David Herbert (artist)

David Herbert. Beautiful Superman (2007).

David Herbert (born July 16, 1977)[1] is an American sculptor. He remakes cultural icons such as Mickey Mouse, Superman and a VHS cassette.

Life and work

David Herbert was born in Seattle, Washington. He gained a B.F.A. from the Cornish College of the Arts in Seattle and an M.F.A. from Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond.[2] He worked initially with video, before changing to sculpture.[3]

One of the highlights[4] of the group show Scarecrow at the Postmasters Gallery in New York in July 2006, was Herbert's VHS, a giant replica of a videocassete of 2001: A Space Odyssey.[4] The work, made in 2005 from foam, plexiglass and latex paint, measures 50" × 12" × 96" (127 × 30 × 244 cm).[5][6]

In December 2006, in The Bong Show at the Leslie Tonkonow Gallery in New York, Herbert's Creature from Bong Water Bog, was a "hilarious"[7] green head with scales, twice life-size, open mouth and partially underwater in a glass tank; it "recalls the melodrama of its black-lagoon forebear while the tubular pink plants surrounding it strike a phallic vibe."[7]

A VHS tape cassette 7½" long of the type replicated by Herbert in a 96" sculpture, VHS.

In January 2007, his solo show, I (heart) New York, took place at the Postmasters Gallery in New York.[8] The center of the show was a 14-foot (4.2 m) tall sculpture of a decaying Empire State Building; other iconic structures were shown in more sculptures.[9] Drawings included a depression era speaker and a burning flag with a KKK member.[9]

Herbert was included in Postmaster Gallery's installation at the 2007 Miami Pulse festival; his work Beautiful Superman was described by Artforum as "an impressively towering sculpture".[10] In 2008, in the show Amerika: Back to the Future at the Postmasters Gallery, he exhibited a foam-core model of the "Starship Enterprise",[11] supported by a wooden framework and with Paleolithic markings all over it,[12] and also a depiction of Mickey Mouse—"retro-primitivist sculptures [which] reconfigure 20th century icons ... as crudely constructed stone-age totems".[13]

In March 2009, his work appeared in the America festival Discover US! in Berlin, which presented 18 contemporary US artists.[14] Herbert used American entertainment icons as a subject, transforming Superman into a skeletal figure of pain and Mickey Mouse into a feeble puppet, pointing to the reality behind the travesty of everyday life.[15]

In June 2008, two works, Beautiful Superman and Western Model, were included in Freedom, the eleventh staging of The Hague Sculpture in The Hague, focusing that year on sculpture of American artists active since 1958.[16] The exhibition took place in the Lange Voorhout avenue and was opened by the Mayor, Jozias van Aartsen; the theme of freedom was chosen for its particular association with the United States.[17] Herbert was provided with accommodation and made his work in the Zijderveld studio in liaison with the carpentry workshop.[18] Western Model is an object which fuses a wooden car with a house on top of it;[18] the car is modelled on the Ford Model T.

His solo show Nostalgia for Infinity took place at the Postmasters Gallery in May 2009,[11] and took as its starting point work by illustrators and animators[19] to make "playful, mixed-media sculptures of architectural and pop cultural monuments in various states of deconstruction and dilapidation."[20] He reconstructed out of chicken wire and spray foam a large version of Ridley Scott's alien, titled Monarch, showing the alien with a butterfly on its hand and sitting in a rocking chair.[11] He transcribed the first Mickey Mouse cartoon, Steamboat Willie, in a stop-motion video, Séance for the Symphony, with flatulent sounds in the background and crude cardboard characters, with the result that "The tension between the cartoon and its humble re-creation educes a drama that’s both sad and beautiful."[11]

His pencil on paper drawing Screwj was one of the artworks in an auction by The New Yorker in 2009 to raise funds for the Friends of the High Line, who aid an elevated railway along the West Side of Manhattan.[2] In December 2009, Don't Flee the Artmarket was a group show at the Postmasters Gallery of nearly 300 works, one of the "quirky highlights"[21] being Herbert's portraits in graphite of a sad lost R2-D2 and C-3PO.[21] Herbert lives and works in New York.[2]

Selected exhibitions

[22]

Collections

References

  1. 1 2 "David Herbert", Postmasters Gallery. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  2. 1 2 3 "Passport to the arts", The New Yorker, 2009. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  3. ↑ "David Herbert", Discover US!, 2009. Retrieved March 28, 2010.
  4. 1 2 Johnson. "The Listings: July 7 - July 13", The New York Times, July 7, 2006. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  5. ↑ "Scarecrow—curator David Hunt", NYArts, September/October 2006. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  6. ↑ VHS opens the book: Dailey, Meghan; Saatchi Gallery (2009), The Shape of Things to Come: New Sculpture, Rizzoli International Publications. ISBN 0-8478-3253-8, ISBN 978-0-8478-3253-8.
  7. 1 2 Baker, R. C. "Buzz-Worthy", The Village Voice, December 19, 2006. Retrieved December 27, 2010.
  8. 1 2 "David Herbert:Biography", Saatchi Gallery. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  9. 1 2 "I (heart) New York", oneartworld.com. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  10. ↑ Velasco, David. "Miami vices", Artforum, December 8, 2007. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  11. 1 2 3 4 Zegeer, Brian. "David Herbert, 'Nostalgia for Infinity' ", Time Out (New York), June 4, 2009. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  12. ↑ Baker, R. C. " 'Amerika: Back to the Future' ", The Village Voice, June 10, 2008. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  13. ↑ Halter, Ed. "The tomorrow people", Rhizome (editorial content), May 29, 2008. Retrieved March 28, 2010.
  14. ↑ Reichert, Kolja. "Tanz die Bilanz!", Der Tagesspiegel, April 7, 2009. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  15. ↑ Preuss, Sebastian. "Coney Island lässt grüßen", Berliner Zeitung, March 30, 2009. Retrieved March 27, 2010. "Und auch David Herbert treibt mit Ikonen des amerikanischen Entertainments sein Spiel. Aus Superman macht er einen skelettierten Schmerzensmann, aus Mickey Mouse eine ärmliche Gliederpuppe. Es ist der alltägliche Karneval, die Wirklichkeit hinter der Travestie."
  16. ↑ "The Hague Sculpture", denhaagsculptuur.com, 2008. Retrieved March 28, 2010.
  17. ↑ "Beeldhouwkunst VS centraal op Den Haag Sculptuur", Dagblad van het Noorden, June 4, 2008 (ANP syndication). Retrieved March 28, 2010.
  18. 1 2 Roeththof, Guikje; Van Den Dikkenberg, Rutger. "Zonder kunstenaar geen kunst", Netherlands: PM, p. July 25, 11, 2008. Retrieved March 28, 2010.
  19. ↑ "David Herbert 'Nostalgia for Infinity' ", NY Art Beat, 2009. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  20. ↑ "The Absolutely Crucial Spring Arts Preview", The L Magazine, March 18, 2009. Retrieved March 28, 2010.
  21. 1 2 McGarry, Kevin. "Bazaar Gifts", The New York Times, December 16, 2009. Retrieved March 27, 2010.
  22. ↑ "Resume (spring 2008)", David Herbert. Retrieved April 25, 2010.
  23. ↑ "Current list of works", 21c Museum. Retrieved March 27, 2010.

Further reading

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