Event overview
The Contemporary Art Talks programme is organised by the Department of Art
Enrico David’s contemporary surrealism challenges our reliance on language and its attendant need for reasoned apprehension. David’s practice deftly employs a range of materials and techniques - painting, sculpture and various other traditions of handicraft, always rooted in drawing - to make tangible a body in perpetual metamorphosis. The disembodied personae populating the artist’s oeuvre exist in an unsettling state of liminality, emerging with reluctance and uncertainty: heads protrude inappropriately from constructions resembling furniture, limbs extend into ornamentation, bodies dissolve into abstraction. Anthropomorphism is the leitmotif of David’s work. His incongruous imagery evokes Surrealism’s bizarre narratives while subtly questioning modernism’s tendency toward abstraction. Enrico David first gained critical acclaim for grotesque and highly abstracted portraits wrought with a cool ornamental detachment. His style drew on the language of modernism mediated through a decidedly non-traditional process of making which referenced performance, theatrical display and folk art. Enrico David was born in Ancona, Italy and studied at Central Saint Martin’s in London. He has exhibited in galleries and museums throughout Europe and the United States, including solo exhibitions at the Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, 2013; Head Gas, New Museum, New York, 2011; Repertorio Ornamentale, Fondazione Bevilacqua La Masa, Venice, 2011; How Do You Love Dzzzzt by Mammy?, Museum für Gegenwartskunst, Basel, 2009; Bulbous Marauder, Seattle Art Museum, 2008; and Ultra Paste, ICA London, 2007. David was shortlisted for the Turner Prize in 2009. He participated in The Encyclopedic Palace, the 55th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale, 2013. Enrico David currently lives and works in London.
Image: Enrico David solo exhibition, installaton view, UCLA Hammer Museum, Los Angeles, 2013.
http://www.michaelwerner.com/artist/enrico-david/works
Dates & times
| Date | Time | Add to calendar |
|---|---|---|
| 5 Mar 2014 | 5:30pm - 7:00pm |
Accessibility
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