The Wadsworth Atheneum is one of my favorite places to visit, even just to recharge my artistic battery. It's even better when they invite a renown artist to come and talk about their work! I was first introduced to Sean Scully's paintings during my MFA critiques with master painter Stephen Brown, whose grace and knowledge I truly miss. Stephen opened my eyes to so many amazing artists, so in Stephen's honor, here's Sean Scully.
Sean discussed his process and inspiration for his 'brick like" structured paintings. It surprised me that many were actually built sculpturally by inserting one painting next to or into another. He was most animated when retelling stories from his childhood in South London and how those experiences continue to enrich his artistic process. Scully's stories about his cerulean blue tricycle and describing his church 'like a drum' (candles, robes, incense) were most entertaining!
photo courtesy of Diana Guay Dixon, staff photographer for the Atheneum, check her out at:
Diana Guay Dixon
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| I was lucky enough to shake Sean's hand and add this to my sketchbook notes |
Sean Scully
Scully, born in 1945 in Dublin, Ireland, has exhibited his work widely throughoutEurope and the United States. Among numerous solo exhibitions, he has had a major retrospective at the Whitechapel Gallery, London, in 1989 and a traveling exhibition initiated in 1995 at the Hirshhorn Museum, Washington, D.C. He is represented in the collections of numerous museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art and the Guggenheim Museum in New York; the National Gallery and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C.; the Tate Gallery in London; the Reina Sofia in Madrid; and in many other private and public collections worldwide. Scully has twice been named a Turner Prize nominee in 1989 and 1993 and received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1983. He currently lives in New York, Barcelona, and Munich. |
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