Martin “engineers” his creative practice as a point of departure for multi facet projects.
Through collage and mixed media he is engaged in a on going conversation with printed matter and his Mexican roots. The artist creates safe spaces for art by way of “Collage Dream” a passion project and small business that rallies people from around the world to explore creativity by way of collage as low risk and high reward activity. Martin’s insatiable curiosity keeps him asking questions that he answerers from his studio out as a community leader.
COMMUNITY
ART AS PRACTICE
ART AS BUSINESS
Join me and the #ArtFam on this Collage Dream adventure!
As an artist it is not enough to make art, I want to share the power collage and art in general has given me. You are invited to join Collage Dream, a community or artist the span the globe centered around collage. Become a member, but a one of a kind collage kit, or just hand out in the virtual studio via a video!
Turn your creative practice into a studio business. Learn to thrive as an
art entrepreneur from a place of power and authenticity. Come learn how to move passed the hangups that can block your journey when you do not fit into the art world system. Let me share the steps I have learned along the way on how to create success on your own terms. Let’s make something of all your potential.
