David Dupuis
Drawings
January 10 - February 8, 2014
Opening Reception: Friday, January 10, 6-8pm
Derek Eller Gallery is pleased to present a solo exhibition of works on paper by David Dupuis. !
Dupuis’ intimate drawings are like pages of a diary suffused with longing, sexual desire, and the
attendant experiences of solitude and despair. Meticulously rendered, using color pencil,
graphite, and collage, each drawing is a world unto itself, populated by swirling biomorphic
forms and male figures, often in states of undress. Like his predecessors Louise Bourgeois,
Juan Miro, James Ensor, and Jean Delville, sex, death, and an aspiration for beauty haunt his
work.
“His body which I had come to know so well, glowed in the light and charged and thickened the
air between us. Then something opened in my brain, a secret, noiseless door swung open,
frightening me: it had not occurred to me until that instant that in fleeing from his body, I
confirmed and perpetuated his body’s power over me. Now, as though I had been branded, his
body was burned into my mind, into my dreams, and all this time he did not take his eyes from
me.” James Baldwin, Giovanni’s Room
David Dupuis’ work was recently included in Utopia/Dystopia: Construction and Destruction in
Photography and Collage, Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Houston, TX; It's Always Summer on
the Inside, organized by Dan McCarthy, Anton Kern Gallery, New York, NY; B-Out, curated by
Scott Hug, Andrew Edlin Gallery, New York, NY; and Hair and Skin, curated by Isaac Lyles,
Derek Eller Gallery, New York, NY. His work is included in a number of museum collections
including the Whitney Museum of American Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the
Hammer Museum, and the New Museum of Contemporary Art.