Jay Lynn Gomez

Jay Lynn Gomez was born in 1986 in San Bernardino, California to undocumented Mexican immigrant parents who have since become US citizens. She briefly attended the California Institute for the Arts before leaving to take work as a live-in nanny with a West Hollywood family, an experience that did much to inform her subsequent artistic practice. Gomez’s work is known for addressing issues of immigration and making visible the “invisible” labor forces that keep the pools, homes, and gardens of Los Angeles in such pristine condition.

In 2013 Gomez had her first solo exhibition at the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center and was also awarded a residency to install a mural in West Hollywood Park, a project titled “The Caretakers”, which remains on view. In 2014 Gomez had her solo gallery debut at Charlie James Gallery in Los Angeles and went on to show widely across North America. In 2015 Gomez exhibited at the University of Michigan Institute for the Humanities, the Chicago Humanities Festival, and again at Charlie James Gallery. In the spring of 2016, Gomez had her third show “On Melrose” at the Charlie James Gallery in conjunction with the publication of a monograph on her work by Lawrence Weschler (Abrams), titled “Domestic Scenes: The Art of Ramiro Gomez”. Gomez participated in the 2017 Whitney Biennial as part of Rafa Esparza’s “Figure Ground: Beyond the White Field” installation. Her work was also included in three of the Getty’s Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA exhibitions – “Home—So Different, So Appealing” at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) and the MFA Houston, a joint show, “In West Hollywood” at the West Hollywood Library with her partner, David Feldman, and the Chapman University exhibition “My Barrio: Emigdio Vasquez and Chicana/o Identity in Orange County.” In 2017 Gomez was featured in “The Sweat Of Their Faces” at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC. In 2018 Gomez had her first NY solo show at PPOW Gallery titled “In NYC.” In 2019 Gomez had a two-person show at the Barrick Museum at UNLV titled “Sorry for the Mess.” In 2019 Gomez had her fourth solo show with Charlie James Gallery titled “Here, For A Moment.” In 2020 Gomez had a solo presentation with PPOW Gallery at the ADAA Fair in New York City and was featured in “Alien Vs. Citizen” at the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago.

Gomez has exhibited at the MCA Chicago, the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, LACMA, Denver Art Museum, MFA Houston, Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art, Torrance Art Museum, Cornell Fine Arts Museum, MCA San Diego and Museum of Latin American Art (MoLAA) among others. Gomez’s work has been covered in the Atlantic, the New Yorker, New York Times Magazine, the Washington Post, NPR, the Los Angeles Times, Artforum, Hyperallergic, Huffington Post, and CNN among others. Gomez lives and works in West Hollywood, California and is represented by Charlie James Gallery (LA) and PPOW (NY).