Anya Tish Gallery presents "Desire Lines," the gallery’s inaugural exhibition of Houston-based artist Gabriel Martinez. Drawing on histories of both quilting and painting, the exhibition features hand-stitched fabric paintings created from clothing found in the street on the artist’s travels throughout the city. Martinez employs the concept of the trace to explore spaces created for the body (garments, neighborhoods, factories, quilts) and the ways bodies, in turn affect and mark those spaces.

The works in "Desire Lines" situate the artist as one body among many involved in the manipulation of the material. The paintings record the traces of global capital, evoking those who dyed and printed the fabric, those who assembled the garments, the people who wore and lost them, as well as the artist who places them back into circulation as luxury objects. They are an invitation for the viewer to consider not only their formal composition and the laborious nature of their production but also the disjunctive economies that enable such value shifts.

Following the opening reception, the exhibit will be on display until October 16.