Sue de Beer
Encyclopedia
Sue de Beer is a contemporary artist
who lives and works in New York, New York.
in New York in 1995 and an M.F.A. from Columbia University
in 1998. As an artist, de Beer uses multiple media including photography, video, installation, and sculpture, to explore the relationships between time and memory.
Growing up in a rambling Victorian house with a widow's walk in Salem, Mass., which still exudes an air of its witchy past, she felt that mysticism was a kind of birthright, and it has been a more prominent element of her work in recent years.. Ms. de Beer has also borrowed from the dark, violent post-religious mysticism of the novelist Dennis Cooper. (From his novel "Period," used in a 2005 de Beer video: "I could open the other dimension right now if I wanted. Or I could stay here with you. I'm kind of like a god.")
Time itself is the most often repeated subject of de Beer's work, emerging from images and ideas related to the passage of time. Ghosts, haunting, adolescence, trace memory and erasure find a common ground within this theme.
Ms. de Beer said that her fascination with ghosts is in one sense simply about finding a way to explore how we all must deal with the past and with loss as we grow older, a struggle that finds a metaphor in the artistic process itself.
De Beer lived in Berlin, Germany between 2002-2008. She produced and shot three films in Berlin: 'Hans & Grete' (2003), 'Black Sun' (2005), and 'the Quickening' (2006).
, the Whitney Museum of American Art
, MoMA PS1, the Brooklyn Museum
, the Park Avenue Armory, and Marianne Boesky Gallery in New York, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions
in Los Angeles, the Reina Sofia
in Madrid, the Kunst-Werke, the Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie, and the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt
in Germany, the Neue Galerie am Landesmuseum Joanneum
in Graz, Austria, the MuHKA Museum in Antwerp, Belgium, and the Museum of Modern Art, Busan, in Busan, South Korea.
De Beer's work has been associated with New Gothic Art
.
De Beer is Co-Director of the MFA Program at New York University, with artist John Torreano
Artist
An artist is a person engaged in one or more of any of a broad spectrum of activities related to creating art, practicing the arts and/or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse is a practitioner in the visual arts only...
who lives and works in New York, New York.
Background
De Beer received an BFA from Parsons The New School for DesignParsons The New School for Design
Parsons The New School For Design, known colloquially as Parsons, is the art and design college of The New School university. It is located in New York City's Greenwich Village, and has produced artists and designers such as Marc Jacobs, Dean and Dan Caten, Norman Rockwell, Donna Karan, Jane...
in New York in 1995 and an M.F.A. from Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
in 1998. As an artist, de Beer uses multiple media including photography, video, installation, and sculpture, to explore the relationships between time and memory.
Early Life and Education
De Beer was raised in New England, and lives in New York City. She cites the aesthetic of 1700 and 1900 New England as an early influence on her work:Growing up in a rambling Victorian house with a widow's walk in Salem, Mass., which still exudes an air of its witchy past, she felt that mysticism was a kind of birthright, and it has been a more prominent element of her work in recent years.. Ms. de Beer has also borrowed from the dark, violent post-religious mysticism of the novelist Dennis Cooper. (From his novel "Period," used in a 2005 de Beer video: "I could open the other dimension right now if I wanted. Or I could stay here with you. I'm kind of like a god.")
Time itself is the most often repeated subject of de Beer's work, emerging from images and ideas related to the passage of time. Ghosts, haunting, adolescence, trace memory and erasure find a common ground within this theme.
Ms. de Beer said that her fascination with ghosts is in one sense simply about finding a way to explore how we all must deal with the past and with loss as we grow older, a struggle that finds a metaphor in the artistic process itself.
De Beer lived in Berlin, Germany between 2002-2008. She produced and shot three films in Berlin: 'Hans & Grete' (2003), 'Black Sun' (2005), and 'the Quickening' (2006).
Career
Her work has been the subject of several major solo exhibitions including "Hans & Grete", at the Kunst Werke, Berlin, "Black Sun", at the Whitney Museum of American Art at Altria, "Permanent Revolution" at the MuHKA Museum in Antwerp, Belgium, and "the Ghosts" at the Park Avenue Armory in New York. She has exhibited widely in the United States and abroad at venues including but not limited to the New Museum of Contemporary ArtNew Museum of Contemporary Art
The New Museum, founded in 1977 by Marcia Tucker, is the only museum in New York City exclusively devoted to presenting contemporary art from around the world...
, the Whitney Museum of American Art
Whitney Museum of American Art
The Whitney Museum of American Art, often referred to simply as "the Whitney", is an art museum with a focus on 20th- and 21st-century American art. Located at 945 Madison Avenue at 75th Street in New York City, the Whitney's permanent collection contains more than 18,000 works in a wide variety of...
, MoMA PS1, the Brooklyn Museum
Brooklyn Museum
The Brooklyn Museum is an encyclopedia art museum located in the New York City borough of Brooklyn. At 560,000 square feet, the museum holds New York City's second largest art collection with roughly 1.5 million works....
, the Park Avenue Armory, and Marianne Boesky Gallery in New York, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions
Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions
Located in Hollywood, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions is a nonprofit exhibition space and archive of the visual arts for the city of Los Angeles, California, USA...
in Los Angeles, the Reina Sofia
Reina Sofia
Reina Sofia can refer to:* Queen Sofía of Spainor several buildings and places named after her:* Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía* Tenerife South Airport...
in Madrid, the Kunst-Werke, the Zentrum für Kunst und Medientechnologie, and the Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt
Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt
The Schirn Kunsthalle is Frankfurt's active exhibition space located in the heart of the old city next to the Dom , exhibiting both modern and contemporary art. Exhibitions in recent years included retrospectives of Wassily Kandinsky, Marc Chagall, Frida Kahlo, Alberto Giacometti, Bill Viola, and...
in Germany, the Neue Galerie am Landesmuseum Joanneum
Landesmuseum Joanneum
The Universalmuseum Joanneum is a multidisciplinary museum in Styria, Austria. It has galleries and collections in many subject areas including Archaeology, Geology, Palaeontology, Mineralogy, Botany, Zoology, History, Art and Folk Culture...
in Graz, Austria, the MuHKA Museum in Antwerp, Belgium, and the Museum of Modern Art, Busan, in Busan, South Korea.
De Beer's work has been associated with New Gothic Art
New Gothic Art
-Manifesto:The Neo Gothic Art Manifesto was written by gothic artist Charles Moffat in 2001, who also coined the term "Neo Gothic" in an effort to differentiate it from gothic architecture...
.
De Beer is Co-Director of the MFA Program at New York University, with artist John Torreano
Solo exhibitions
- 2011 "The Ghosts", Park Avenue Armory, New York, curated by Art Production Fund
- 2011 "Depiction of a Star Obscured by Another Figure", Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York
- 2008 Sue de Beer & Delia Gonzalez: "Ghost Polaroid Graveyard", The Forgotten Bar, Berlin
- 2008 "Permanent Revolution", Museum of Modern Art, Antwerp, curated by Dieter Roelstraete
- 2008 "Zoetropes", Marianne Boesky Gallery at the Dark Fair, The Swiss Institute, New York.
- 2007 "Permanent Revolution", Arndt and Partner, Berlin
- 2007 "Permanent Revolution", Sandroni Rey Gallery, Los Angeles
- 2006 "The Quickening", Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York
- 2005 "The Stills", Sandroni Rey Gallery, Los Angeles
- 2005 "Black Sun", Whitney Museum of American Art at Altria, New York, curated by Shamim Momin
- 2004 "The Dark Hearts", Sandroni Rey Gallery at Statements, Basel, Miami
- 2003 "Hans & Grete", Kunst Werke, Berlin
- 2003 "Hans & Grete", Postmasters Gallery, New York
- 2002 "Photographs", Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin
- 2001 "Photographs / project room: Ghost Stories Magazine", Sandroni Rey Gallery, Los Angeles
- 2000 Sue de Beer & Laura Parnes: "Heidi 2", Los Angeles Contemporary ExhibitionsLos Angeles Contemporary ExhibitionsLocated in Hollywood, Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions is a nonprofit exhibition space and archive of the visual arts for the city of Los Angeles, California, USA...
, Los Angeles - 2000 Sue de Beer & Laura Parnes: "Heidi 2", Deitch ProjectsDeitch ProjectsDeitch Projects was a contemporary art gallery in New York City founded by Jeffrey Deitch.-History:Since opening with a performance by Vanessa Beecroft in February 1996, the gallery has presented nearly one hundred and eighteen solo exhibitions and projects, ten thematic exhibitions, and a few...
, New York
External links
- Sue de Beer Official Website
- Art Production Fund. Project Page for Sue de Beer's 'The Ghosts' with Images, Project Description, and Installation views.
- Randy Kennedy, New York Times: "White Paint, Chocolate and Postmodern Ghosts". New York Times Feature on Sue de Beer's the Ghosts.
- Sue de Beer at Marianne Boesky Gallery
- Sue de Beer, Permanent Collection of the Museum of Modern Art