How often are you the first among your friends to try something new?
Very often
What do you want people to know most about you?
Cleveland Dean has learned to live his life through the course bristles of a brush. Cultured on the south side of the City of Chicago he soon saw the influences of other sections of his home and encompassed them within himself. Always having an affinity with artistic expression he dabbled in many forms of art including drawing, songwriting, poetry, spoken word to name a few. Before certain realizations his art wasn’t considered art to him but simply a hobby. After time, the realization was made that this indeed formed a roadmap to his psyche. Being self-taught he refuses to be “professionally” schooled to techniques of art, believing that, a true artist disciplines oneself to find their way and the means for expression. Gravitating to the influences of the early American Abstract Expressionist movement he took all the elements of his life and formed an individual style that expresses his vision, intellect, passions, transgressions and love.
Gravitating to the influences of the early American Abstract Expressionist movement and Asian calligraphy, Cleveland pulls from various elements and life experience, and has formed an individual style that reflects his vision, intellect, passions, transgressions, and love. The centered ideology is that which is to evoke individual thought for the viewer as opposed to being conditioned to what one should think or see. As a self-taught artist, he refuses to be “professionally” schooled to techniques of art, asserting that a true artist disciplines oneself to determine their own style, and the appropriate means and medium(s) for expression.
“My work is that which bridges the unconscious and conscious; painted in depictions abstracted from my psyche. This can only be done by stepping outside my self-sanctuary and embracing that which exists deep within my soul.
Many times when I paint I black out, go into a trance and awake to realize I have just given birth to expression. I do not know the individual within me who paints. My physical frame is simply its vessel to dissertate my mentality in form. I wish not to know this entity. I do not wish for my physical existence to influence this metaphysical being. I allow it to create movement within a still depiction, letting my soul dance on canvas”.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Cleveland Dean has been part of several exhibitions and has been an influential contributor (deemed one of the pioneers) to the live painting exhibition movement that has found growth in Chicago.
Style Network (November 2006)
Work featured on ‘We Live Here’
5 Magazine (February 2007)
Artist Spotlight, Feature Article
Gianofer Fields, interview with Cleveland Dean, Old School Artist Cleveland Dean, National Public Radio, WBEZ (848), (Chicago, 17 July 2008)
Mural completed at A.N. Pritzer Elementary, Chicago (August 2008)
Nominated by the Chicago Artists Coalition as 2008 Chicago Artist to Watch (June 2008)
Chicago Artist Coalition Interview (September 2008)
Pepper Coate, “An Interview with Cleveland Dean - Chicago Artist to Watch”, Chicago Artist’s News (September 2008) p11, 19.
Aliya Levinson, Cleveland Dean “Chicago’s Dean of Art” Image Magazine (Aug/Sept 2008) p46.
Video short completed by Scott Montgomery Music Video Production Coneucopia Productions, Inc. “I’m an artist”
200+ works in private collection (September 2005 - April 2009)
SELECTED SOLO/ GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2009
Sticks and Stones –
Northeastern Illinois University Chicago, IL [group]
Thaw Chicago, IL [group]
2008
Chicago Artist Coalition Art Open Chicago, IL [group]
Unlearn Phaiz Gallery Chicago, IL [solo]
Juror for Fall into the Arts festival Illinois Wesleyan University Bloomington, IL [group]
Interpretable Chaos at Flatfile Gallery Chicago, IL [solo]
Look Gallery @ Macy's on State Street, Chicago, IL [solo]
R.E. Connect (c/o Cape Horn Group), Chicago IL [group]
Terra Museum of American Art Chicago IL [group]
Webster Wine Bar Chicago, IL [solo]
Humboldt Park Art Fair Chicago, IL [group]
2007
Color Motion Form Depth (pt. II) Chicago, IL [group]
@ Victor Hotel
Winter Arts Festival Chicago, IL [solo]
Q4 Gallery Chicago, IL [group]
Andrew Jackson Language Academy
Benefit Chicago, IL [group]
Save Darfur Benefit- Acknowledgement/ Chicago, IL [group]
Resolution @ Las Manos Gallery
Interpretable Chaos v.1 gallery of the
Hot House Chicago, IL [solo]
Humboldt Park Art Fair Chicago, IL [group]
PUMA/ Guillermo Vilas tribute-
All Rise Gallery Chicago, IL [group]
Q4 Gallery Chicago, IL [group]
Tzeta Gallery Chicago, IL [group]
Around the Coyote @ The Silver Room Chicago, IL [solo]
Around the Coyote @ Marshall McGearty Chicago, IL [group]
Art blowout @ Gary Comer Youth Center Chicago, IL [group]
2006
Collective Reasoning v.2 Chicago, IL [solo]
Soul Junkies @ Sonotheque Chicago, IL [solo]
Inner Sound System Chicago, IL [solo]
CoreNET Silent Auction Chicago, IL [group]
Espia - Espacino Imagen Alternativa Mexico City, Mexico
Espacio El Galeron- Desde
Chicago y en Oposicion Mexico City, Mexico [group]
Color Motion Form Depth
@ Victor Hotel (pt. I) Chicago, IL [group]
Around the Coyote Chicago, IL [group]
Just got here. I´m still trying to figure out how things work. You´re the first one I connect with. I´d love to hear your comments on my work
www.claudiaxavierdelima.com
take care!
Claudia
Man, you are the ONE! and I don't say that without meaning it....I'd be honored if you visited my blog and critiqued some of my work, www.eonscott.blogspot.com
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Just got here. I´m still trying to figure out how things work. You´re the first one I connect with. I´d love to hear your comments on my work
www.claudiaxavierdelima.com
take care!
Claudia
-teruyo
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