Octopus Initiative Artist Jaime Carrejo
Jaime Carrejo is a multi-disciplinary artist whose projects involve painting, sculpture, video, and immersive installations using layered materials, intricate patterns, graphic landscapes, and iconography related to physical barriers. In the body of work produced for the Octopus Initiative, Carrejo uses pattern and color, sourced from plants, textiles, and the Southwestern landscape, to address a relationship between place and identity. He considers the layering of this imagery pivotal to his practice, as it allows him to explore the collision between immigrants, the land in which they navigate, and their existence within a complex political climate.
Carrejo was born in 1977 in El Paso, Texas and currently lives in Denver. He received his B.F.A from the University of Texas, El Paso in 2001 and M.F.A. from the University of South Florida in 2007. His work is featured in periodicals, such as The New York Times, Artforum, and Hyperallergic. Exhibitions include Waiting at the MCA Denver (2021), Pa’lante, a flag project at The Momentary in Bentonville, Arkansas (2021), and If Once We Ever Where, at Black Cube in Denver, Colorado (2019). His project Border/Land is part of the permanent collection at the El Paso Museum of Art in El Paso, Texas (2018). He held a residency at Redline Denver from 2011 – 2013 and served on the board of the Contemporary Art Alliance for the Denver Art Museum and Tilt West Denver. He currently sits on the Public Art Committee in Denver.
