Local artist uses bold colors to energize familiar subjects

HARLINGEN — The bold, almost flamboyant colors quickly dominate your vision, commanding the attention of viewers.

Jason Ray Perez seems to have captured the voice of the modern pop art. His portrayals of red faces covered with white dots, Frida Kahlo enraptured with blues and greens and other subjects at once tap into the personality of the genre while revealing his own rendition.

Beyond Arts Gallery at 114 North A St. will open a show Friday exhibiting Perez’s art.

The show, “LACONISM: A Mixed Media Print Work Collection,” is a mixed-media pop-art collection.

“We haven’t had too much pop art,” said Jessica Salazar McBride, gallery director. “It’s a lot of things we see every day and he gives them a modern aesthetic,” she said. “It’s going to be really exciting.”

Perez is a Weslaco native and a self-taught artist who uses mixed media.

“My artistic styles rang from modern contemporary expressionism to traditional Mexican pyrography folk art,” he said.

Laconism, Perez said, means brevity or terseness of expression or styles.

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