The Blaffer Art Museum is presenting the first solo museum exhibition of work by artist John Guzman (b. 1984). Flesh and Bone focuses on works produced in the artist’s hometown of San Antonio and the Texas debut of paintings completed during, and immediately following, time at the NXTHVN Studio Fellowship Program in New Haven, Connecticut.
As a spectator to claustrophobic psychological and physical states growing up in San Antonio’s Southside, Guzman’s monumental paintings are a byproduct of experiences, recordings, and environmental reflections. The artist abstracts the human figure to reflect the harm endured by the body, and the unrecognizable transformation brought on by years of punishment, addiction, relapse, and self-destruction.”Our lives are formed by the basic principles of cause and effect. We are the byproduct of experiences and the result of consequences. The prominent interactions we have with others influence our character, how we love, why we hate and our impressionable habits that effect our logic. My images are derived by my existence, visual documentation and the perception of my environment.
Artist Statement:
My fascination with the human form is the amount of abuse the body can endure. I’ve watched people push themselves to an absolute limit, at times to the point of death. During their journey I have observed the transformation of the body and mind to an almost unrecognizable state. In my images I deconstruct the human element to represent punishment brought upon ones self and the experience of loss that can exist in someone familiar.
I use rooms of domestic architecture as a setting from which these images are inspired by. I interpret how these people fulfill their desires behind closed doors in the shadows of isolation, concealing their behavior from others and themselves.