Multidisciplinary artist Tony Pharo’s work is conveyed with a raw and transparent spirit, celebrating emotion and conviction. With a visceral color palette and a disarmingly playful tone, he tears down barriers to the soul.
Eight years ago, Pharo left his home in New York and set out for California to change his life and find direction. What he now knows as a cry for help, Pharo took action and has been in recovery and sober for seven years. When it was suggested to Pharo that he channel his emotion into art as part of his recovery, it was then when he uncovered the rawness of his creative voice as a true conduit of his generation and their potentially pointless search for meaning and purpose amidst a cruel life in a flawed world.
Completely self-taught, Pharo pulls inspiration from his adolescent experiences, as they are what shapes us, and creates the thoughts, routines, and perspectives that we carry through today. He also aims to challenge thinking, perspective, ethnicity-based thinking, stereotypes, and racism, to make viewers pause, to challenge how things are presented or how people perceive things should be presented.
This can be seen across his works, where you may find the word “ear” written on the canvas where the actual ear should be, or instead of a neat brain and colored in backdrop behind it, he leaves it wide open and filled it in with pastels and oil stick. You never know what challenges his works will present.
See more of Tony Pharo’s work on his IG @TonyPharo and Artsy
