Derek Sullivan
#70, Pinwheel, Cardinal Pirelli, 2010
coloured pencil on paper
52 3/8 x 40 1/8 in. (133 x 102 cm)
The Poster Drawings series use the changing rhythm of advertising as a structure for an exploration of high and low cultural vernaculars. The works vary between monochromatic geometric abstractions, repeating patterning that recalls late modernist art and graphic design, figurative allusions, and drawn and folded book signatures. Conflating an eclectic and highly personal range of references, each drawing is executed with the same idiosyncratic gestural mark making that imbues these works with a naïve, yet meticulous aesthetic.
La série Poster Drawings utilise le rythme changeant de la publicité comme structure pour explorer les registres culturels « hauts » et « bas ». Les œuvres varient entre des abstractions géométriques monochromes, des motifs répétitifs rappelant l’art et le design graphique tardivement modernistes, des allusions figuratives, et des signatures de livre dessinées et pliées. Convoquant un éventail éclectique et profondément personnel de références, chaque dessin est réalisé avec le même geste idiosyncratique qui confère à ces œuvres une esthétique à la fois naïve et minutieusement travaillée.
Derek Sullivan (b. 1976, lives in Toronto) received his BFA from York University in Toronto and his MFA from the University of Guelph (2002). Sullivan has held solo exhibitions at the MacLaren Art Centre, Barrie; Dunlop Art Gallery, Regina; Oakville Galleries, Oakville; Modern Fuel Artist-Run Centre, Kingston; The Power Plant, Toronto; KIOSK, Ghent, Belgium; the University of Waterloo Art Gallery, Kitchener; and Southern Alberta Art Gallery, Lethbridge. His work has been shown in group exhibitions at galleries and institutions such as Leopold-Hoesch Museum, Düren; Gund Gallery, Ohio; Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax; Kamloops Art Gallery, Kamloops; National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; Galerie UQO, Gatineau; Art Museum, Toronto; Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna; and Mendel Art Gallery, Saskatoon. His books and editions have been published by Paul & Wendy Projects (Toronto), Art Metropole (Toronto), Boabooks (Geneva), and Printed Matter Inc. (New York).
Collections: National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa; Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; Art Gallery of York University, Toronto; McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg; Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Kingston; McCarthy-Tétrault, Toronto; Fasken-Martineau, Toronto; The Granite Club, Toronto; TD Bank Group, Toronto; Royal Bank of Canada, Toronto; Bank of Montréal, Toronto; CDLA, Saint-Yrieix-la-Perche, France; Bibliothèque Kandinsky, Centre Pompidou, Paris; Bibliothèque de France, Paris; Getty Museum Archives and Library, Los Angeles; Guelph Art Gallery, Guelph; Perimeter Institute, Waterloo; University of Waterloo Art Gallery, Waterloo; private collections: Toronto, Montréal, Vancouver, Saskatoon, Oakville, Barcelona, Brussels, Paris.