Adam Scott

My recent paintings are visual distillations of observed geologic phenomena that occurs in the high elevations of the Mojave Desert in Joshua Tree California.  I couple those distillations with my interest in the utopic and dystopic aspects of science fiction to create paintings that re-imagine the western landscape circa 2017.  Was the painting made by a human hand or extruded from the earths’ mineral crust by something altogether non-human.

I’m interested in making paintings that speak a sculptural language within a compressed two-dimensional abstracted pictorial space, in other words, I see my work as micro-sculpture that hinge on the brink of the pictorial. 

I’ve always been fascinated by the visual and physical weight of paint as a substance, yet also by paint’s ability to transcend its physical boundaries and become a shunt that communicates directly with the viewer.  For me, painting has always been about a comingling of the concrete and the fictive, in other words, there must always be a tension between the “thingness” object hanging on the wall and what is being “pictured” on the surface of that object.   

Lives and works in Chicago, IL

 

MFA, The School of the Art Institute Of Chicago

BFA, California State University Long Beach

 

Solo Exhibitions:

2017

Terraforms, David Richard Gallery, Santa Fe, NM

Terraforms, David Richard Gallery, New York, NY

2016

Silent Running, Julius Caesar Gallery, Chicago, Il.

Recordings, Mild Climate, Nashville, TN.

2013

Fragments: Sampling The Modern, Elmhurst Art Museum, curated by Staci Boris

2010

Glue Dreams Kavi Gupta Gallery

2008

Kavi Gupta Gallery, Leipzig

2007

Paint by Number, doART Gallery, Seoul, Korea 

2005

Adam Scott: New Paintings, doART Gallery, Seoul, Korea

2004

Wasn’t Tomorrow Wonderful, Kavi Gupta Gallery, Chicago, IL

Wasn’t Tomorrow Wonderful (part II), Galerie Schuster and Scheuermann, Berlin, Germany

2003 

Adam Scott, Galerie Schuster, Frankfurt, Germany

2002

12 x 12: New Artists/New Work, Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL

Electric Avenue, Kavi Gupta Gallery, Chicago, IL

2001

Jellystone, College of DuPage, Glenn Elyn, IL

American Log, Dogmatic Gallery, Chicago, IL

 

Group Exhibitions:

2017

Simultaneous Contrast, Durden & Ray, Los Angeles, CA.

Visible and Permanent, Carrie Secrist Gallery, Chicago, IL.

Project Space, 65 Grand, Chicago, IL.

2016

How High, Left Field Studio, San Louis Obispo, CA.

2015

Baudrillard's America, Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago, IL.

Pareidolia, Coagula Curatorial Exhibitions, Chinatown, Los Angeles, CA.

2014

Nanjing International Art Festival, Nanjing, China

Ducks, Greenpoint Terminal Gallery, Brooklyn, NY.

2013

American Painting Today: Physical and Visceral, KRASL Art Center, St. Joseph, MI.

2012

White Noise, Circuit 12 Gallery, Dallas, TX.

Autumn Space, in collaboration with Lief Sandberg.

Black and White, Double Break Gallery, Curated by Ryan Christian, San Diego, CA

2011

Provocateurs, University Of South Dakota  (Adam Scott & Phyllis Bramson)  

Armory Show, New York, NY (Kavi Gupta Gallery)

Adam Scott & Curtis Stage, Fringe Exhibitions, Los Angeles, CA.

Mudertown, “Mudertown” Chicgao, IL.

Tethered to Our World, Highland Park Art Center, Curated by Phylis Bramson

2009  

Sports, Syncroncity Space, Los Angeles, CA.

Wintergarten, Kavi Gutpa Gallery, Berlin

2008

Next Art Fair, Kavi Gupta Gallery, Chicago, IL

2007

Forest Assembly, GAD, Oslo, Norway, curated by Marianne Hurum

2006

Psychoideology: Spirituality, Politics and Identity in Search of a New Paradigm, Roebling Hall, New York, NY

Drawn Together/Collapse Apart, curated by Curtis Stage, Harris Gallery, University of La Verne, CA

2005

Crossings: 10 Artists from Kaohsiung and Chicago, curated by Gregory Knight and Tseng Fangling, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL and Kaoshiung Museum of Fine Art, Kaoshiung, Taiwan

In Search of a Continuous Present, Prague Biennale 2, curated by Lynne Warren? (MCA, Chicago)

VOLTA 01, Kavi Gupta Gallery, Basel, Switzerland

Art Forum Berlin, Kavi Gupta Gallery, Berlin, Germany

Built Against Site, Paragraph Gallery, Kansas City, KS *

Exploding Plastic Inevitable, curated by –Scenic, Bergdorf Goodman, New York, NY

2003

Art Frankfurt, Galerie Schuster, Frankfurt, Germany

2002

Here and Now, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL, curated by James Rondeau, Lanny Silvermann, Greg Knight and Mary Anne Richter *

NADA, Vedanta Gallery, Miami, FL

2001

Whippersnapper III, Vedanta Gallery, Chicago, IL

2000

Look; Paint, Beacon Street Gallery, Chicago, IL

Artificial, Berkeley Center for Contemporary Art, Berkeley, CA

Deluxe, Deluxe Projects, Chicago, IL

Matter and Memory, Thomas Wojtas Fine Arts, Detroit, MI

1999

Squirrels on Parade, Suitable, Chicago, IL

Mid-West AIDS Project, Edsel and Elanor Ford House, Grosse Point, MI

The American Icon, Detroit Focus Gallery, Detroit, MI

Constructing Eden, Belle Isle Botanical Garden, Detroit, MI

MFA Thesis Show, Gallery 2, School of the Art Institute, Chicago, IL

Eight Painters, Art Center of Battle Creek, Battle Creek, MI

International Group Show, Atelier 14, New York, NY

In Justice, Detroit Artists Market, Detroit, MI

1997

Abstraction, Bruise Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI

Triangulus, (Traveling Show), White Box Gallery, Philadelphia, PA

Triangulus, Atelier 14, New York, NY

1996

Group Show, Detroit Artists Market, Detroit, MI

New Talent-Detroit, KRASEL Museum of Art, St. Joseph’s, MI

Large Scale, Ann Arbor Art Association, Ann Arbor, MI

 

Bibliography

2016

Dluzen, Robin, Chicago: Adam Scott at Julius Caesar, Two Coats of Paint

2013

Velez, Pedro, Eye Exam: My Top Art Picks for Chicago and the Midwest, New City Art

2012

Reames, Josh, Reinvention: A Q&A Session with Adam Scott, New American Paintings

2007

Ryu, Junghwa, Adam Scott: Paint by Number, exhibition catalog, Do Art Gallery, Seoul Korea

2005

Elms, Anthony, Crossings, exhibition catalog, Terror Steroid, Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago, IL and Kaoshiung Museum of Fine Art, Kaoshiung, Taiwan

& Edited by Gregory G. Knight and Tseng Fangling (Curators)

2004

Hawkins, Margaret, Chicago Sun-Times, Gallery Season Beckons, September 10.

Camper, Fred, Chicago Reader, Hot and Heady, September 24, Volume 33, No. 52.

Rosenfeld, Kathryn, Artnet.com, That Kind of Fall, October 14, 2004.

2003

Becker, Josef Dr., Bild Frankfurt, Kunst-Feinschmecker auf der Pirsch, September.

2002

Chicago Cultural Center, Here and Now, exhibition catalog, curated by James Rondeau, Gregory Knight, Marianne Richter and Lanny Silverman.

Stein, Lisa, Chicago Tribune, Artists Profile Adam Scott, July.

Cunniff, Bill, Chicago Sun-Times, Up-and-coming Artists get star treatment at Cultural Center, October.

Artner, Alan, Chicago Tribune, Art Review- Here and Now, October.

2000

New American Paintings, Midwest #29 Catalog, Juror: Joan Rothfus

Newsstand Dates: August 2000 / September 2000

 

Curatorial Experience:

Co-owner and director of Deluxe Projects.

 

Duties include: installation, gallery space maintenance, web based and hard-copy show announcements / graphic design, public relations, organizing opening night activities, fund-raising, and curatorial studio visits. Deluxe Projects was a curatorial collective consisting of Danielle Gustafson-Sundell, Andy Moore, and Carrie Gundersdorf, and Adam Scott. Starting in May of 2000 and ending in 2006, Deluxe Projects curated 11 solo projects in a variety of media and forms. From 2000-2004 Deluxe Projects was located in the 500 W. Cermak building. Eight of the eleven shows took place in our gallery space. Three of the projects were located in the various incarnations of the “Stray Show”. Two of those projects took the form of posters and underground “zines”. Our Next project will be the publishing of Andy Moore’s 700 page graphic novel.

 

***Deluxe Projects was included in Artists Run Chicago at the Hyde Park Art Center, curated Britton Bertran and Allison Peters Quinn.

Deluxe Projects participated in the form of a free poster that consisted of a love letter to future young DIY gallery spaces.

Deluxe Projects Artists shown:

Carl Warnick (Los Angeles), Nancy Ford (Chicago) Curtis Stage (Los Angeles), Cindy Lohr (Formerly Chicago), Millhouse Collective (Milwaukee), Rihad Miha (New York), Michelle Grabner (Chicago), Andy Moore (Chicago), John Parot (Chicago), The Biotic Baking Brigade (San Francisco), Tim Kerr (Austin, TX), Mike Thomas (owner of Dogmatic Gallery, Chicago), Kay Rosen ( Chicago), John Paul Ricco (Art Historian, Toronto), Ken Fandell (Chicago).