The Hepworth Prize for Sculpture, The Hepworth Wakefield, Wakefield, West Yorkshire
October 26 - January 20, 2019
The Hepworth Prize for Sculpture, The Hepworth Wakefield, Wakefield, West Yorkshire
October 26 - January 20, 2019
The Hepworth Prize for Sculpture, The Hepworth Wakefield, Wakefield, West Yorkshire
October 26 - January 20, 2019
Having you on, BALTIC Center for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK
June 22 - September 30, 2018
Having you on, BALTIC Center for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK
June 22 - September 30, 2018
Having you on, BALTIC Center for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK
June 22 - September 30, 2018
Having you on, BALTIC Center for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK
June 22 - September 30, 2018
Having you on, BALTIC Center for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, UK
June 22 - September 30, 2018
Analogue LOL, ShanghArt Gallery, Shanghai
March 24 - May 13, 2018
Michael Dean
Lollol (Working Title), 2018
Concrete, steel reinforcement, plastic, publications, ink stained publication, cable ties, bike locks, paper on crushed cans, coins
70 7/8 x 31 1/2 x 28 3/8 in (180 x 80 x 72 cm)
Analogue LOL, ShanghArt Gallery, Shanghai
March 24 - May 13, 2018
Michael Dean
LooL (Working Title), 2018
Concrete, steel reinforcement, cable ties, bike locks, ink stained publications
68 1/8 x 40 1/2 x 42 1/8 in (173 x 103 x 107 cm)
Michael Dean
lol (Working Title), 2018
Concrete, steel reinforcement, plastic, ink stained publication, padlocks, cable ties
74 7/8 x 26 x 20 1/2 in (190 x 66 x 52 cm)
Analogue LOL, ShanghArt Gallery, Shanghai
March 24 - May 13, 2018
Analogue LOL, ShanghArt Gallery, Shanghai
March 24 - May 13, 2018
Michael Dean
LOL (Working Title), 2018
Concrete, steel reinforcement, plastic, cable ties, publications, stickers
71 1/4 x 50 x 31 1/2 in (181 x 127 x 80 cm)
Analogue LOL, ShanghArt Gallery, Shanghai
March 24 - May 13, 2018
Michael Dean
LOLLOLLOL (Working Title), 2018
Concrete, steel reinforcement, plastic, padlocks, bike locks, cable ties, publications, stickers,
grass
70 x 65 x 35 3/8 in (178 x 165 x 90 cm)
Analogue LOL, ShanghArt Gallery, Shanghai
March 24 - May 13, 2018
Michael Dean
Lols (Working Title), 2018
Concrete, steel reinforcement, plastic, padlocks, stained publications
84 3/4 x 46 1/2 x 39 3/8 in (215 x 118 x 100 cm)
Four Fucksakes, Herald St., London
September 23 - November 18, 2017
Four Fucksakes, Herald St., London
September 23 - November 18, 2017
Four Fucksakes, Herald St., London
September 23 - November 18, 2017
Michael Dean
L (Working Title) Cursive, 2017
Concrete, steel reinforcement, ink soaked publication (ILO VEY), paperback publication (ILO VEY), cable ties, U Lock, chain lock, vinyl stickers, custom made plastic carrier bag
69 3/8 x 51 1/8 x 40 1/8 in (176 x 130 x 102 cm)
Tender Tender, Skulptur Projekte, Münster, Germany
June 10 - October 1, 2017
Tender Tender, Skulptur Projekte, Münster, Germany
June 10 - October 1, 2017
Tender Tender, Skulptur Projekte, Münster, Germany
June 10 - October 1, 2017
Teaxths and Angeruage, Portikus, Frankfurt
July 1 - September 3, 2017
Teaxths and Angeruage, Portikus, Frankfurt
July 1 - September 3, 2017
Sightings: Michael Dean: Lost True Leaves, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, TX
October 22, 2016 - February 5, 2017
Sightings: Michael Dean: Lost True Leaves, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, TX
October 22, 2016 - February 5, 2017
Sightings: Michael Dean: Lost True Leaves, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, TX
October 22, 2016 - February 5, 2017
Sic Glyphs, South London Gallery, London
March 17 - May 22, 2016
Sic Glyphs, South London Gallery, London
March 17 - May 22, 2016
Sic Glyphs, South London Gallery, London
March 17 - May 22, 2016
Michael Dean (b. 1977, Newcastle Upon Tyne, U.K.) lives and works in London. Dean’s work begins with his own writing, abstracting text into sculptures and immersive installations that explore language, the body, and intimacy. In 2019, Dean will have a solo exhibition at the Museo Tamayo, Mexico City. Recent solo exhibitions include: Having you on, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead, United Kingdom, Teaxths and Angeruage, Portikus, Frankfurt, 2017, Sic Glyphs, South London Gallery, London, 2016, Lost True Leaves, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas, 2016. In 2017, Dean participated in Skulptur Projekt Münster, and in 2016, was nominated for the Turner Prize.
While the transmutation of language is particularly important to Dean’s practice, his works are not intended to be read as words, but rather to be identified as an element of language in their own form and imagined as a word or idea. He attributes a physical form to a personally developed language, based on a series of typographic alphabets, which he designs himself.
Michael Dean’s immersive sculptural installations begin with his own writing, which he translates into physical form, from letter-like human-scale figures to self-published books deployed as sculptural elements within his installations. His materials are readily available, and include concrete and steel reinforcement bars. For Lismore, Michael has created a new body of work developing on from recent work which examines how our experience of text exists in the realm of the street. Commonplace signs such as hazard and police tape have been replaced by Dean’s own typographies and nonsensical poetic fragments, emptying them of their original meaning. The transformation of written words into a language of concrete objects is characteristic of Dean’s work. Typically beginning with his own writing, he abstracts and deforms these texts into new typographies, subsequently materialized in solid, physical forms.
The Hepworth Prize for Sculpture was established in 2016 as a £30,000 biennial award recognizing a British or UK-based artist of any age, at any stage in their career who has made a significant contribution to the development of contemporary sculpture.
