Dan Colen - Contemporary Art Part I New York Monday, November 8, 2010 | Phillips

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  • Provenance


    Peres Projects, Los Angeles

  • Exhibited


    London, Royal Academy of Arts, USA TODAY New American Art from The Saatchi Gallery, October 6 - November 4, 2006; New York, Whitney Museum of American Art, Whitney Biennial From Day For Night, 2006; Los Angeles, Peres Projects, Dan Colen, April 1 - April 29, 2006

  • Literature


    M. Dailey and N. Rosenthal, USA TODAY: New American Art from The Saatchi Gallery, London, 2006, pp. 94-95 (illustrated); M. Dailey, Shape of Things to Come: New Sculpture, 2008, pp. 336-337 (illustrated)

  • Catalogue Essay


    Drawing from mass media, environmental experience and sub-cultural language, Dan Colen’s work infuses a sense of magic in the under valued and ordinary. In Untitled (Vete Al Diablo), a graffitied boulder is fictionally transplanted from suburban wasteland. Towering as a henge-like monument, it immediately conjures images of teenage ritual, exuding a reliquary aura as degenerate totem. It is in fact made from papier mâché expertly faux finished to look like the real thing. Colen creates a duplicity in the sculpture’s rough hewn appearance, elevating the overlooked and forsaken to a contemplative object of inspiring craftsmanship.

  • Artist Biography

    Dan Colen

    American • 1979

    American artist Dan Colen has spent most of his career asking himself questions about the editorial decisions artists have to make when creating a scene from scratch on canvas. In his early work, Colen painted mundane interiors punctuated with fantastical elements. This manifested as part of a growing curiosity in the ethereal or divine intervention.

    Colen subsequently stepped away from paint as material and started using found objects as mediums with which to paint. Among these, Colen has used chewing gum, street trash, confetti, feathers, flowers and dirt. This methodology allows Colen to abandon control and create in a more free-form, subconscious manner.

    View More Works

104

Untitled (Vete al diablo)

2006

Wood, wire, polyurethane, papier mâché, gesso and oil paint.

72 x 48 in. (182.8 x 121.9 cm) with 12 in. (30.5 cm) tall base.

Estimate
$150,000 - 250,000 

Sold for $290,500

Contemporary Art Part I

8 November 2010
New York