stay, take your time, my love
David Antonio Cruz
Opening reception Thursday, May 15th.
Born and raised in North Philadelphia by parents who migrated from Puerto Rico, David Antonio Cruz explores the complexities of queerness and race through painting, sculpture, and performance. stay, take your time, my love brings together a selection of Cruz’s ongoing chosenfamily series anchored by newly commissioned work for ICA SF. A major new painting, two new drawings, and a site-specific installation all respond to San Francisco sites of LGBTQ+ rest, resilience, and resistance.
These chosenfamily group portraits capture queer relationship structures, highlighting the strength of nonbiological bonds formed through mutual love and support. Cruz’s painting process embodies a deep sense of community. Each portrait begins with conversations around the project’s intention, sharing gratitude and stories of family, and a celebratory dinner. Their celebration transitions into a lavishly styled group photoshoot (a performance in its own right) that Cruz later collages and reimagines into intricate artworks.
The paintings on view here represent the diversity of the United States, featuring sitters from California, New York, DC, Illinois, Massachusetts, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania. They lounge together in loving, nonhierarchical arrangements that upend traditional European and American colonial portraiture. Real and imagined elements combine in glitching, dreamlike environments where skin is fluorescent blue, limbs double up, and sitters melt into each other. Flat brown backgrounds break with reality to tilt towards the viewer. Playful poses add rhythm to each composition. Cruz’s bright paintings and layered drawings rest on new custom wallpaper—a lush, dark landscape combining San Francisco scenes with art historical references.
In the face of discriminatory policies, erasure, and rising violence around the nation, Cruz highlights moments of touch, support, and empowerment as a “love letter” to the Bay Area queer community. This exhibition affirms: you are loved, you are safe, you are here to stay.
“Chosen family are the folks that love you undeniably, unconditionally. They don’t come with restrictions or rules. This is our safety net, this is how we create home.”
—David Antonio Cruz for The Guardian, 2023
Date
May 16–December 7, 2025
DAVID ANTONIO CRUZ Artist Website & Instagram
Cover image: Installation view of stay, take your time, my love. Photo: Nicholas Lea Bruno.
David Antonio Cruz, stay,takeyourtime,mylove, 2025. Oil, latex, ink, and graphite on wood panel . 72 x 96 inches. Courtesy of the artist and Monique Meloche Gallery, Chicago. Photo: Nicholas Lea Bruno
David Antonio Cruz, stay, take your time, my love installation view. Photo: Nicholas Lea Bruno
David Antonio Cruz, ilovedeveryoneofthem, 2022. Oil, acrylic, and ink on wood panel. 72 x 60 inches. Collection of Pamela and David Hornik. Photo: Nicholas Lea Bruno
David Antonio Cruz (b. 1974, Philadelphia, PA) explores the intersectionality of queerness and race through painting, sculpture, and performance.
Cruz received his BFA in Painting from Pratt Institute, NY, and his MFA from Yale University, CT. He attended Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture and completed the AIM Program at the Bronx Museum, New York. Recent solo exhibitions include Sugar Hill Children’s Museum of Art, New York, NY (2024); Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia, PA (2023); Galleria Poggiali, Florence, IT (2023); and moniquemeloche, Chicago, IL (2024, 2021, 2019). Group exhibitions include the Ulrich Museum of Art, Wichita, KS; Zuckerman Museum of Art, Kennesaw, GA (2023); DeCordova Sculpture Park and Museum for the New England Triennial, Lincoln, MA (2022); The Block Museum at Northwestern, Evanston, IL (2022); Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA (2022); Museum of African Diaspora, San Francisco, CA (2022); Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY (2019); Ford Foundation, New York, NY (2019); McNay Museum, San Antonio, TX (2019); and the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, Washington, D.C. (2019). Forthcoming solo exhibitions include Halsey Institute of Fine Art, Charleston, SC (2025); Wave Hill Museum, Bronx, NY (2025); and ICA San Francisco (2025). Cruz is a 2024 Outwin Boochever National Portrait Competition prize winner.
His work is in the collections of the Newark Museum of Art, Newark, NJ; El Museo Del Barrio, New York, NY; Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA; 21c Museum Hotels, Louisville, KY; Pierce & Hill Harper Arts Foundation, Detroit, MI; Tufts University, Medford, MA; The Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, OK; and Green Family Art Foundation, Dallas, TX. Recent residencies and fellowships include Joan Mitchell Artist-in-Residence, New Orleans, LA (2025); Anderson Ranch Arts Center, Snowmass Village, CO (2024); Villa Bergerie Art Residency, Laguarres, Spain (2023); the Joan Mitchell Foundation Painters & Sculptors Award (2018); Neubauer Faculty Fellowship, Tufts University, Boston (2018); BRIC Workspace Residency, Brooklyn (2018); Gateway Project Spaces, Newark, NJ (2016); and the LMCC Workspace Residency, New York (2015). Cruz lives and works in New York City, where he is the Assistant Professor of Visual Arts at Columbia University, and is represented by Monique Meloche Gallery, Chicago.
Support for stay, take your time, my love is generously provided by David and Pamela Hornik; Kayleen Arnke and Stuart Parmenter; Jeff Dauber and Marc Levin; Heidy Braverman and David Skinner; and LYRA Art Foundation. Additional support provided by Cadogan Tate; De Sousa Hughes; The Jay, Autograph Collection; Sherwin-Williams; Shaw Contract; and Monique Meloche Gallery.