The Artwork
I Want to Be Free (That’s the Truth)
2026
Mobile artworks exhibited on trucks
April 28 – May 1, 2026
I Want to Be Free (That’s the Truth) is a temporary public artwork in motion composed of a 40-foot shipping container transformed into a monumental moving painting. One side reads I WANT TO BE FREE; the other reads THAT’S THE TRUTH. Traveling throughout Los Angeles County’s streets, the work introduces moments of color, movement, and reflection within the city’s daily flow.
The container is wrapped in vinyl and painted with house paint, drawing from street signage, posters, and worn industrial surfaces found in neighborhoods surrounding the Port of Los Angeles. The work reclaims this familiar language and redirects it toward something shared and human. Layered color and weathered marks reflect a process of erasure and transformation, where surface and language carry traces of endurance, survival, and resilience while remaining bold and legible at a distance.
As it moves through the city, the container transforms an overlooked industrial object into a collective voice within public space. The work offers a reminder of freedom as both personal and shared, inviting moments of recognition, reflection, and connection within the spaces that keep the city moving.
Edgar Ramirez is a Los Angeles-based artist whose practice draws from the industrial landscapes and visual language surrounding the Port of Los Angeles. Working through abstraction and material process, he engages themes of visibility, labor, and endurance, focusing on surfaces shaped by use, time, and accumulation. Street signage and the built environment inform paintings that emerge from overlooked elements of the urban landscape, reflecting the physical and emotional conditions of the city.
Ramirez received his MFA from ArtCenter College of Design and his BFA from Otis College of Art and Design. Solo exhibitions include Chris Sharp Gallery, Los Angeles (2023), and Meliksetian & Briggs, Dallas (2024). Recent group exhibitions include Wönzimer, Los Angeles (2026). His work has also been presented at Frieze, Los Angeles (2023), Kiaf, Seoul (2025), and Post-Fair, Los Angeles (2026). His work is held in the collections of the Frederick R. Weisman Art Foundation and the City of Santa Monica Art Bank.
Ramirez is a recipient of the Los Angeles Lakers "In the Paint" grant and the Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan Artist-in-Residence program. His work has been featured in The New York Times, ARTnews, Frieze, Hyperallergic, and the Financial Times.