Borrowing instruments and strategies from the practices of the sculptor, the writer and the typographer, British artist Michael Dean investigates the relationship between text and physicality. Exploring the three-dimensional possibilities of language, Dean often ‘spells out’ his words through an alphabet of human-scale shapes, employing industrial and everyday materials such as concrete, steel, MDF, padlocks and dyed books of his writings.
Read MoreWhile the transmutation of language is particularly important to Dean’s practice, his sculptures 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.
Addressing the timeless subject of human intimacy, references to the human body are recurrent throughout Dean’s works. Casts of his and his children's fists, limbs and fingers with drilled out eye holes and tongue muscles appear among the forms. The latter of these is particularly emblematic of Dean’s overlapping interest in touch and language, since it is the part of the body which can feel, as well as taste, and which also moulds words before they leave our mouths.
Michael Dean (Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK, 1977) lives and works in London.
His most recent solo exhibitions include Having you on, BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art, Gateshead (2018); Analogue LOL, ShanghArt Gallery, Shanghai (2018); Four Fucksakes, Herald St | Museum St, London (2017); Teaxths and Angeruage, Portikus, Frankfurt (2017); Sightings: Michael Dean or Lost True Leaves, Nasher Sculpture Center, Dallas (2016) and Qualities of Violence, De Appel, Amsterdam (2015).
Additionally, his work has been included in institutional group exhibitions such as The Hepworth Prize for Sculpture 2018, The Hepworth Wakefield, Wakefield (2018); Against The Wall?, S.M.A.K., Ghent (2018); Skulptur Projekte Münster 2017, Münster (2017); Turner Prize, Tate Britain, London (2016); Sculptures Also Die, Centre for Contemporary Culture Strozzina, Florence, (2015); Mirror City, Hayward Gallery London, London (2014) and A History of Inspiration, Palais de Tokyo, Paris (2013).
Text courtesy Mendes Wood DM.
Given the current political climate, we here at frieze have been reflecting on the role of art in responding to conflict. With this in mind, we invited a cross-section of artists, curators and writers
It’s sculpture, but not as you know it. For years the shortlists for the annual £25,000 Turner Prize given to an artist under 50, with the runners-up each receiving £5,000, have focused on sound art, archive art, theory art, video art and other more or less immaterial forms. Last year’s competition, when much of the...
LONDON — It’s the same thing every year. The press has a field day with some sensational piece that challenges the very definition of art and the Turner Prize is front page news for the day — a rare event for any contemporary art show — bringing it to the attention of hundred of thousands, if not millions, of potential...
