David Altmejd

David Altmejd (born 1974, Montreal, Quebec) is a Canadian sculptor who lives and works in New York City. Altmejd creates highly detailed sculptures that often blur the distinction between interior and exterior, surface and structure, figurative representation and abstraction. His work has appeared in major exhibitions at the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium, Brussels (2016), Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebaek (2015), Mudam Luxembourg, Musée d’art moderne Grand- Duc Jean, Luxembourg (2015 - 2016), Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris (2015), MOCA Cleveland, Cleveland (2012), the Brant Foundation Art Study Center (2011), the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa (2010), the New Museum (2010) and the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (2010). He featured early in contemporary Canadian group exhibitions, Artifice 98 at the Saidye Bronfman Art Center, Montreal (1998), the Québec Triennial at the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal, Montreal (2008), and Intrus/Intruders at the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec, Quebec City (2008) and many more cultural venue.

David Altmejd, The Eye, 2011, bronze, (355 x 248 x 235cm), Claire and Marc Bourgie pavilion, Montreal, Quebec. Donation of the artist and the employees of the MMFA

Life and work

Born in Montreal, Quebec, Altmejd earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Université du Québec à Montréal.[1] Altmejd completed his Masters of Fine Arts at Columbia University in 2001.

Since graduating with an MFA, he has taken part in many solo and group exhibitions globally, from New York where Altmejd has had numerous exhibitions with galleries representing his work, Andrea Rosen Gallery, N.Y., and Stuart Shave/Modern Art, London. In 2003, he participated in the 8th International Istanbul Biennial, Poetic Justice curated by Dan Cameron, following in 2004, he was included in the Whitney Biennial of American Art curated by a team, Chrissie Illes, Shamim M. Momin and Debra Singer to showcase new art made in America. In addition to these exhibitions, he had a solo exhibition at Oakville Galleries in Gairloch Gardens, Metamorphosis (2007) curated by Louise Déry and organized as a travelling exhibition to Galérie de l'UQAM, Montreal, QC, Canada, Illingsworth Kerr Gallery, Alberta College of Art and Design, Calgary, Alberta.

In 2007 he represented Canada at the Venice Biennale; his installation The Index and The Giant, was commissioned by curator, Louise Déry for the Canadian pavilion. The sculpture installation was subsequently purchased by the Art Gallery of Ontario,[2] Toronto, and a second part of the installation acquired by a private collector in Greece.[3]

Altmejd's sculptures present viewers with an amalgam of organic random objects such as decapitated werewolf heads with graffiti-style Stars of David, towers made of mirrors, plastic flowers and costume jewelry as creative tools for sculptural systems loaded with what he calls "symbolic potential" and "open-ended" narratives.[4] Werewolf heads have appeared frequently in his work that in the contemporary art world, they are widely recognized as being closely recognized with the Canadian creator and visionary. They featured prominently in his 2011 solo exhibition at the Brant Foundation, Art Study Centre, Greenwich, Connecticut, including many other sculpture platforms.[5] One might also find inspired sources of literary figures and popular cultural icons, that are central to his art, and has been seen alike with artist, Louise Bourgeois, Kiki Smith, Matthew Barney, Paul McCarthy, Minimalism artist Sol LeWitt and Donald Judd, and novelists and filmmakers, David Cronenberg, Jorge Luis Borges, and Mary Shelley.[6]

Kara L. Rooney writes of his work, "The Vessel" (2011), the central piece in his March 2011 showing at Andrea Rosen Gallery:

Like Altmejd's figurative giants, 'The Vessel' contains a myriad number of small universes that lodge themselves like secrets in pockets of flesh and plastic. Lengths of fine gold chain, Plasticine hands and ears, shards of mirror and quartz, spools of multi-colored thread, seahorse and insect casts, as well as abstracted references to Avian gods, such as cranes and other airborne creatures, swarm the Plexi castle in a cacophony of frozen movement.[7]

In 2016 Altmejd designed the art for Yeasayer's album Amen & Goodbye which the band described as "Sgt Pepper meets Hieronymous Bosch meets Dalí meets PeeWee's Playhouse."[8]

He is represented by White Cube in London and Xavier Hufkens in Belgium.

Documentary
  • 2012 - Chaorismatique, David Altmejd, sculpteur (dir. Rénald Bellemare)

References
  1. David Altmejd Bio
  2. "AGO Receives Acclaimed Canadian Contemporary Sculpture". Art Gallery of Ontario, Press release. 20 August 2007. Retrieved 2009-06-15.
  3. Sarah Thornton. Seven Days in the Art World. New York. ISBN 9780393337129. OCLC 489232834.
  4. Tippett 2017, p. 222.
  5. Bregman, Alexandra (25 March 2015). "AO On Site – Greenwich, Connecticut: David Altmejd at The Brant Foundation through March 31, 2012". Art Observed. Retrieved 2015-04-12.
  6. Jonathan Shaughnessy, Acquisition Proposal for David Altmejd's The Holes, accession #42946, National Gallery of Canada.
  7. Rooney, Kara L. (May 2011). "David Altmejd". The Brooklyn Rail.
  8. http://www.transversomedia.com/articles//take-a-bizarre-trip-through-yeasayers-amen-goodbye-album-art-in-new-music-video-for-unnamed-single

Bibliography
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