Susan Muñoz's paintings explore the aesthetic patterns of disease in the human body

Yellow Fever #1, 8" x8", mixed media on canvas, 2003

ARTIST'S STATEMENT

There is an invisible template that guides the development of shapes in the physical world.  My work explores the repetition of patterns in nature and the mathematics that governs organic form.

The curling of a tree's branches and the intertwining of blood vessels follow the same blueprint.  By combining liquid media of differing viscosities - including oil, acrylic and watercolor paints, inks, various adhesives and mediums, wax and carbon - I try to echo this fractal geometry.

I am particularly interested in disease.  The aesthetic rules for decay are consistent with those for formation.  A deadly cancer cell resembles an exotic spiny fruit.  There is beauty even in nature's horrors.  My recent paintings have explored the shapes and patterns of cancer, heart disease, herpes and AIDS.

I am currently working on a series about yellow fever, a potentially fatal virus typically transmitted via the bite of an infected Aedes aegypti mosquito.  Interestingly, the virus is spread only by the female of the species, for whom feeding on blood is necessary to the reproductive cycle - a poetic reminder of the ruthless fight for survival among the species.  Yellow fever takes its name from the visual manifestation of its consequences: the jaundice cased by the liver failure it induces.  Its own aesthetic expression - elegant clusters of nearly perfect circles - belies its deadly motives. 

ARTIST'S BIOGRAPHY

A native New Yorker, Susan Muñoz works from her studio on the Bowery and has exhibited extensively in Manhattan and Brooklyn.  Several of her pieces have been selected to appear in the forthcoming Paramount Pictures film, The Stepford Wives.  Susan has a background in both art history and economics, with an undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College and a graduate degree from Harvard University.  She recently collaborated with a team of cardiologists at New York Weill Cornell Medical Center to produce a series of work, called "The Dynamical Heart," based on angiogram films taken inside the heart prior to bypass surgery and is currently developing a project based on MRI scans in conjunction with several neurologists.  Susan has also worked as a freelance art critic for dozens of magazines internationally, including ArtNews and Asian ArtNews.

CONTACT INFORMATION

Email: susan@susanmunoz.com
Website: www.susanmunoz.com

Yellow Fever #5, 8" x8", mixed media on canvas, 2003

Yellow Fever #6, 8" x8", mixed media on canvas, 2003