James Harris Gallery | "Ghost Stories: Paintings by Ronald Hall and Freddy Ortega"

"Ghost Stories: Paintings by Ronald Hall and Freddy Ortega"

April 28, 2026—June 27, 2026 | Reception May 16th, 4-6PM

James Harris Gallery is pleased to present Ghost Stories, a two-person exhibition featuring the work of Brooklyn-based artist Ronald Hall and El Paso-based artist Freddy Ortega. Through richly layered narrative paintings, both artists construct otherworldly spaces where figures grapple with the complexities of past, present, and future. The exhibition explores how personal and collective histories shape contemporary identity, revealing how echoes of the past continue to haunt and reverberate in the present.

Ghost Stories highlights each artist’s engagement with historical memory, drawing attention to the tension embedded within the historical record. Hall and Ortega create unsettling juxtapositions that invite viewers into complex visual narratives, where moments of dislocation and ambiguity give rise to deeper reflection. In many ways, their work recalls the tradition of Romantic “history painting,” yet replaces classical subject matter with urgent contemporary concerns.

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"Dejame te acompaño a afuera/ Let me see you out" 2026

Freddy Ortega is a Mexican painter born in Chihuahua City and raised in El Paso, Texas. His practice is shaped by a life lived across borders, where movement, uncertainty, and adaptation become part of daily experience rather than distant ideas. He earned his BFA in Painting and Drawing from the University of Texas at El Paso in 2020 and earned his MFA in Painting from Texas Christian University in 2026.
Ortega approaches painting as a disciplined and sustained practice. Influenced by early exposure to graphic design and tattoo culture, he developed a sensitivity to line, structure, and permanence that continues to inform his work. His paintings combine multiple visual languages, including precise line work, flat color, and dense material surfaces, to construct layered compositions that reflect complex identities.
His work centers on questions of mestizaje, migration, and cultural inheritance. Rather than presenting these as fixed narratives, he builds images where figures and spaces exist in tension, shaped by overlapping histories and conflicting systems of meaning. Humor and exaggeration often appear as entry points, allowing difficult subjects to unfold through visual complexity rather than direct explanation.
For Ortega, painting is not separate from life but an extension of it. The studio becomes a space where personal history, cultural references, and formal decisions converge, producing work that is both technically grounded and deeply invested in the conditions that shape it.