Project Description

Michael David

Michael David (b. 1954)

Born Michael David Singer in Reno, Nevada, his family relocated to Brooklyn, New York where he was raised. He attended SUNY Fredonia before switching to Parsons School of Design and received a B.F.A. in 1976. In 1981 he was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship, at the time the youngest artist ever to be so honored.

David is classified as an abstract painter, best known for his use of the encaustic technique that incorporates pigment with heated beeswax. He is also known for his work in mixed-media figure painting, photography, and environmental sculpture. His work is included in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Guggenheim Museum, New York; Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; and Los Angeles County Museum, Los Angeles. In addition to the Guggenheim Fellowship, he is the recipient of awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, The Edward Albee Foundation, and The American Academy of Arts and Letters.

EDUCATION
1976
BFA, Parsons School of Design, New York, NY
 
AWARDS
1984
The Guggenheim Fellowship
1983
National Endowment for the Arts
1982
The Edward Albee Foundation, Montauk, NY
1982
The American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, Art Award, New York, NY
1982
The Meet the Composer Grant, New York, NY
1982
Guest Professor, Advanced Painting, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
1981
The Edward Albee Foundation, Montauk, NY
1980
The Edward Albee Foundation, Montauk, NY
 
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2011
New Paintings, The Chmar Gallery, Santa Fe, NM
2010
New Paintings, Bentley Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ
2010
Michael David: New Encaustic Works, The Lowe Gallery, Atlanta, GA
2009
Michael David: Chortens, The Lowe Gallery, Atlanta, GA
2009
The Greenhouse Project, Studio Swan, Palmetto, GA
2009
The Greenhouse Project and New Landscapes, Alan Avery Fine Art, Atlanta, GA
2008
Michael David: Old School, Mason Murer, Atlanta, GA
2007
Michael David: Painting and Photography, The Lowe Gallery, Atlanta, GA
2006
Compassion, The Lowe Gallery, Atlanta, GA
2006
Michael David: New Encaustic Painting, Wooster Projects, New York, NY
2001
Michael David, The Lowe Gallery, Atlanta, GA
2000
New Encaustic Paintings, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1999
Michael David, The Lowe Gallery, Atlanta, GA
1998
Cruciforms, Meredith Long and Company, Houston, TX
1988
New Work, Dorothy Blau, Bay Harbor, FL
1997
Michael David, Bentley Gallery, Scottsdale, AZ
1997
Michael David, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1995
Michael David, Aspen Art Museum, Aspen, CO
1995
The Poured Image, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1994
Paintings and Works on Paper, Meredith Long and Company, Houston, TX
1994
Paintings, Margulies Taplin Gallery, Boca Raton, FL
1993
The Wolfen Series, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1993
Michael David, Irving Galleries, Palm Beach, FL
1992
Michael David, Margulies Taplin Gallery, Boca Raton, FL
1992
Painted Collage, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1991
Paintings on Paper, Meredith Long Gallery, Houston, TX
1991
The Georgia Series, Solo Gallery, New York, NY
1991
New Paintings: The Georgia Series, Knoedler and Company, NY
1990
Six Paintings, Meredith Long Gallery, Houston, TX
1990
Works on Paper, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1989
New Work, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1988
New Work, Meredith Long and Company, Houston, TX
1988
Golem and Other Prints, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
1988
New Paintings: Invisible Cities, Compass Rose Gallery, Chicago, IL
1987
New Paintings, The Greensberg Gallery, St. Louis, MO
1987
Paintings and Drawings, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1987
Recent Works, Knoedler Gallery, London, England
1986
Recent Painting, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1984
New Paintings, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1984
Paintings, Dart Gallery, Chicago, IL
1983
Michael David, Hamilton Gallery, New York, NY
1982
Michael David, Hamilton Gallery, New York, NY
1981
New Paintings: Evolutions of the Symbol, Sidney Janis Gallery, New York, NY
 
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2010-2011
Post Mammallian Tension, Michael David & Scott Browning, Bill Lowe Gallery, Atlanta, GA
2006
Unspoken Connections, The Lowe Gallery, Santa Monica, CA
2004
The Lowe Gallery, Atlanta, GA
2002
Unexpected Selections from the Martin Z. Margulies Collection: Art from 1985 to the present, The Art Museum at Florida International University, Miami, FL
1999
Waxing Poetic: Encaustic Art in America, Montclair Art Museum, Montclair, NJ
1999
Forty Years of American Drawings, Raab Galerie, Berlin, Germany
1997
Michael David and James Hyde, Margulies Taplin Gallery, Coral Gables, FL
1996
Different Sides: Drawings/Photographs/Prints/Paintings/Sculpture, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1994
Summer Group Exhibition 1994, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1994
Michael David: Paintings / Nicholas Pearson: Sculpture, Margulies Taplin Gallery, Boca Raton, FL
1992
Group Exhibition, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1991
Group Exhibition, Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1991
Working with Wax: Ten Contemporary Artists, Tibor de Nagy Gallery, New York, NY
1990
Heland Wetterling Gallery Shows Knoedler Gallery Artists, Wetterling Gallery, Stockholm, Sweden
1990
Works on Paper, The Harcus Gallery, Boston, MA
1989
Projects and Portfolios: the 25th Print National, The Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY
1989
Important Works on Paper, Meredith Long and Company, Houston, TX
1989
New Editions, Pace Prints, New York, NY
1988
Golem! Danger, Deliverance, and Art, The Jewish Museum, New York, NY
1988
1988 Invitational, New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, CT
1988
Seventeen Years at the Barn: Highlights of the Edward F. Albee Foundation, Rosa Esman Gallery, New York, NY
1987
Monotypes, Pace Editions, New York, NY
1987
Working in Brooklyn / Painting, The Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY
1987
Art Against AIDS, benefit exhibition and art sale held throughout New York, participating gallery Knoedler and Company, New York, NY
1987
Jewish Themes: Contemporary American Artists, Spertus, Chicago, IL
1986
First Impressions: Recent Monotypes by 15 Artists, Allan Frumkin Gallery, New York, NY
1986
Saints and Sinners: Contemporary Responses to Religion, De Cordova Museum, Lincoln, MA
1986
Jewish Themes: Contemporary American Artists, The Jewish Museum, New York, NY
1986
Public and Private American Prints Today, Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn, NY
1985
A Decade of Visual Arts at Princeton: 1975-1985, The Art Museum, Princeton
University, Princeton, NJ
1985
With an Eye to Nature, Jeffrey Hoffeld and Company, New York, NY
1984
Off the Landscape, Grand Central Galleries, New York, NY
1984
Cunningham Dance Foundation Benefit, Leo Castelli Gallery, New York, NY
1984
Invitational Painting Exhibition, Part I: Twelve Abstract Painters, Seige Contemporary, New York, NY
1984
Small Paintings, Jeffrey Hoffeld Gallery, New York, NY
1983
Calaway, David, Nelson, Hamilton Gallery, New York, NY
1982
Sounds and Visions, Rockland Center for the Arts, West Nyack, NY
1982
Group Show, Hamilton Gallery, New York, NY
1982
The Crucifix Show, Barbara Gladstone Gallery, New York, NY
1982
Elaine de Kooning’s Inadvertent Collection, Elaine Benson Gallery, Bridgehampton, NY
1982
Work by Newly Elected Members and Recipients of Honors and Awards, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, New York, NY
1982
Paintings and Sculptures by Candidates for Art Awards, American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, New York, NY
1981
New Visions, The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT
1981
New Directions – Contemporary American Art from the Commodities Corporate
Collection, Sidney Janis Gallery, New York, NY
1980
Bobsand New York City Volunteers, Municipal Parking Garage, New York, NY
1980
Seven Young Americans, Sidney Janis Gallery, New York, NY
1979
Story Mann’s Possum Head – In a Pictorial Framework, The New Museum, New
York, NY
1978
Black and White on Paper, The Nobe Gallery, New York, NY
1977
Six New Painters, The SoHo Center for the Visual Arts, New York, NY
1977
Sixth Annual Contemporary Reflections, The Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT
 
PUBLIC/PERMANANT COLLECTIONS
Best & Co, Richmond, VA
Chase Manhattan Bank, New York, NY
Commodities Corporation, Princeton, NJ
Dannheiser Foundation, New York, NY
De Cordova and Dana Museum and Park, Lincoln, MA
The Denver Art Museum, Denver, CO
The Edward Albee Foundation, New York, NY
Fort Wayne Museum of Art, Fort Wayne, IN
The Guggenheim Museum, New York, NY
Houston Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, TX
The ITT Collection, New York, NY
The Jewish Museum, New York, NY
List Art Center, Brown University, Providence, RI
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY
Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA The
Neuberger Museum, State University at Purchase, NY
Rose Art Museum, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA
 
PUBLICATIONS
2000
Kuspit, Donald. Michael David: Knoedler and Company, ArtForum 980 Larson, Kay and Rickey. Carrie, Art: Seven Young Americans, The Village Voice
1999
Gomez, Edward M. Improvised Images in Molten Wax, as Fluid as Jazz, The New York Times
1997
Upshaw, Reagan. Michael David at Knoedler, Art in America
1995
David, Michael. Art of Hot Wax and Dogs, The Aspen
1995
Nicholson, Stuart. The Poured Image, Cover Arts Magazine
1993
Southworth, Linda. Michael and the Wolfen, Upper Eastside
1993
Sjostrom, Jan. David’s Intense Art Examines the Inner Man, Palm Beach Daily News
1993
Ruzicka, Joseph. Michael and the Wolfen, Upper Eastside Resident
1993
Mahoney, Robert. Sacred Iconoclasm: Exercising Painting’s Ancient Demons, Cover Arts Magazine
1991
Haggerty, Gerard. Michael David’s New Paintings: The Georgia Series, Cover Arts
Magazine
1991
Tallman, Susan. Michael David at Knoedler, Art in America
1989
Wallach, Amei. The Golem Legend in Many Guises, (review: The Jewish Museum), Newsday
1988
Sherman, Mary. David’s abstract art entices, grips the viewer, Chicago Sunday Times
1988
Hanson, Bernard. New Britain Museum’s 1988 Invitational Exhibit, The Middletown Press
1988
Potter, Thomas F. Contemporary Art Show will Appeal to All Art Lovers, Meriden Record
1988
Damsker, Matt. 1988 Invitational show at New Britain Museum, The Hartford Courant
1987
Schwartzman, Allan. Corporate Culture: The Yippie-Yuppie Artist (Jeff Koons), Manhattan, Inc.
1987
Ackley, Clifford S. Michael David, The Print Collector’s Newletter Journal
1987
Derrickson, Howard, Abstract show at Greenberg Triumph of Metaphor and Mystery, West End Word
1987
Koch, Liz. Not Just a Bunch of Brooklyn Painters, The Phoenix
1987
Moorman, Margaret. An Eclectic Brooklyn Show, New York Newsday
1986
Bringing Fresh Approaches To Age-Old Jewish Themes, The New York Times
1986
Bottino, Carroll Ann. DeCordova takes a look at the ‘Saints and Sinners, Lincoln
1986
Stapen, Nancy. DeCordova show has mass appeal, The Boston Herald
1985
Brenson, Michael. Critics’ Choices, Art, The Guide, The New York Times.
1985
Fraile, Stephen. …, The Print Collector’s Newsletter XVI, no. 3
1984
Silverthorne, Jeanne. Michael David, ArtForum
1984
Henry, Garrit. Michael David at Hamilton, Art in America
1983
Boyce, David B. Michael David: New Abstraction and the Transcendent Metaphor, Arts Magazine
1982
Harris, Susan. Michael David, Arts Magazine
1981
Michael David, The SoHo News
1981
Gongard, Willi. David at Janis, Art Aktuell
1980
Kramer, Hilton. Seven Young Americans, The New York Times
1980
J, H. Sieben Amerikaner der Gegenwart, Kunst
1980
Jessup, Sally. Seven Young Americans, Art/World
1980
Zimmer, William. Seven Young Americans, The SoHo News

Art historian Donald Kuspit characterized David’s paintings in the following essay;

“Michael David’s abstract paintings renew immediacy, indeed, reconstitute, strengthen, and even apotheosize it. They raise it to a feverishly fresh intensity with their remarkable touch, indicating they are among the very best painterly abstractions made. To me, they make it transparently clear that immediacy may be an illusion to the intellect but it is not one for the senses—for touch and sight, mingled together inextricably in ecstatic perception. For them, painterly immediacy is ultimate reality: pure sensuous intensity transcendent of ordinary, habitual understanding of the world, which is mediated by socially sanctioned language and banal meanings that force sense experience into their procrustean bed.

David may be the most innovative master of immediate surface since the abstract expressionists. He has acknowledged his debt to Abstract Expressionism, but he has transformed it. Where the abstract expressionist paintings of the forties and fifties seem like modern cave paintings, as their crude, unfocused, often meandering, turbulent painterliness suggests, and as such to reinstate prehistory, David seems to turn the cave into a temple, as his more considered, concentrated, indeed, dense, contemplative painterliness indicates, so that his paintings have the aura of post history. The sublime is gained with no loss of force—no sacrifice of painterly dynamics. Indeed, there is a gain in the sense of bodiliness: each of his works has a certain “body”—density of presence—so that it seems to embody the sublime, not simply evoke it. His paintings make the abstract sublime vividly concrete, as though it could be grasped rather than existed as some numinous beyond.”

Donald Kuspit, Immediacy Redivivus: Michael David New Works 2002-2004, 2004

Huffington Post: Watch Him Set His Painting on Fire
Michael David was introduced to encaustics in 1975 while attending Parsons. Following his schooling, David pioneered his edgy encaustic painting style in the New York’s downtown art scene. Despite adverse health effects suffered from years of exposure to experimental materials, Michael David continues to push the limits of his work, as demonstrated in his newest piece entitled Cluster of Blessings.