Don Suggs
Encyclopedia
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
. Described as polymorphic and stylistically variable, his oeuvre includes paintings, drawings, photographs, and sculptures and is recognized for its use of color.
Biography
Don Suggs was born in Fort Worth, TexasTexas
Texas is the second largest U.S. state by both area and population, and the largest state by area in the contiguous United States.The name, based on the Caddo word "Tejas" meaning "friends" or "allies", was applied by the Spanish to the Caddo themselves and to the region of their settlement in...
and grew up in San Diego. He received a B.A. in 1969 from University of California, Los Angeles
University of California, Los Angeles
The University of California, Los Angeles is a public research university located in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA. It was founded in 1919 as the "Southern Branch" of the University of California and is the second oldest of the ten campuses...
(UCLA), having studied psychology, film, and art. He received both an M.A. in 1971 and an M.F.A. in 1972 from UCLA.
Suggs taught drawing, painting, sculpture and color theory from 1972-1984 at Florida State University
Florida State University
The Florida State University is a space-grant and sea-grant public university located in Tallahassee, Florida, United States. It is a comprehensive doctoral research university with medical programs and significant research activity as determined by the Carnegie Foundation...
at Tallahassee, Franconia College
Franconia College
Franconia College was a small experimental liberal arts college in Franconia, New Hampshire, United States. It opened in 1963 on the site of The Forest Hills Hotel on Agassiz Road, and closed in 1978, after years of declining enrollment and increasing financial difficulties.A small, eclectic...
in New Hampshire
New Hampshire
New Hampshire is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. The state was named after the southern English county of Hampshire. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Atlantic Ocean to the east, and the Canadian...
, University of Southern California
University of Southern California
The University of Southern California is a private, not-for-profit, nonsectarian, research university located in Los Angeles, California, United States. USC was founded in 1880, making it California's oldest private research university...
, and Otis
Otis
-People:*Otis family, Prominent American political family*Otis *Otis -Fictional characters:*Otis, a puppy in The Adventures of Milo and Otis*Otis the Aardvark, a BBC puppet character...
Art Institute. Since 1983 he has been teaching painting and drawing at UCLA. Over the years, he has been co-editor with Paul Vangelisti of several non-profit art and literature publications: Boxcar, Forehead, and Ribot. He has published four art and poetry books, collaborating with Paul Vangelisti and Martha Ronk.
Suggs currently lives and works in Los Angeles.
Suggs' work
During his career, Suggs has worked in three- to five-year periods on a particular idea and with specific media. He has followed his varied aesthetic interests in a methodical way and is thus portrayed as an artist’s artist. Illustrating the continuity of a rigorous aesthetic investigation, Suggs’ major bodies of work include Passions, Autochthonous Views, Proprietary Views, Portraits, Old Genres, Heuristic Paintings, Tondototems, Paint Ons and Feastpoles. Renowned for his painting, Suggs’ practice in this medium is said to range from geometric abstraction to abstract expressionismAbstract expressionism
Abstract expressionism was an American post–World War II art movement. It was the first specifically American movement to achieve worldwide influence and put New York City at the center of the western art world, a role formerly filled by Paris...
to conceptualism
Conceptualism
Conceptualism is a philosophical theory that explains universality of particulars as conceptualized frameworks situated within the thinking mind. Intermediate between Nominalism and Realism, the conceptualist view approaches the metaphysical concept of universals from a perspective that denies...
to photorealism
Photorealism
Photorealism is the genre of painting based on using the camera and photographs to gather information and then from this information creating a painting that appears photographic...
to pop art
Pop art
Pop art is an art movement that emerged in the mid 1950s in Britain and in the late 1950s in the United States. Pop art challenged tradition by asserting that an artist's use of the mass-produced visual commodities of popular culture is contiguous with the perspective of fine art...
.
Suggs has been showing with LA Louver gallery in Venice, California since 1977.
Exhibitions
Since 1970, Suggs’ works have been included in dozens of group exhibitions across the United States. He has been reviewed in numerous publications including ArtforumArtforum
Artforum is an international monthly magazine specializing in contemporary art.-Publication:The magazine is published ten times a year, September through May, along with an annual summer issue...
, Art in America
Art in America
Art in America is an illustrated monthly, international magazine concentrating on the contemporary art world, including profiles of artists and genres, updates about art movements, show reviews and event schedules. It is designed for collectors, artists, dealers, art professionals and other...
, Artweek, Frieze
Frieze (magazine)
-Publication:frieze is published eight times a year and is based in London. As well as essays, exhibition reviews and columns by forward-thinking writers, artists, critics and curators, the magazine includes music reviews, artist projects, interviews and sections on design and...
, LACMA publications, Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
, LA Weekly
LA Weekly
LA Weekly is a free weekly tabloid-sized "alternative weekly" in Los Angeles, California. It was founded in 1978 by Editor/Publisher Jay Levin and a board of directors that included actor-producer Michael Douglas...
, Modern Painters
Modern Painters
Modern Painters is book on art by John Ruskin which argues that recent painters emerging from the tradition of the picturesque are superior in the art of landscape to the old masters. The book was primarily written as a defence of the later work of J.M.W. Turner. Ruskin used the book to argue...
, and Smithsonian
Smithsonian (magazine)
Smithsonian is the official journal published by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. The first issue was published in 1970.-History:...
magazine. Don Suggs’ solo exhibitions include:
2007
Don Suggs: Concentric, LA Louver, Venice, CA Exhibition page
2007
Don Suggs: One Man Group Show, curated by Meg Linton
Meg Linton
Meg Linton is a curator and the Director of Galleries and Exhibitions at the Ben Maltz Gallery at Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles. She was previously the Executive Director of the Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum and has held many curatorial and teaching positions in California...
at the Ben Maltz Gallery
Ben Maltz Gallery
The Ben Maltz Gallery at Otis College of Art and Design in Los Angeles is a professional art space that presents group and solo exhibitions in a variety of media. The Gallery’s main focus is showcasing contemporary art that pushes the boundaries of form and subject matter in the context of national...
, Otis College of Art and Design
Otis College of Art and Design
Otis College of Art and Design is an art and design college in Los Angeles, California.The school's programs, accredited by WASC and National Association of Schools of Art and Design, include four-year BFA degrees in illustration, fine arts, graphic design, architecture, landscape design, interior...
, Los Angeles, CA Exhibition page
2005
Don Suggs, Ben Maltz Gallery at Otis College of Art and Design, Los Angeles, CA (traveling)
2004
Pacifiers and Tondo Studies, Peter Blake Gallery, Laguna Beach, CA
Paintings and Feastpoles, College of Creative Studies
College of Creative Studies
The College of Creative Studies is one of the three undergraduate colleges at the University of California, Santa Barbara, unique within the University of California system in terms of structure and philosophy...
, UCSB, Santa Barbara, CA
Compound Photographs, Thomas McCormick Gallery, Chicago, IL
1997
Hexane Photographs, LA Louver, Venice, CA
1993
Old Genres - Photoworks, LA Louver, Venice, CA
1989
Clearing, drawing installation at LACMA, Los Angeles, CA
1987
Don Suggs, Struve Gallery, Chicago, IL
1985
Painting from 1982-84, LA Louver, Venice, CA
Don Suggs: Paintings, Quint Gallery, San Diego, CA
1982
Don Suggs, LA Louver, Venice, CA
Night Studies, Quint Gallery, San Diego, CA
1977
Don Suggs, LA Louver, Venice, CA
Public Collections
- Los Angeles County Museum of ArtLos Angeles County Museum of ArtThe Los Angeles County Museum of Art is an art museum in Los Angeles, California. It is located on Wilshire Boulevard along Museum Row in the Miracle Mile vicinity of Los Angeles, adjacent to the George C. Page Museum and La Brea Tar Pits....
, Los Angeles, CA - University of California, Los AngelesUniversity of California, Los AngelesThe University of California, Los Angeles is a public research university located in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, USA. It was founded in 1919 as the "Southern Branch" of the University of California and is the second oldest of the ten campuses...
, CA - University of California, Santa BarbaraUniversity of California, Santa BarbaraThe University of California, Santa Barbara, commonly known as UCSB or UC Santa Barbara, is a public research university and one of the 10 general campuses of the University of California system. The main campus is located on a site in Goleta, California, from Santa Barbara and northwest of Los...
, CA - Laguna Beach Museum of Art, Laguna Beach, CA
- La Jolla Museum of Contemporary Art, La Jolla, CA
- Museum of Fine Arts, Santa Fe, NM
- Princeton UniversityPrinceton UniversityPrinceton University is a private research university located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. The school is one of the eight universities of the Ivy League, and is one of the nine Colonial Colleges founded before the American Revolution....
, Princeton, New JerseyPrinceton, New JerseyPrinceton is a community located in Mercer County, New Jersey, United States. It is best known as the location of Princeton University, which has been sited in the community since 1756...