Untitled (Church)

Martin Ramírez was among many Mexicans lured to America in the 1920s by the promise of work. He made the journey by train and worked for a time on the railroads and in mines. But in 1931, he was detained for vagrancy and subsequently admitted to a psychiatric hospital where he was diagnosed with schizophrenia. He spent his remaining thirty-two years institutionalized. Around 1950, he began to draw images that combine memories of his homeland, such as this parish church, with highly abstracted images evoking a profound sense of displacement and loss.