Antonio Perez: Entanglement explores family, culture and the paths that shape us

Antonio Perez spent years taking every art class a community college offered before he knew what would come next. On Thursday, Sept. 17, the Los Angeles-based artist described that path at Moreno Valley College to a room filled to capacity, most of them students. At least 20 more people listened from outside the glass wall.

The artist talk, which was free and open to the public, served as the closing reception for Antonio Perez: Entanglement, a solo exhibition of recent photographs and sculptures at the MVC Art Gallery in Student Services, Room 217. The exhibition opened Aug. 24 and closes Friday, Sept. 25.

Perez works in platinum-palladium printing and cast concrete, physically demanding processes that he uses to explore family, loss and cultural identity. He draws on the idea of quantum entanglement, in which particles stay linked even when separated, to examine how people remain bound to one another across time and distance.

Informed by rasquachismo, a Chicano sensibility rooted in making art from what is at hand, Perez's work explores grief as a form of connection rather than absence. It grew out of the deaths of his brother and father, and it carries his admiration for his mother.

Prints such as Lazos Tejidos and Unión, both from 2026, appear alongside cast concrete sculpture. The pieces speak to the bonds of one family while raising broader questions about home, inheritance and how cultural ties endure.

The artist talk took place during Hispanic Heritage Month, which runs Sept. 15 to Oct. 15. The exhibition is presented in conjunction with FotoSoCal by CuratorLove, a constellation of exhibitions featuring Chicanx, Latine, Indigenous, immigrant and undocumented photographers and lens-based artists, among others.

During the talk, Perez explained the origin of one untitled work in the show. His father, who was battling cancer, underwent three back-to-back surgeries that were unsuccessful. During the third, he died and was revived. Afterward, Perez said, his father described seeing beings floating around him and a window through which he could see Perez, his mother and his sister. Perez said the experience brings him peace and that he finds comfort in the possibility that such a connection might exist if there is some form of afterlife. He is leaning toward a title that refers to a portal or hologram.

A fourth-grade teacher noticed his talent, Perez said, and gave him extra time on art projects while other students worked on math and science.

"It's kind of funny that all it takes is a little tiny spark from somebody to give you that momentum to grow on," he said.

Perez let art slide in high school, then returned to it after graduating by enrolling in community college classes. He took every art class he could find, then audited courses to keep working. He described community college as "a place where I could just go and do the work that I wanted to do and not have to pay for a studio."

The cost of art school concerned him, Perez said, though he noted that scholarships and other financial help are available. An instructor eventually encouraged him to decide what he wanted to pursue next. He applied to Otis, was accepted and transferred as a junior, graduating in 2024 with a bachelor's degree in fine arts, an emphasis in painting and a minor in credential teaching.

At Otis, Perez said, the studio became a place to process those losses and put them into his artwork.

"There is no one path," he told the audience. He said the work takes time and encouraged anyone who feels a pull toward something to pursue it.

Perez is a first-generation Mexican American interdisciplinary artist whose practice spans printmaking, photography, ceramics, painting and sculpture. He has exhibited at Avenue 50 Studio, the Museum of Latin American Art, Tiger Strikes Asteroid Los Angeles and the Santa Monica College Art Gallery. He taught art to students from kindergarten through high school in Bell Gardens, building lessons around Latinx artists, and after graduating from Otis began working at the studio of artist Doug Aitken.

To learn more about the Moreno Valley College Art Gallery and upcoming exhibits, visit the Art Gallery's webpage.