Bio

Born 1972, New Zealand
Lives and works in Australia

Stefan Dunlop’s artworks enigmatically turn the elements of visual design on their head. Compositions of collage fragment and tend towards abstraction. Illusionistic space collides with the flat surface of the canvas. Figures and objects appear to protrude out to a fourth dimension. Strong diagonal lines and pyramid shapes arrest the viewer and visually defy gravity. Poetic license is at play as colours of the Renaissance complement rather than obey nature.

Dunlop contextualises his work in today’s world of ‘fake news’ and post-internet art by addressing the Western art tradition with irony. He adheres to a critical approach based on an aesthetic discourse that employs abstract art as a response to digital technology. His response to the chaos confronting us today is to go back to the old-school order of paint and canvas, using collage and fragmentation to evoke the digital milieu’s over saturation of images.

Dunlop’s oeuvre has evolved from creating observational-based work and still lifes to figures in landscape. Early on, his work comprised monumental heroic figures painted in warm colours and bold gestural strokes. His recent work, in contrast, uses less structured, looser forms.

His focus is not on the finished painting but in the process - an honest and authentic engagement with materiality. He combines the formal elements, ‘mashing them together…extending their vocabulary,’ Dunlop explains. The artist grapples with composition, colour, line, shape, tone, texture and expansive space, pushing and pulling, adding and removing, painting over, and dragging and blurring paint, until he feels the completed work ‘ visually reverts or hums.’ …He presents a fragmented images that visually exhaust like pixellated computer graphics. He complete the process by adding a cheeky Jeff Koons-inspired figurative bunny head and a piece of cake on a plate. …The process painter of fragmented art hints it is an inside joke - a painting whose elements of design reveal a fourth dimension that in time will tell. (Extract from: Sarah Cox, Artist Profile, Issue 47, p.140-141)

Dunlop's studies have included a three month residency at the Leipzig International Art Programme, the University of Texas Artist Residency, the Slade School of Fine Art in London and the New York Studio School of Painting, Drawing and Sculpture.



EDUCATION

2010 University of Texas Artist Residency, Centraltrak, Dallas Texas
2002 Slade School of Fine Art, London
2001 New York Studio School of Painting Drawing & Sculpture, New York
2001 Slade School of Fine Art, London
2000 Chelsea College of Art, London
1994-96 Brisbane Institute of Art, Brisbane
1994-96 niversity of Queensland - Bachelor of Commerce


SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS

2022 Endless, Edwina Corlette, Brisbane
2020 Recent Work, Scott Livesey Galleries, Melbourne
2019 The Peasant Wedding, Galerie Pompom, Sydney
2019 Galerie Pompom, Sydney
2018 Requiem for the static King, Edwina Corlette Gallery, Brisbane
2017 Titles are Hard, Scott Livesey Galleries, Melbourne
2015 Super, Elastic, Bubble, Plastic, Edwina Corlette Gallery, Brisbane
2014 Porno for Pirates, Scott Livesey Galleries, Melbourne
2013 Rum, Sodomy and the Lash, Edwina Corlette Gallery at Sydney Contemporary Art Fair
2012 Concrete Plastic Monument to Nothingness, Scott Livesey Galleries, Melbourne
2012 Stefan Dunlop: Ten Years, University of the Sunshine Coast Art Gallery
2011 Rum Sodomy and the Lash, Edwina Corlette Gallery, Brisbane
2009 Select Paintings, Edwina Corlette Gallery, Brisbane
2008 The First Lie of Painting, Axia Modern Art, Melbourne
2007 Recent Paintings, Tim Olsen Annex Gallery, Sydney
2006 Pick of the Crop, Noosa Regional Gallery
2006 New Work, Fisher Galleries, Auckland, New Zealand
2004 Stefan Dunlop Painting, University Of The Arts London
2003 Cracker - Recent Paintings, Goya Galleries, Melbourne
2003 Cracker - Recent Paintings, House of House of Phillips Fine Art, Sydney
2003 Compression; Stefan Dunlop & Jason Szalla, Ensign Gallery, London
2002 People Places - Recent Paintings, House of Phillips Fine Art, Sydney
2002 Recent Paintings, Rex-Livingston Contemporary Art, Sydney


SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS

2021 Twenty One, Scott Livesey Galleries, Melbourne
2020 Auckland Art Fair, Edwina Corlette, Online
2019 The New Gallery Show, Edwina Corlette, Brisbane
2014 Twenty Fourteen, Scott Livesey Galleries, Melbourne
2013 Sydney Contemporary, Sydney, Edwina Corlette Gallery, Brisbane
2012 Edwina Corlette Gallery, Brisbane
2011 RBS Emerging Artist Award, Sydney
2011 The Stan and Maureen Duke Gold Coast Art Prize, Queensland
2011 Clayton Utz Launch Art Award, Brisbane
2011 Artereal, Sydney
2011 Wattle, The Cat Street Gallery, Hong Kong
2010 Art Hong Kong 10, Cat Street Gallery, Hong Kong
2010 The Stan and Maureen Duke Gold Coast Art Prize, Queensland
2010 London Art Fair, COMODAA, London
2010 Recent Acquisitions, Parliament House Collection, Canberra
2010 Clayton Utz Launch Art Award, Brisbane
2010 Signal 8 - The Cat Street Gallery, Hong Kong
2010 Approach to the Landscape, AXIA Modern Art, Melbourne
2010 Edwina Corlette Gallery, Small Works Show, Brisbane
2009 Iain Dawson Gallery - Sydney Australia
2009 Australia Now, COMODAA, London UK
2009 Launch, Metro Arts/Clayton Utz, Brisbane
2009 Chronology, The Cat Street Gallery, Hong Kong
2009 Edwina Corlette Gallery, Brisbane
2009 Noosa Regional Gallery, Traveling Scholarship Show
2008 Edwina Corlette Gallery, Brisbane A
2008 Duke Gold Coast Art Prize, Gold Coast City Art Gallery
2008 2 x 2, Tim Olsen Gallery, Sydney
2008 Narrative, Brenda May Gallery, Sydney
2008 Still Life, Brenda May Gallery, Sydney
2007 Sunshine Coast Art Prize, Caloundra Regional Art Gallery
2006 Conrad Jupiters Gold Coast Art Prize, Gold Coast City Art Gallery
2006 Tim Olsen Gallery, Sydney
2005 Art Aid - Royal College Of Art, London
2004 This Is 7, International Exhibition of New Painting - Accademy of Art Architecture & Design, Charles University - Prague, Czech Republic
2003 Conrad Jupiters Gold Coast Art Prize, Gold Coast City Art Gallery
2003 Goya Galleries, Melbourne
2002 House of Phillips Fine Art, Saint George Bank, Sydney
2001 Sadler Fine Arts, Mad River Post, New York
1991 Excellence in Youth Art, Brisbane


AWARDS, PRIZES & GRANTS

2020 Finalist, Sunshine Coast Art Prize, Caloundra Regional Gallery
2019 Finalist, Paddington Art Prize, Sydney
2019 Finalist, Sunshine Coast Art Prize, Caloundra Regional Gallery
2016 Finalist, Sunshine Coast Art Prize, Caloundra Regional Gallery
2011 RBS Emerging Artist Award, Sydney
2011 Clayton Utz Launch Art Award, Brisbane
2010 University of Texas at Dallas Grant
2010 Short listed Duke Gold Coast Art Prize
2010 Short listed Clayton Utz Launch Art Award, Brisbane
2010 Arts Queensland Career Development Grant
2009 University of Texas Artist Residency, Centraltrak, Dallas, Texas USA
2009 Short-listed - Launch Scholarship exhibition, Clayton Utz/Metro Arts, Brisbane
2008 Short listed - Gold Coast Art Prize, Gold Coast City Art Gallery
2007 Short listed - Sunshine Coast Art Prize, Caloundra Regional Art Gallery
2006 Short listed - Conrad Jupiters Art Prize, Gold Coast City Art Gallery
2004 Short listed - Canberra Art Prize
2004 Short listed - Cromwell’s Art Prize, Sydney
2003 Short listed - Conrad Jupiters Art Prize, Gold Coast City Art Gallery
2003 Short listed - Canberra Art Prize
2003 Nominated - Jerwood Artists Platform - London UK
2001 Vincente Scholarship, New York Studio School - Two Semester Scholarship
1991 Winner - QLD Excellence Youth Art Award


PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITIES

2010 Artist Talk - University of Texas at Dallas, Advanced Painting
2010 Artist Talk - Mckinney Avenue Contemporary, Dallas Texas
2010 Arts Queensland Professional Development Grant
2009 Exhibition floor Talk, Edwina Corlette Gallery, Brisbane
2006 Exhibition talk, Noosa Regional Gallery, Noosa


COLLECTIONS

Parliament House Collection, Canberra
Collection of the Ministerial Council on Education, Employment, Training and Youth Affairs - Melbourne


SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

2011 Richard Brettell Essay, http://www.stefandunlop.com/pdf/Brettell-Essay.pdf
2009 Radio RTA Hong Kong, Interview with Sarah Passmore & Linton Meagher, September
http://www.stefandunlop.com/assets/HongKongInterview.mp3
2009 The Arbuturian, Australia Now Review, September,
http://www.arbuturian.com񳏉/australia-now-contemporary-art
2008 Paintblog October, http://www.paintblog.ca񳏈ቦ቞/stefan-dunlop/
2008 Vogue Living July/August 'arts & events', p. 58
2007 Sydney Morning Herald, Open Gallery, Review Karen Pakula, November 10
2007 Vogue Living July/August, Margie Fraser Feature Article
2006 Suncoast Daily, Revive Magazine, Feature Article Smart Art
2005 Sydney Morning Herald, Open Gallery, Review Sunanda Creagh
2005 Tema Celste, Self Portrait Stefan Dunlop, www.temaceleste.com
2004 Prague Literary Review, July/August Issue, Review of group show ’This Is 7’ by Louis Armand http://www.shakes.cz/plr/
2003 Sydney Morning Herald October 25, Grey Scapes - Review Lenny Ann Low http://www.smh.com.au/articles񳏃ቦቴ�.html?from=storyrhs
2003 Interview on ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) Triple J. Interviewed by Fenella Kernebone on November 6, Melbourne Australia. http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/arts/default.htm
2003 The Agony And The Ecstasy, BBC (British Broadcasting Corporation) Online Entertainment - diary of Stefan Dunlop edited by Will Cantopher
www.bbc.co.uk/london/entertainment/galleries/dunlop_newpictures2004.shtml
http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/entertainment/galleries/dunlop_szalla_gallery.shtml
or willcantopher@bbc.co.uk
2004 This Is 7 - Group Exhibition Review, http://iforum.cuni.cz/IFORUM-922.html