Our Crazy Baby, Sugar Shack
26’ x 18’ x 18’
Wood, steel, acrylic, hand-painted peony and rose wallpaper
2016
2016 FSP/Jerome Fellow
Artist Statement
I am a conceptual artist creating mythology around state-sanctioned social conditioning and the presence of new ecosystems to prioritize the end of power hierarchy and labor exploitation. Living in rural/suburban America, the oppression I faced as a queer youth pushed me to identify other modes of fascism lurking in modern society. I utilize symbolism within personal and communal histories of trauma to question the purpose of these coercive power structures and the systems that reinforce their existence. Navigating within patriarchal power dynamics, I create possible future realities to reorient the power these systems have over us and our work. I am interested in the mask of stability, the anxiety of impermanence, and the subliminal threshold of the unknown. I conceive of new worlds to examine disciplinary and ideological boundaries through architectural design, drawing, painting, performance, sound, and video. Converging architectural iconography and the physiognomy of human posture and personality, I develop works that are both familiar and uncanny. I manifest architecture in the image of chaos to dismantle and disrupt the state, and to reclaim this imagery for the marginalized bodies of the proletariat.
Thomas Putzier
Born: Minneapolis, MN, USA, 1990
Resides: North Oaks, MN, USA
Education:
MFA Sierra Nevada University 2020