GAYLETTER: Bony Ramirez

Bony Ramirez came to New York from the Dominican Republic in 2009 at age 13. Growing up, he made colored pencil drawings with the dream of becoming a children’s book illustrator. However, he was quick to recognize that his chances of working as a full-time artist were slim without resources and opportunities like a fancy graduate school education. After finishing high school, college seemed out of reach, so Ramirez began working six days a week in construction with his uncle. Continuing what he considered to be his hobby, he began making artwork on panels made with the extra wood from his construction sites and buying up and gessoing over old canvases from thrift stores. The resulting surfaces were rough from the textures underneath, so he started drawing figures on large sheets of paper and gluing them down into the compositions to cover the more bumpy areas.

As the 2020 lockdown pushed most people onto their computers, @bonyramirezz continued working with his uncle but began regularly posting his work on Instagram. To his amazement, the art market had a newfound thirst for figurative painting, and his work quickly grabbed the attention of gallery curators and directors. After his inclusion in a few group shows and the success of an online exhibition that summer, he was approached about an in-person showcase of his work later that fall. He knew he would not be able to produce enough work in time with his one free day each week, so, taking a leap of faith, he left his construction job. The risk paid off. Ramirez’s meteoric rise has included showing at art fairs internationally from Switzerland to South Korea, an institutional solo show at Sugar Hill Museum in New York, and then this past fall, the major solo exhibition Tropical Apex at Jeffrey Deitch in New York.

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Text by @tylerakers
Photography by @malik.dupree

Shot on 120 film - Medium format.