Stephen Pusey (born 24 June 1952) is a New York-based artist of Irish and British descent known for abstract painting and earlier work as a painter of figurative community murals in London, UK.
Early Life and Education
Stephen Pusey was born on 24 June 1952 in London, England. He studied painting at Saint Martins School of Art in London, from which he graduated in 1975.
Career
From 1977 to 1982, Pusey painted large outdoor community murals on the exteriors of buildings around London, commissioned by local authorities. His most notable murals include the Covent Garden Earlham Street mural (1977) and the mural Children at Play on the Brixton Academy (1982).
His debut solo exhibition in the United States was at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center in 1986, after which he moved permanently to New York City. In the years that followed, his work expanded to include experimentation with digital media and net art, in addition to painting, drawing, and sculpture that combined calligraphic gesture ranging from figurative to abstract.
In 1994, he founded the online art and discussion hub Plexus with curator Yu Yeon Kim, with whom he also curated Omnizone: Perspectives in Mapping Digital Culture in 1997. He was a founding member of the Foundation for Digital Culture in 1996.
Concurrent with his digital and network explorations, Pusey continued exhibiting his paintings in New York City and internationally. In 2019, he was commissioned by the Seoul Metropolitan Government, South Korea, to paint a five-section mural in the pavilion of the Oil Tank Culture Park in Mapo District, Seoul.
Artistic Style
Pusey's abstract paintings are characterized by calligraphic, cursive marks that occupy a space between writing and drawing. Art critic John Yau described his work as "courting a chaotic mélange of marks but never descending into it," noting that Pusey "respects each of the gestures he makes enough not to destroy them." Critic Robert C. Morgan wrote that Pusey "creates a labyrinthine stasis, embedding distant feelings of the universe that appear in the process of suspending opticality."
Selected Exhibitions and Recognition
- Solo exhibition at P.S.1 Contemporary Art Center, New York (1986)
- Omnizone: Perspectives in Mapping Digital Culture (1997)
- Commissioned mural at Oil Tank Culture Park, Seoul, South Korea (2019)
- Works held in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York
References
- Carol Kenna & Stephen Lobb (ed.), For Walls With Tongues - An Oral History of Street Murals 1966-1985, Greenwich Mural Workshop
- Dr. Alan W. Barnett, Community Murals - The Peoples Art, The Art Alliance Press, U.S.A.
- John Yau (6 February 2021), "Stephen Pusey's Remarkable Calligraphic Abstractions", Hyperallergic
- Robert C. Morgan (2008), "Stephen Pusey (Review)", Art Press, Paris (#342)
- Matthew Mirapaul (18 June 1998), "Omnizone Tries to Map the Unmappable", The New York Times
