From the Artist

As an artist my practice gravitates towards immigration and identity issues through art making and activism. It is important to understand that as an immigrant time unusually happened in several planes; the here and there then become relative.

In my previous years I’ve developed work that changes its forms and condition turning time into its medium. For instance, I created a specific rust etching technique. The process allows me to print from a rusted steel plate in order to expand the conceptual dialogue about postcolonial aesthetics. An example of this is the Facsimil Razonable project on which the rusted image of a passport was printed for 28 days consecutively. For this reason my projects don't necessarily focus on a final object, instead they consider the process as important as the result.
—From Brandywine Workshop and Archives records

Ortiz-Pagán's visual art projects tend toward a conceptual focus on how post-industrial and post-colonial communities have been affected by the way our society approaches and trades time. He explores the common thread connecting higher economic systems and displacement, with migration being one of the most important phenomena inherent to this correlation. His practice and process also involve contemplating spiritual practices as cultural gateways to developing community strength and self-agency.
—Adapted fromhttps://www.folkloreproject.org/ofrenda/jose-ortiz-pagan-project-manager-and-artist, accessed 6-18-2021

For Ortiz-Pagán, the problems affecting his home, where his family lives, contrast with where he lives now, in the United States—a country that he sees as a colonizer that exacerbates Puerto Rico’s problems by unjustly asserting its will to control the politics and freedom of his people.

Ortiz-Pagán’s aim is always to create a space in his work for conversation about what he calls “post-industrial realities” that affect the tropics. Time and power dynamics are always at play, corroding perspective and interfering with how we communicate with each other.
—Excerpted from https://tallerpr.org/filadelfia-new-perspectives/, accessed 6-28-2021