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2021

Cervidae, Catalyst Contemporary, Baltimore, MD

I Love To Hate You, IA&A at Hillyer, Washington, DC

2018

Ironed Out, Bowie State University Galleries, Bowie, MD

2017

Targets and Trophies, Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD

DAMON ARHOS

Damon Arhos, Agnes Moorehead & Me (No. 11/Figure Portrait), acrylic on canvas, 84 x 72 inches, 2020

DAMON ARHOS

BIOGRAPHY

Lives and works in Washington, DC.

Texas, United States, 1967

MFA in Studio Art, MICA, MD
BA in Journalism, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX

Resides

Education

Born

Damon Arhos is an interdisciplinary artist who uses pop culture references fused with the personal to examine social contexts of gender and sexuality. Subjects—often self-referential—in everyday situations are appropriated and repeated to explore multifaceted concepts with a frequent focus on issues significant to the LGBTQ+ community. Laying himself and his own sense of identity bare, Arhos challenges viewers to find both the differences and commonalities among all of us. It is only by embracing our differences can we fulfill our potential and hope to understand and accept the complexities of each other, our personal interactions, assumptions, and beliefs.


Driven by an interest in portraiture—faces are the one thing all humans share—Arhos has developed expressions of the self that are merged with historical figures who have significance in the LGBTQ+ community. In a recent body of work, the artist modeled paintings from hybridized digital collages that conflate his face with that of actor Agnes Moorehead—an iconic figure in the gay community. He turned the portrait into a symbol of absorbing different identities into oneself in order to expand the possibility of a more open concept of self, one without boundaries or constraints, norms or rules. Visually the paintings draw us in; the merged faces are reductive and colorful, playful and serious, objective and subjective. They speak of openness, love, inclusion, uniqueness, as well as hope for a day when one can be whoever one wants to be.


In a more recent body of work, Arhos used the trophy buck as a central element, something that was omnipresent for him growing up in Texas. For Arhos, the trophy buck represents complicated feelings about masculinity, a deep discomfort at harming living creatures, and family expectations, as well as pride, strength, and honesty. The myriad layers of identity inherent in masculinity are wrapped up in one symbol.


Arhos is a Texan living in Washington, D.C. He earned a BA from Texas A & M University, College Station, Texas, and an MFA from the Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, Maryland. His works can be found in the collections of the citizenM Capitol hotel, Washington, D.C., and the Matthew Shepard Foundation, Denver, Colorado, as well as in numerous private collections.

SELECTED WORKS

PUBLICATIONS

EXHIBITIONS

Group Exhibition, Gallery Lombardi, Austin, TX

NOVA Faculty Biennial at Loudoun, Waddell Art Gallery, Northern Virginia Community College, Sterling, VA

INSIGHT, Cape Cod Museum of Art, Dennis, MA

Identity, Maryland State Arts Council, Baltimore, MD

Fuchsia, Cross MacKenzie Gallery, Hillsboro, VA (curated by Rebecca Cross)

Envisioning Creative Resistance, Bowie Center for the Performing Arts, Bowie, MD

Uncommon Goods, Willow Street Gallery, Washington, DC

Good Form, Decorum, and in the Manner, American University Museum at the Katzen, Washington, DC

BMA Salon, Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD

Authentic Realities, Catalyst Contemporary, Baltimore, MD

Left Space, 1100 Wicomico Street, Baltimore, MD

Catalyst, Catalyst Contemporary, Baltimore, MD

Alchemical Vessels, Joan Hisaoka Healing Arts Gallery, Washington, DC

Dialogues, STABLE, Washington, DC

WERQ, NOGO Arts / The Cluster Gallery, Brooklyn, NY

Academy 2017, Connersmith, Washington, DC

Faculty Biennial, Julio Fine Arts Gallery, Loyola University Maryland, Baltimore, MD

STIFF, John A. Cade Center for Fine Arts Gallery, Anne Arundel Community College, Arnold, MD

East Austin Studio Tour, Austin, TX

The People's Gallery Exhibit, City of Austin, Austin, TX

Member Exhibition, DC Arts Studios, Washington, DC