Hasted Kraeutler

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Artist Biography

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Sarah Hasted and Marc Dennis

The hyperrealist painter Marc Dennis (b. 1969) applies his wry, witty sense of humor and technical mastery of his medium to his hyperrealist compositions, creating stunningly evocative still lifes or compelling works of institutional critique that suggest the darker side of things usually associated with beauty, luxury, and glamour. Armed with a keenly observant critical eye and a healthy taste for irony, he has always been comfortable with pushing the envelope, and the glorious formal elements of his paintings— their bold compositions and gorgeously rendered surfaces—both belie and enhance the subtly subversive commentaries they contain.

Dennis straddles the line between light and dark, pleasure and power. His arrangements of jewel-studded daisies, women’s silken undergarments, or piles of fuzzy teddy bears are so superficially delicious that they round the bend into a more dystopian vision. He carries that macabre sensibility into minutely observed anthropological studies that recall the painted perfection of Vermeer’s lighted interiors and the meticulous vision of Dutch vanitas. In these works, Dennis explores the withered shells of dead beetles and the sinewy carcasses of flayed meat, or delves into the iridescent feather patterns of domesticated birds, evaluating the surfaces and textures of nature’s glory with a morbid, scientific focus. Recent works place modern protagonists in conversation with canonized art historical works— investigating the contradictions and manipulations inherent to any civilized system, including that of the art world. 

Dennis chooses to pierce the Brechtian divide between artwork, artist, and audience that has been preserved throughout the history of painting, and—much as Manet did with his seminal 1865 work Olympia—forces viewers into a position of active self-awareness. Often canvases feature a painting within a painting, depicting a human subject standing before a canonized work of art, such as Courbet’s Origin of the World or Caravaggio’s Bacchus, which Dennis reproduces to perfection. Opening a window onto the very act in which a viewer is presently engaged—the act of looking at work of art —these compositions rupture the psychological space of total absorption and enjoyment a painting is meant to offer, encouraging a more thoughtful, critical, and engaged relationship to the dynamics involved in the preservation of Culture.

Marc Dennis received his B.F.A. from the Tyler School of Art and his M.F.A. from The University of Texas at Austin. His paintings have been exhibited throughout the world and are included in numerous private and public collections, including those of Glenn and Amanda Fuhrman, John and Amy Phelan, Beth DeWoody and Firooz Zahedi, David and Jennifer Stockman, Bill and Maria Bell, Larry and Marilyn Fields, Sean and Tammy McCarthy, Michael Danoff and Jo Laird, The Rockwell Museum of Western Art, and The Neuberger Berman Collection.

 

Exhibitions

Marc Dennis

An Artist, A Rabbi And A Curator Walk Into A Bar...
Nov 08, 2013 - Feb 08, 2014

Sketchy

Rómulo Celdrán, Marc Dennis, Aleksandar Duravcevic, Trevor Guthrie, Leanne Shapton, Paolo Ventura
Jul 09 - Aug 16, 2013

Marc Dennis

Honey Bunny
Oct 20 - Dec 03, 2011

Press

Pasatiempo

Mind your manners: Marc Dennis takes on cell slobs
Sep 04, 2014

Juxtapoz

Museum Visits with Marc Dennis
Mar 21, 2014

Beautiful Decay

Marc Dennis’ Hyper-Realistic Paintings of Viewers Gazing at Famous Art
Mar 03, 2014

Whitehot Magazine

Marc Dennis Interview
Feb 17, 2014

Stargazette

Neighbors: Elmira College professor Marc Dennis named to ‘25 Artists to Watch’ list
Feb 05, 2014

Time Magazine

Check Out the World’s Best Collection of Cat Art
Jan 13, 2014

Nailed

Artist Feature Marc Dennis ...IMMEDIATE AND VISCERAL; REFLECTING A PARADOX OF DUALITIES...
Jan 10, 2014

Los Angeles Times

Cat-themed art show to pounce on L.A.
Dec 11, 2013

Modern Painters

Studio Check - Marc Dennis
Dec 01, 2013

Blouin ARTINFO

One-Line Reviews: Pithy Takes on Brancusi, The biennale, and More
Nov 22, 2013

Village Voice

Marc Dennis’s Paintings Are No Joke
Nov 20, 2013

the Wild

Getting Real wit Painter Marc Dennis
Nov 19, 2013

The Brooklyn Quarterly

Marc Dennis: "Paint is sex. Photography is not sex."
Nov 18, 2013

Huffington Post

Marc Dennis: An Artist, A Curator And A Rabbi Walk Into A Bar...
Nov 04, 2013

Huffington Post

Marc Dennis: 10 Hyper-realistic Paintings That Will Forever Pervert Your View Of Art History
Nov 03, 2013

Hi Fructose

Exclusive Interview with Marc Dennis
Oct 28, 2013

Huffington Post

Haiku Reviews: Not –Quite Minimalism, Hallucinatory Hyper-Realsim And ‘The Glass Menagerie’
Dec 16, 2011

Blackbook

MARC DENNIS’ ‘HONEY BUNNY’ AT THE HASTED KRAEUTLER GALLERY GETS TO THE MEAT OF THE MATTER
Dec 03, 2011

Artlog

Amy Phelan’s Fall Gallery Highlights: Astrageous
Nov 22, 2011

Whitehot Magazine

Marc Dennis at Hasted Kraeutler
Nov 01, 2011

Dirty Magazine

Marc Dennis' Hyper-Reality
Oct 20, 2011

Bon

Amy Phelan
Aug 01, 2011

News

Marc Dennis

Marc Dennis painting to be exhibited at The Japanese American National Museum
Sep 12, 2014

Marc Dennis, Awol Erizku & Martin Schoeller

Hasted Kraeutler artists included in Shaquille O'Neal's booth at Expo Chicago
Sep 08, 2014

Marc Dennis

A$$holes on Cell Phones, exhibition of new drawngs by Marc Dennis
Aug 29, 2014

Marc Dennis

An Artist, A Rabbi And A Curator Walk Into A Bar... Artist's Reception
Nov 07, 2013

Marc Dennis

Honey Bunny, Artist Reception
Oct 20, 2011