Alumnus Chaz Guest, ’85, a painter whose fans include Herbie Hancock, Vanessa Williams, Former President Barack Obama, Oprah Winfrey, and Angelina Jolie has a major feature article in the New York Times Arts section about his career and a new exhibition of his work in New York City. A resident of Los Angeles, Calif., Guest got his start as an artist in New York years ago, so the new exhibition at Vito Schnabel Gallery, “Memories of Warriors,” his first in the city in over 25 years, represents a kind of homecoming for him.
Guest was a gymnast while a student at Southern and credits CSU Professor Emeritus of Art David Levine, his art history professor, and the late Howard Fussiner [professor emeritus of art], the only painting teacher he ever had, for encouraging him.
The eight paintings in Guest’s exhibition mostly feature battle scenes and portraits depicting the Buffalo Soldiers, the all-Black U.S. Army regiments that served on the Western frontier after the Civil War. The late actor Michael K. Williams sat for Guest as a model for the figures in the paintings.
Guest’s show at Vito Schnabel Gallery runs through March 19, 2022.
Read the New York Times article, “Painting Black Warriors, With Michael K. Williams as His Model” (by Ted Loos | Feb. 2, 2022)
Read an article about Guest from the Southern Alumni Magazine, “Power Painter,” Fall 2019 issue)
