Biography

Erman

Cuban born, Juan Antonio Gonzalez, better known as Erman, has lived in the United States since 1969. After High School and a truncated career in Science, Erman obtained an A.S. in Fashion Design and Merchandising from Miami Dade Community College and in 1979 moved to New York City where he established himself as a fashion designer and illustrator.  In 1991, he was accepted as a resident artist at Art Center South Florida where Ellie Schneiderman, its founder and director, considered his work sculpture. Since then he has had an extensive exhibition record, and has achieved numerous national and international professional accolades. 

Most recently, Erman completed a prestigious fellowship with Sacatar Foundation in Brazil where he shared artist residency space with five International, cross cultural and interdisciplinary artists. Some of the work in this exhibition is evidence of that residency experience. He has traveled extensively throughout the Caribbean participating in International Cultural Exchanges and Exhibitions with Diaspora Vibe Gallery. Erman has been invited as guest lecturer to Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City and to the National Art Gallery of the Bahamas. Erman's work is in the collection of major art collectors.  He has taught children from underserved neighborhoods how to weave, tutored students from I.F.A.C. about Fashion Illustration, has taught seminars around the country on Surface Design techniques and their application in art to wear and is currently an art therapist.  His work in textiles has received many accolades and has been the subject of magazine and newspaper articles in Miami and abroad.  This exhibition Cotando, Cociendo y Recordando curated by Rosie Gordon-Wallace will travel to Lincoln Center in Fort Collins, CO and later to David Rockefeller Center for Latin American Studies at Harvard University.  Erman is represented by Diaspora Vibe Gallery in Miami, Florida.

CV

Erman [Juan Erman Gonzalez ]

Education

Miami  Sr. High School, Class of '75
MDCC, Kendall Campus, Class of 78. AS. Fashion Design/ Merchandising

Professional Experience

Feb. 06 Biennale Artists Retreat, The National Gallery  and Popop Studios, Nassau, Bahamas
Nov.05. Artist/ Facilitator for The Miami Fellows Program, directed by Abbey Chase.
Oct.05. Guest  artist, The National Gallery, Nassau, Bahamas. Artists and Critics Series.
Oct.04. Guest lecturer. Fashion Institute of Technology, NYC. Fiber Arts Dept.
Dec.04/ Sept.05, Art Therapist. Access Services. Miami Dade Parks and Recreation Dept. CAC Senior Centers and After School Programs. Lucy Binhack, supervisor.
2000/ 2003- Instructor. MDCC School of Continuing Education, Kendall Campus.
2000/present- Studio visual artist with gallery affiliation.
1998/ present- Miami Jewish Home and Hospital. Art Therapist. Activities Dept. Mary Robinson, supervisor.
1998/ 2000- Area 8 artist representative to Florida Craftsmen's Board of Directors.
Aug. 1998- Guest lecturer. Colorado State University, Ft. Collins, Co. Art and Consumer Sciences  Depts.
1996/present- Freelance pattern maker for the local fashion industry. Various references upon request.
1990/1996. Studio Fashion Designer, South Florida Art Center, Miami Beach, Fl.
1979/1990 Fashion Designer, patter maker, tailor in NYCs Fashion Industry. Established own firm ERMAN, supplying designer dresses to over 150 national accounts. Freelance Fashion Illustrator. Studio Visual Artist (partial)
2006- Upcoming, Sacatar Foundation, Bahia, Brazil. Eight week artist residency,
Aug./Oct. 06  Handmade, New World School of the Arts Gallery, Miami.
Art Miami 06, juried Diaspora Vibe artists showing in International Currents, Miami Beach Convention Center.
2005- ArtBasel Out Castes, Diaspora Vibe Gallery, Miami, Fl. Juried artists. Catalogue and printed media available.
51st Annual Florida Craftsmen Exhibit,Broward Community College Gallery.
Award of Excellence in Fiber,Lewis Wexler, Wexler Gallery, Philadelphia, Pa; juror . 
Tea, Glorious Tea Revolution Gallery, Kingston, Jamaica. Printed media available.
Combined Talents 2005 Museum of Fine Arts, FSU, Tallahassee, Fl.  Catalogue available.
"Spotlight 2005" Kellogg Center for Creativity and Design, UNC. Asheville,NC. David Revere McFadden, juror.Catalogue available  Aruba Revisited Access Gallery, Oranjestad, Aruba. Deep Blue:Caribbean-American Statements,traveled. Florida Crafstmen Gallery and Diaspora Vibe Gallery. Curated by Erman. Printed media available.
Erman, New Works, Klein Gallery, Florida Craftsmen Inc; St. Petersburg, Fl. (Solo)
Five Artists and Their Visions, May Center Gallery, Douglas Gardens. Curated by Erman                            
2004-Five. Diaspora Vibe Gallery, Miami Fl. Rosie Gordon-Wallace, curator.
Off The Main Puck Bldg.. NYC, NY.Catalogue and printed media available.
Crafts National 38" Zoller Gallery, Penn State University, State College, Pa. Gail M. Brown, curator. Catalogue available.
Surviving Memories. Diaspora Vibe Gallery, Miami, Fl.(Solo)
South Florida Fiber Artists and Friends Futernick Gallery, Dave and Mary Alper Jewish Community Center. Miami, Fl  Catalogue available. Curated by Erman Exit, Moving Inside Out Merryshaw House, University of the West Indies, Grenada.
Thresholds, Expressions of Art and Spiritual Life City Gallery at River Park, Charleston, SC. Traveling until 2007. Eleanor Heartney, curator. Catalogue and printed media available.
2003- Strata: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow Diaspora Vibe Gallery, Miami, Fl.
Metamorphosis Diaspora Vibe Gallery, Miami, Fl
50th. Anniversary Deland Museum of Art, Deland, Fl. Traveled. Catalogue available.
Land and Roots Diaspora Vibe gallery, Miami, Fl.
Art to Wear 7th Biennial Exhibition. Larson Gallery, Yakima Valley Community College, Yakima. Award
Fabrics at Their Best, Rosemary Eichorn, juror.
Wearable Expressions Biennial Echibition. Palos Verdes Art Center, P.V. Ca. Louise Coffey-Webb, juror.
2002 -Ideas, Preocupaciones Y Otras Espinas, May Center, Douglas Gardens, Miami, Fl (Solo)
Uncommon Threads The Fine Line Arts Center, St. Charles, Ill. Award Best of Show, Alyce Van Acker, juror.
Mental Larios Restaurant, South Miami, Fl. Permanent installation.
Art is in the Bag Ohio Crafts Museum, Columbus, Ohio. Ruth Lantz, curator.
Crafts Concepts The Noyes Museum, Oceanville, NJ. Invitational exhibit.
49th Annual Florida Craftsmen Exhibition Center for the Arts, Vero Beach, Fl. Allan Dubois, juror.
2001-Hot Gayle Wilson Gallery, East Hampton, NY. Benjia Morgenstern, curator
Wearable Expressions Palos Verdes Art Center, P.V. Ca. Carol Sauvion, juror. Award, 2nd Place.
Art Wear Lincoln Center, Ft. Collins, Co. Best of show 95 and 97.
2000 -Beyond The Fringe Lowe Art Museum, University of Miami. Ken Uyemura, juror. Traveled to various locations through 2001. Catalogue and printed media available.
Unveiling Gayle Wilson  Gallery, East Hampton, NY.
Expanded resume through 1994  available upon request.

[Content provided by Erman]
 

Gallery 1

Erman

"COCOON" is an interactive solitude station. I am experimenting with the "act of creating" presented as performance while possibly engaging the audience into participating by choosing to sew and create with the available materials or by taking an amulet off the walls. Through its skin, multi-colored capillary and vein-like, "Cocoon" continues my metaphoric conversation about my bi-racial, multi-ethnic and cross-cultural bloodlines similar to those of the many laborers worldwide who sew for a living. In the 60's, as a newly arrived refugee from Cuba, I was a child laborer, earning pennies in exchange for operational piecework in sweatshops throughout Miami. Later in NYC, as designer/owner of the "Erman" label, I made sure that my workers earned a deserved salary, with humane working conditions.

Today, I sit inside "Cocoon" to relive and exorcise some of the demons from my past and to honor piece workers and laborers all over the world in particular the often-illegal migrants! who make up the majority of the sewers in factories across America. Making "talismanic" objects with religious imagery, folkloric Afro-Caribbean colorations imbued with good wishes and well intentions, I also honor "the powers that be " whose guidance and protection helped me survive those experiences. I encourage you to pick your favorite, leave a donation$$$ that will be forwarded to a needy cause and go on with your artistic visual overload experience counting your blessings if you never produced piece work in a factory or counting your blessings, feeling stronger if you survived it... A special "Thank you " To Rosie Gordon-Wallace for her continuous support of emerging, experimental work such as "Cocoon" and for allowing me a "safety zone" to create it and expose it. PAZ Erman [Content provided by Erman]

A Stitch In Time	El Plato Nacional
[Work 3]	[Work 4]