Sean Hopp
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Sean Mathew Hopp (born 1970) is a surrealist painter, graphic designer, musician, and the founder of the experimental art and music collective Mathbat [1]. His paintings are featured in public collections in Chicago, Los Angeles, and London, as well as many private collections throughout the US, Europe, and Australia. Hopp's body of work spans over 250 finished oil paintings, as well as numerous prints, drawings, and murals.
Hopp's recent series of dark portraits, which have remained generally consistent in style since the early 1990's, constitute a "study of an imaginary group of saints and their internal demons". The portraits offer psychological examinations of their sometimes shrouded subjects, and feature themes of both western and eastern religions, as well as mysticism, gnosticism, and the occult. His work is often considered disturbing and absurd, but alternately has been described as spiritual, ethereal, and darkly comic.
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[edit] Biography
Sean Hopp was born in Oakland, California, in 1970. He moved around the States frequently throughout his childhood, and spent his formative years in Cleveland, Ohio. Spending much of his adolescence in museums and libraries, he became heavily influenced by the psychological revelations and obsessive creative process of late-twentieth century artists like H.R. Giger.
Hopp's paintings are created with a combination of oil, acrylic, tempera, charcoal, ink, found artifacts, organic material and bodily fluids. He claims to use both hands to paint, and frequently uses his fingers rather than brushes, in an experimental technique using modifications and "misunderstandings" of the traditional oil layering processes established by the early renaissance artists Jan van Eyck and Albrecht Dürer.
Sean Hopp currently lives, works, and teaches in Chicago with his family and a small artist collective, and is an active member of Chicago art, design, and music communities.
[edit] Exhibitions
- Aesthetic Eye Gallery. Chicago. April 2006.
- L2kontemporary. Los Angeles. July 2005.
- Peter Jones Gallery. Strange and Bizarre Art Show. Chicago. July 2005.
- Aesthetic Eye Gallery. Chicago. October 2004.
- Perihelion Arts. Phoenix. September 2004.
- Around the Coyote. Fall Arts Festival. Chicago. September 2004.
- High Risk Gallery. Chicago. July 2004.
- New Arts Invitational Salon Exhibition of Small Works. Kutztown, PA. May 2004.
- High Risk Gallery. Chicago. February 2004.
- Limner Gallery. New York. December 2003.
- Diego Victorio Gallery. Miami, Florida. November 2003.
- Limner Gallery. New York. October 2003.
- Chicago Artists' Coalition, CAC Art Open. Chicago. October 2003.
- Williamsburg Art & Historical Center. New York. September 2003.
- Morgan Park Academy. Chicago. September 2003.
- Around the Coyote. Fall Arts Festival. Chicago. September 2003.
- High Risk Gallery. Chicago. August 2003.
- Galleri Art. Kirkcudbright, Scotland. August 2003.
- Cork Street Gallery. London. July 2003.
- David Leonardis Gallery. Chicago. July 2003.
- New Arts Invitational Salon Exhibition. Kutztown, PA. May 2003.
- University of Illinois at Chicago, Ward Gallery. Chicago. April 2003.
- Monkey Business Gallery. Chicago. March 2003.
- Zoo Studios. Chicago. December 2002.
- Northwestern University, Dittmar Gallery. Chicago. November 2002.
- Dark Millennia Studios. Denver. July 2002.
- Stolizzo Gallery. Chicago. October 2001.
- Chicago Artists' Coalition, CAC Art Open. Chicago. October 2001.
- Columbia College, Glass Curtain Gallery. Chicago. November 2000.
- Peter Jones Gallery. Adam and Eve Show. Chicago. July 2000.
- Dupreau Gallery. Chicago. March 2000.
- 2828 Gallery. Chicago. November 1999.
- CBGB Gallery 313. New York. June 1999.
- Izzo's Artery. Chicago. February 1998.
- Guilty & Innocent Productions. Chicago. January 1998.
- Poop Studios. Chicago. September 1997.
- Altered Image Gallery. Cleveland, Ohio. August 1997.
- Studio Danzalla. Kent, Ohio. March 1993.
- Kent State University. Kent, Ohio. December 1992.
[edit] Funding
2004 George Sugarman Foundation Grant
