James meikle guy biography channel

Born in Middletown, CT and trained at the Hartford Art School, Guy was among the earliest Americans to see European surrealism via a 1931 show at the Wadsworth Atheneum on the “Newer Super-Realism.” Thereafter he was strongly influenced by painters like Salvador Dali, Giorgio de Chirico, and José Clemente Orozco. At the same time, Guy’s work was characterized by a sharp satirical edge that may have owed something to his own work experience—after high school he had tried selling rugs and typewriters; was a sailor and census-taker—and to his political activities, including membership in the radical John Reed Club. In 1930 he helped stage a 1930 labor play entitled Strike; amid unsuccessful attempts to stage it in New York, Guy remained in the city.During the Great Depression Guy was among the leaders of the Unemployed Artists Group (later renamed the Artists Union), which advocated government support for the arts and later resisted proposed cuts to t