Details:

This oil-transfer drawing was created by saturating a piece of paper with oil stick pigment and then drawing on the back of it with a ballpoint pen. The pigment is transferred to another piece of paper the artist puts underneath, resulting in a work that resembles a circuit board or an architectural plan.
Unframed

① Artwork:

Novelty Machine

This oil-transfer drawing was created in a process that mimics carbon paper. The artist saturates a piece of paper with oil stick pigment and then draws on the back of it with a ballpoint pen using a few elemental instruments—such as a ruler. This transfers the pigment to another piece of found paper the artist puts underneath, which becomes the final work. This labor-intensive process achieves dazzling results; the final drawing/painting looks similar to a circuit board or an architectural plan—and can also evoke early European abstract art.

Sullivan's practice frequently involves adopting a distinct series of limitations. The primitive transfer process he used to create this work draws inspiration from the process of early music recordings; technological limitations during that period resulted in works often overlaid with unintentional yet otherworldly tones. Sullivan's oil-transfer process “records” in paint the lines of his drawings, while also capturing unpredictable marks of chance.

Specs:

10 inches
8 inches

③ Artist:

Sean Sullivan

Sean Sullivan’s work exists at the intersection of several media, including painting, drawing and writing. The artist places a piece of found paper face down on top of a color transfer sheet marked with oil stick, and then makes a drawing on the reverse side of the found paper with a ballpoint pen; each color in a finished piece is represented by a different sheet of oil transfer paper in a sort of hybrid process of drawing and printmaking. Sullivan’s compact works are similar to haiku, as they are created through a specific set of procedures and parameters, yet ultimately become limitless in their deft play.

BIO:

Sean Sullivan was born in the Bronx, New York in 1975.

Solo and two-person exhibitions of Sullivan’s work have taken place at: Feuilleton in Los Angeles, California (2020); BDDW Annex Gallery in New York City (2019); String Figures, with Christoph Schellberg, a collaboration between Markus Luttgen Gallery and Linn Luhn Gallery  in Dusseldorf, Germany (2019); à ùne éa at Jack Hanley Gallery in New York City (2018); WEST / END / BLUES at 57w57Arts in New York City (2017); Ubbe & Sacco at 510 Warren Street Gallery in Hudson, New York City (2017); and Sunset, Saudade Station at Devening Projects in Chicago, Illinois (2017).

Group exhibitions that have shown Sullivan’s work have taken place at: Chris Sharp Gallery in Los Angeles, California (2021); Slow and Everywhere Like Breath at Markus Luettgen Gallery in Düsseldorf, Germany (2020); Solitude at Shrine Gallery in New York City (2020); Ute Parduhn Gallery in Dusseldorf, Germany (2018); Mon Oncle at Museum for Drawing in Hunningen, Belgium (2017); and We’ll turn Manhattan into an island of joy at Markus Luttgen Gallery in Cologne, Germany (2017).

Sullivan lives and works in Hudson, New York.

Sean Sullivan:
Novelty Machine, 2021
Oil on kitikata paper
8.0 × 10.0 inches /