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Häsler Gómez
MFA Fellowship 2025
Häsler Gómez (Virginia Commonwealth University) is the recipient of a 2025 Master of Fine Arts Fellowship in Painting & Sculpture.
Häsler Gómez is an artist from Guatemala City, Guatemala. He states: “From the ground we walk on to the water embedded in the air we breathe to the shadows that cling to our feet, my work is steeped in issues of desire, labor, and visibility. By building entangled systems of unseen performance, sound, light, architectural intervention, and objects, I create speculative spaces and encounters rooted in the inherent realities of materials, objects, and bodies.”
Gómez makes reductive work that reorients the everyday to explore material, conceptual, and philosophical possibilities. These gestures direct our attention for deep, empathetic looking, and to the possibilities held within space, material, and form. Ultimately recalibrating the way we look and by extension care, his practice impacts how we encounter one another, recognizing that these relations reflect broader systems of power and oppression in our culture at large.
A FORCED PERSPECTIVE, 2024, drop ceiling, 4k video without sound (3:48 loop with moments where screen goes dark built into video), tv, media player, ceiling tile, mdf, plywood, joint compound, texture, primer, locked bathroom stall, audio recording of an hvac system (1 hour loop), wireless speaker, media player, mount; dislocated ceiling tile, plexiglass, intervention with window inside the bathroom’s plenum that allows cold air to alter the temperature of the bathroom as well as refracts light throughout the day; satellite dish, duct-tape, plastic-sheeting, joint compound, spray paint, tar, automotive enamel, dust, variable dimensions
A FORCED PERSPECTIVE (detail)
A GRAIN OF SALT BETWEEN TWO TONGUES (detail), 2024, flashlights with custom filters that mimic the color of the street lamps outside the building; bike rack, insulation foam, tar, polyurethane, water extracted from the air, welded steel; my 1999 ford ranger left unlocked on the passenger side, car seat cushion, plaster bandages, hydrocal, liquid dye, used dryer lint sheets, hair, polyurethane, liquid rubber, lube, humidifier, dehumidifier, extension cord, generator, intervention with truck bed so that it holds/leaks, unseen performance where I fill the truck bed with a combination of water extracted from the air, water extracted from the building, saliva, and sweat; trash can lids, joint compound, tar, enamel, audio recording of water dripping (3 hour loop), wireless speaker, media player, mount, intervention with preexisting hole in the dark room’s door that turns the room into a camera obscura, unseen performance where I flood the floor of the dark room with a combination of water extracted from the building and water extracted from the air; enema bags, silicone tubing, catheter valves, meat hooks, dentist’s spit bowls, hydrocal, pvc pipe, surgical tape, liquid dye, enamel, plastic sheeting, painter’s tape, tar, liquid rubber, unseen performance where I remove the sculpture that drapes over the ladder to climb to the mezzanine space to fill the enema bags with a combination of saliva, sweat, and water extracted from the air, dimensions variable
A GRAIN OF SALT BETWEEN TWO TONGUES (detail)
NIGHTSHIFT (detail), 2024, custom door coated in liquid latex, found kick plate, janitor’s closet, tar, painter’s tape, flashlights with custom filters, audio recording of sinks running at full pressure (1 hour loop), wireless speaker, media player; found wet floor sign, masking tape, joint compound, polyurethane, enamel; intervention with shelving units and shelf dividers, dimensions variable
NIGHTSHIFT (detail)
AT THE EDGE OF A SHIFTING I, 2024, two two-by-fours, water extracted from the air, tar, unseen performance where I track the light that seeps into the room throughout the day and record it onto the work via touch so as to only be visible at certain distances and light; my sock, used lint sheets, dust, hair, color pencil, starch, spray adhesive, surgical tape, liquid latex, polyurethane, lube; pink fiberglass rebar, salmon pink masonry line, florescent pink masonry line, joint compound; intervention with gallery windows, window tinting; gallery spotlights with custom filters; audio recording of the room’s hvac system with added digital ambient sound (8 hour loop), wireless speaker, media player, mount, dimensions variable
IN OBLIVION’S LIGHT, 2024, intervention with hallway light bulbs to dim the amount of light present before entering the gallery; window tinting, weather stripping, door sweeps, painter’s tape; gallery wall, joint compound; digitally degraded audio recording of a g cord (30 minute loop, with 20 seconds of built in silence between loops), wireless speaker and media player housed within custom built container for manual sound modulation; self-leveling laser levels with custom stands designed to break the lines of light so as to not touch any of the sculptures in the installation but to hit the viewer at ankle height; florescent pink masonry line illuminated with laser level, drywall screws, joint compound; church pew, cockroach trap, found wood, wood glue, joint compound, painter’s tape, tar, photograph, chewed gum, dimensions variable
A FORCED PERSPECTIVE, 2024, drop ceiling, 4k video without sound (3:48 loop with moments where screen goes dark built into video), tv, media player, ceiling tile, mdf, plywood, joint compound, texture, primer, locked bathroom stall, audio recording of an hvac system (1 hour loop), wireless speaker, media player, mount; dislocated ceiling tile, plexiglass, intervention with window inside the bathroom’s plenum that allows cold air to alter the temperature of the bathroom as well as refracts light throughout the day; satellite dish, duct-tape, plastic-sheeting, joint compound, spray paint, tar, automotive enamel, dust, variable dimensions
A FORCED PERSPECTIVE (detail)
A GRAIN OF SALT BETWEEN TWO TONGUES (detail), 2024, flashlights with custom filters that mimic the color of the street lamps outside the building; bike rack, insulation foam, tar, polyurethane, water extracted from the air, welded steel; my 1999 ford ranger left unlocked on the passenger side, car seat cushion, plaster bandages, hydrocal, liquid dye, used dryer lint sheets, hair, polyurethane, liquid rubber, lube, humidifier, dehumidifier, extension cord, generator, intervention with truck bed so that it holds/leaks, unseen performance where I fill the truck bed with a combination of water extracted from the air, water extracted from the building, saliva, and sweat; trash can lids, joint compound, tar, enamel, audio recording of water dripping (3 hour loop), wireless speaker, media player, mount, intervention with preexisting hole in the dark room’s door that turns the room into a camera obscura, unseen performance where I flood the floor of the dark room with a combination of water extracted from the building and water extracted from the air; enema bags, silicone tubing, catheter valves, meat hooks, dentist’s spit bowls, hydrocal, pvc pipe, surgical tape, liquid dye, enamel, plastic sheeting, painter’s tape, tar, liquid rubber, unseen performance where I remove the sculpture that drapes over the ladder to climb to the mezzanine space to fill the enema bags with a combination of saliva, sweat, and water extracted from the air, dimensions variable
A GRAIN OF SALT BETWEEN TWO TONGUES (detail)
NIGHTSHIFT (detail), 2024, custom door coated in liquid latex, found kick plate, janitor’s closet, tar, painter’s tape, flashlights with custom filters, audio recording of sinks running at full pressure (1 hour loop), wireless speaker, media player; found wet floor sign, masking tape, joint compound, polyurethane, enamel; intervention with shelving units and shelf dividers, dimensions variable
NIGHTSHIFT (detail)
AT THE EDGE OF A SHIFTING I, 2024, two two-by-fours, water extracted from the air, tar, unseen performance where I track the light that seeps into the room throughout the day and record it onto the work via touch so as to only be visible at certain distances and light; my sock, used lint sheets, dust, hair, color pencil, starch, spray adhesive, surgical tape, liquid latex, polyurethane, lube; pink fiberglass rebar, salmon pink masonry line, florescent pink masonry line, joint compound; intervention with gallery windows, window tinting; gallery spotlights with custom filters; audio recording of the room’s hvac system with added digital ambient sound (8 hour loop), wireless speaker, media player, mount, dimensions variable
IN OBLIVION’S LIGHT, 2024, intervention with hallway light bulbs to dim the amount of light present before entering the gallery; window tinting, weather stripping, door sweeps, painter’s tape; gallery wall, joint compound; digitally degraded audio recording of a g cord (30 minute loop, with 20 seconds of built in silence between loops), wireless speaker and media player housed within custom built container for manual sound modulation; self-leveling laser levels with custom stands designed to break the lines of light so as to not touch any of the sculptures in the installation but to hit the viewer at ankle height; florescent pink masonry line illuminated with laser level, drywall screws, joint compound; church pew, cockroach trap, found wood, wood glue, joint compound, painter’s tape, tar, photograph, chewed gum, dimensions variable
