Two exhibitions this year also revealed new sides of artists’ oeuvre, both explorations using the earth: Gisela Colón (at Efraín López) and Frank Romero (at Ruiz-Healy Art). Colón is better known for her meticulously fabricated and polished sculptures that are studies in light and color, while Romero is best known as a founding member of the Chicano collective Los Four and for dynamic paintings of cars. Romero’s earth works, the “Adobe Series,” date back to 1995, while Colón’s are a recent turn for the artist. But the strength in these two shows comes from the respective gallery’s smart move to give these artists the space to highlight artistic inquiries that might not always be popular with collectors, who often like buying the work that artists are best known for.
