Michael Collazo

Michael Collazo was raised as an Unorthodox Jew born into an American military family. Being a mixed-race individual and having eventually travelled to all 4 coasts of America Michael decided to attain his bachelor’s degree in integrated Studio Arts at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design (2017). Collazo then graduated from the Masters program at the Glasgow School of Art (2019) in Scotland and continues to push the boundaries of his practice.

Collazo’s work investigates expanded notions of drawing and foretelling the past. His original ancestors remained in Cameroon and Mali and it is from there that he learned of his family’s ancient past of African Soothsaying. Duration becomes ineffable and can only be shown indirectly through images that can never reveal a transparent appearance.

Time spent drawing with his ballpoint pen can be recorded and experienced, yet the past according to the individual cannot be a shared experience within a shared future. The work aims for honest remembrance and embraces the outcome of an erroneous present. The invisible memory of labor transforms well past the production of Collazo’s creations and amalgamates within the audience’s analysis.