Juan Gonzalez

Juan Gonzalez (January 12, 1942- December 24, 1993) was an important Cuban-American painter who rose to international fame in the 1970s and remained active until his death in the 1990s.

Juan Gonzalez was born in Camaguey, Cuba, in 1942. He spent his early life in Cuba until fleeing to the United States in 1961 as a part of the Cuban exile resulting from the Cuban Revolution. Gonzalez resided in Miami with other exiled Cuban artists and earned his Masters of Fine Arts from the University of Miami in 1972. Later that year he relocated permanently to New York City following a successful exhibition - his first - at the Allan Stone Gallery. Gonzalez had another highly successful exhibition in 1975 at the Nancy Hoffman Gallery, which as a result went on to manage and represent him for the rest of his career and following his death.

Throughout the rest of his career, Gonzalez would continue to paint, have solo and group exhibitions, win awards, and have his works added to the permanent collection of renown institutions. He also designed elaborate sets for two plays by famed Spanish poet and playwright Federico Garcia Lorca, "Blood Wedding" (1988) and "As Soon as Five Years Pass" (1991), and taught and lectured at the New York School of Visual Arts for nearly twenty years.

He died in 1993 in New York City of complications stemming from AIDS.

His work was the subject of an in-deapth, career-spanning retrospective book, Dreamscapes: The Art of Juan Gonzalez, by Irene McManus, which was published by Hudson Hills Press on the year of his death.

Gonzalez in known for creating paintings and collages that ranged from realism to surrealism and fantasy. His themes and subject matter included religion, reinterpreted scenes from art history, portraits of family and friends, and psychologically introspective expressions of identity (via self-portraits) and his struggle with AIDS. His works were characterized by their rich detail and symbolism.

• 1991 National Endowment for the Arts
• 1985 National Endowment for the Arts
• 1980 National Endowment for the Arts
• 1977 CAPS (Creative Artists Program Services)
• 1976, 1974 Cintas Fellowship Award
• 1984-1987 Board of Governors, New York Foundation for the Arts
• 1979-1982 Served as a panelist on the New York State Council on the Arts

One-Person Exhibitions:

• 1997 “Juan Gonzalez: Enchanted Visions,” Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, Florida
• 1993 International Bird Museum, Boca Raton, Florida
• 1991-92 The Meadows Museum, Dallas, Texas; Traveling to: Center for the Fine Arts, Miami, Florida; City Gallery of Contemporary Art, Raleigh, North Carolina; Museum of Fine Arts, Springfield, Massachusetts
• 1991 Nancy Hoffman Gallery, New York
• 1988 Cleveland Center for Contemporary Art, Ohio
• Nancy Hoffman Gallery, New York
• 1985 Nancy Hoffman Gallery, New York
• 1982 Nancy Hoffman Gallery, New York
• 1981 Center for Inter-American Relations, New York
• 1980-81 Frances Wolfson Art Gallery, Miami-Dade Community College, Florida; Traveling to: Gibbes Art Gallery, Charleston, South Carolina
• 1978 Nancy Hoffman Gallery, New York
• Tomasulo Gallery, Union College, Cranford, New Jersey
• 1975 Nancy Hoffman Gallery, New York
• 1973 Corcoran and Corcoran, Miami Florida
• 1972 Allan Stone Gallery, New York

• The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
• Art Institute of Chicago, Illinois
• Musée d'Orsay, Paris
• Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington D.C.
• The Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
• Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.
• Chase Manhattan Bank, New York
• Bacardi Collection, Miami, Florida
• Cleveland Center for Contemporary Art, Ohio
• Danforth Museum of Art, Framingham, Massachusetts
• Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indiana
• The Meadows Museum, Dallas, Texas
• University of Oklahoma at Norman
• Vassar College Art Gallery, Poughkeepsie
• The Seavest Collection