I am Daniel Castro, a multi-media artist born and raised in the Bronx in a traditional Puerto Rican household, interested in exploring themes of cultural identity, displacement and erasure within the context of the urban landscape. By way of combining painting and sculpture, my work breaks out of the traditional painting format, resulting in assemblages that propose painting as object.

My practice is also characterized by a fascination with materials that blur the line between reality and artifice. I create hyperreal replicas of urban detritus such as concrete barriers, traffic cones, and various other objects that typically exist within construction sites around the city. These objects are inherently embedded with connotations of gentrification, authority, and masculinity.

Growing up in a community where hyper-masculinity was both an expectation and survival mechanism, I investigate the performative nature of strength through material play. I fabricate sculptures out of lightweight materials such as insulation foam, and treat them to appear deceptively heavy and substantial.

My work with clothing such as hoodies, sagging jeans, and sneakers, reframe these garments as symbols of identity and systemic scrutiny. The hoodie in particular, becomes the most loaded signifier in the work—a representation of both protection and perceived threat.