David Marquez

Artist Statement

Urban, industrial, and technological surroundings herd societies through manufactured environments shaped by authoritative entities. These forces manipulate perception, constructing rigid, oppressive structures that dictate behavior and thought. Through painting and mixed-media sculpture, my work explores this surreal landscape, navigating the conformist burden placed on the individual within these controlled realities– Exposing the tension between structure and chaos.
Organic forms grow, decay, and transform, alongside the fabricated structures they are placed on and within. The influence of manufactured braces and frames molds a figure into abstraction, a synthesized mass of flesh and material. Pictured within a surreal gallery setting, the inanimate clusters are reduced to objects and artifacts held and stratified within space.
Visualizing the control asserted by overbearing infrastructure, I emphasize the dominance of political, economic, and societal institutions over perception and autonomy. These commanding structures shape our surroundings—dictating a compliance-based perspective. Through reflections on media and urban consumption, I examine how these forces influence thought, reinforcing cycles of entrapment. My work observes the exploitative relationship between humans and the environments that govern them.