Visited the new gallery space, Fifty24SF to see KMNDZ's new show - "The Heaviest" and loved it. KMNDZ ( aka Johnny Rodriguez) has a commanding painterly style, lots of texture and brushstroke against saturated darks and vivid colors. His images reminded me of Jeff Soto's works in the past, especially the robots, another artist whose works I admire. The exposed wood and collage feel of the backgrounds also spoke of Rauschenberg, especially where the images were layered, squared off and segmented within the whole. The excellent metallic sheen on his bombs and robots just pop out at you and the glistening refractions in the jewels and droplets are unbeatable. Really enjoyed the whole exhibit and the woman working there was a sweetie pie- friendly and helpful without being in-your-face. The space is a nice size, not very big- but big enough and they had a closet in which they hung some of KMNDZ's smaller works - a very cool little niche. Took some cropped, closer up, detail shots of the artworks for those of you who like to see a little more. Strongly recommend the show, it's up thru May 19th, located in the Lower Haight Street area of San Francisco.
