MONTERREY.- Located in ‘Barrio Antiguo’, which is the heart of the artistic district in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon, Mexico, and just a few blocks from the Museo de Arte Contemporario and Museo del Noreste, the art gallery Armario 916 possesses within itself an exquisite personalization of it’s own architecture and interior with its unique blend of Mexico’s old ‘barrio’ and new industrial architecture styles under just one roof.

The artwork within the current exhibition,"The Rise of the Observed", hanging on their walls reflects artist dan guz man's very personal view of his paintings.

Considered to be of international renowned ever since guz man (manguzdan) was recognized by the Chinese 2019 Modern Art World Exhibition, he now represents Mexico’s talent as a Modern artist.

Below is the first part of a conversation ArtDaily correspondent Liz Marie Gangemi recently had with the artist.

dan guz man: All right.

Liz Gangemi: Hi, how are you?

DG: Very, very good,

LG: Okay. Very, very interesting painting. What is the name of the painting?


"Es Pau Sedan 5 Velocidades", 2020 Acrylic on mdf panel, 0.61 x 0.61 m.


DG: This painting is titled “Es Pau Sedan 5 Velocidades”, and this one, I did it in 2020. It's part of all those 2020 paintings that I did regarding several dreams that I had. This particular work, I painted it because I had this dream where I was watching TV, which is a very, strange thing for me to do, since I do not watch TV, never, ever. It's not natural for me. So, in this dream, I was watching TV, looking at my television set, an old one. And I was dreaming that I was looking at, some sort of a commercial or an advertisement of a car and there were three persons there, down there at the bottom. They were talking about planning to kill me, this guy here, he was hiring these other two in order to kill me, you know, the artist of the painting.

And it was disturbing for me, I woke up and I did my sketch and eventually did the painting. But the interesting thing is that you can see here, the commercial, the advertisement, because here's the car, here's the wheel, here's the dashboard of the vehicle, the foot that steps on the gas pedal, and the guy that is looking, it's kind of like my inner person that is looking towards the sky. And there, you can see the Sun in the background and there's a guy, right there standing up with a guitar in his hands, on a surfboard, at the top of the wave, and then there's another one right here, another surfer looking to climb the next wave.

LG: And what does the Sun symbolize?

DG: It's a recurring leitmotiv in my work. It symbolizes me; like I am part of the Sun.

LG: All right. Very good. And how about this one over here? Very different,

DG: Very, very different this one is called Welcome to the Jungle 1.


Welcome to the Jungle I, 2020. Acrylic on 6 mm mdf panel, 0.61 x 0.61 m


I actually did two of them. This is number one, and it's the result of acrylics on wood board. Pretty much it talks about coming to this world and living in this system in terms of trying to see the world as a jungle, a concrete jungle, like the song from Guns N’ Roses, Welcome to the Jungle. I borrowed it from that song and tried to put my own jungle here.

LG: Are these angels here in the background? Are those wings?

DG: Yeah. It's like an angel on a “monociclo”. How do you say that in English?

LG: Unicycle.

DG: Unicycle and the guy has these wings, stretched with metal and leather.



LG: Straps.

DG: Exactly on the wings, in order to make this and with a unicycle in my own vision, you could fly that way if you had enough power in your arms and in your legs in order to go and fly, it's conceptual, and it was my own, very personal jungle.

LG: Besides the acrylic. What other materials do you have here? It's kind of like mixed media. Isn't this?

DG: Very, very mixed.

LG: We see ballpoint pen in there?

DG: Yes. A lot, a lot of ballpoint pen, a lot of permanent marker as well.

LG: In this building. What is this?

LG: Like the Empire State Building or

DG: No, they do not correspond to real buildings. Though, every building that I represent in my paintings is made, like an original building. They do not try to copy (other buildings) except for a several few but are very, very, rare you know.

LG: Okay this is the tail of an airplane down here?

DG: Yes, it is. You are the first person that sees that element.

LG: Alright well, I like it. It's very, very nice. I like the turquoise. I like the ball point pen

DG: . Thank you very much.

LG: It's a nice color blue


Jimenita sera un Estrella, 2020. Acrylic on 6 mm mdf panel, 0.61 x 0.61 m


DG: This one is the one that we were talking about a while ago about Jimenita. This is the girl that I was telling you about, she attended an institution specialized in cerebral paralysis patients, and here she was with me in a program in order to make an art collaboration. She and I. And we had a very interesting approach, her name is Jimena and she was seven years old when I met her, nowadays she should be around 11 or so. She was a very, very sweet girl, but she had this attitude, and she was a pain in the ass you know, and she was at first throwing the markers and pencils at me, a bad attitude about everything. But eventually I got to understand her personality because she is a person that cannot speak.

LG: Okay, so she was verbally limited.

DG: Very.

LG: And what is the official name of the painting?

DG: (Jimenita Sera una Estrella) “Jimenita will be a Star”. Exactly, yeah and she is a star, it was deeply emotional for me because I used to cry a lot after my sessions with Jimenita, when I got to my house, you can ask my wife about me going to the back of the house and she said, Hey, what was your day like? And I started crying because I had a lot of frustration and stuff like that. It was very emotional and it took a toll on me. We finished the painting together and that painting sold at Marco (Museum of Contemporary Art in Monterrey.

LG: In an auction

DG: In an auction. Yeah.

LG: It's very interesting the way you made her mouth very little because of that.

DG: Yeah.

LG: And the name of this painting?


Nadis is a, 2020. Acrylic on 6 mm mdf panel, 0.61 x 0.61 m


DG: “Nadis is A”, which if you read it backwards, it says “A si si, Dan”, which is like my girls, my daughters mocking me, you know, because they don't give a shit, you know, they are like 21 and 19, and they are like yeah, yeah Dad. So, this is them and the representation of the”Soul army”, which is this kind of soldiers let's say, but these soldiers, they don't have specific, how can I say this? Everyone is a woman and they are all teenagers. It's like my daughters defending love and defending their ideals nowadays. These kids, they are not afraid anymore to speak their minds, to speak for themselves. And they raise their hand and they don't give a shit, you know? So, I put them like numbers in there,

LG: Is there a special meaning to the numbers, two, four, and six? They are even numbers, they are not odd numbers.

DG: You know what? No, there is no correlation whatsoever, which is a very good question, but to be honest with you. No.

LG: Now I see here in the nostrils of this man, is this his nose? Is there a man here?

DG: yeah. Yeah. It's kind of like my idea of the general or the captain, or the figure of respect that is hidden inside the personality and that's it.

LG: Okay. It's very nice.

DG: Thank you very much. Thank you

LG: Okay, now let's continue on the other way of transportation III


The Other Way of Transportation 3, 2020. Acrylic on 6 mm mdf panel, 0.61 x 0.61 m

DG: Three, yeah. Three, because I did two previously, one of them it's same dimensions and the other one (the second I did) is a very, very big piece. This one, the third, it's very special for me because it's telling a future story. The painting belongs to the second part of that one. (La gente decide volar) People decided to fly and why? Well, because people decided to fly out of this system, out of these walls, like “let's move” like that, you know? And the other way of transportation represents the way people are going to think in the near future. About what they might start to re-think about transportation, you know, stop burning, Stop polluting, etcetera, etc.