The Holland Project’s Billboard Gallery showcases the work of exceptional emerging and established regional artists on billboards throughout Reno-Sparks. Three new artists are installed every four weeks. For November 2023, our participating artists are Andie Pereyra, Jon Kortland, and Bobby Lee.
NOVEMBER 2023 ARTISTS + WORKS
Location #1: above Lasting Dose Tattoo, on Virginia Street and Taylor
Artist: Andie Pereyra
Artwork: Deuce, colored pencil, 2023
Website | Instagram
Bio: Andie Pereyra’s drawings are inspired by her Filipino heritage and suburban American upbringing. Her artwork explores what shapes our sense of identity and how this self evolves through a lifetime. Her colorful illustrations convey a sense of nostalgia which juxtaposes the subject matter of feeling foreign in both Filipino and American communities. Her work centers on self-discovery and otherness, serving as a means to reconnect and reclaim space within both of her cultures.
Location #2: Wells Avenue & Vassar Street
Artist: JON KORTLAND
Artwork: Untitled, ink on paper, 2023
Website | Instagram
Bio: A graduate of UNR with an emphasis in painting, Jon Kortland set his focus more on music and illustration for the better half of his creative life. During his formative years, he organized shows, made flyers, and released records for his own and other bands throughout Northern Nevada. At the end of the 90s, he co-founded IRON LUNG, a duo who have managed to tour all 50 states, Canada, Mexico, Europe, Australia, and Asia. In the late 00s the formation of IRON LUNG as a record label began and continues now, having over 250 releases distributed throughout the world. To coincide with the label, a collaborative art/design partnership was formed with Nic Schmidt, known as FEEDING, which provided artwork for releases and events.
Jon’s visual work has been part of solo and group exhibitions at UNR, Sierra Nevada College, Nevada Museum of Art, Holland Project, Vera Project (Seattle), Econojam Records (Oakland), and telephone poles / dirty walls worldwide.
Statement: We woke up into a poorly written sci-fi nightmare- not even a novelization, but an incompetently directed, low-res HD movie of the week.
Having been raised and educated in and around the 1970s – 90s Reno must contain some explanation to the nature of this work.
Location #3: Prater Way & Rock Boulevard, at Deer Park
Photo: Bobby Lee
Artwork: Protect McDermitt Caldera, photography, 2023
Website | Instagram | People of Red Mountain
Bio: Bobby Lee is a photographer and book artist interested in landscape, nature, and conceptions of place. Originally from Southern California, he loves to travel and explore deserts, mountains, and cities with equal curiosity. He is currently an MFA Art candidate at the University of Nevada-Reno studying the intersections of photography and book arts at the Black Rock Press.
Statement: The massive lithium deposit found in the McDermitt Caldera on the border of Nevada and Oregon promises to provide a significant domestic supply of lithium for the nation’s green energy transition goals. Climate change is the greatest challenge the world faces, and the need to transition away from fossil fuels is central to meeting that challenge. However, opposition from local indigenous communities and environmental groups challenge the rush toward lithium mine development citing inadequate environmental impact assessments and a failure to properly consult with tribes in the permitting process. Impacts on the water table, sensitive wildlife habitats, and consideration of the cultural significance of the land that native tribes consider sacred have not been fully addressed. The uncritical push towards more resource extraction reflects the broader cultural view of land and rock as inanimate material which runs counter to the reality of the interconnectedness of all matter and ecological systems, living and nonliving. Focusing on ever more extraction and consumption as the only solution rather than questioning the systems of industrialization that got us into this position, to begin with, is shortsighted.