Marlene Dumas is a contemporary South African artist and painter currently based in the Netherlands.
Life and work
Dumas was born in 1953 in Cape Town, South Africa and grew up in Kuils River in the Western Cape, where her father had a vineyard. Dumas began painting in 1973 and showed her political concerns and reflections on her identity as a white woman of Afrikaans descent in South Africa. She studied art at the University of Cape Town from 1972 to 1975, and then at Ateliers '63 in Haarlem, which is now located in Amsterdam. She studied psychology at the University of Amsterdam in 1979 and 1980. She currently lives and works in the Netherlands and is one of Hollands most prolific artists. She is also widely regarded as one of the most influential painters working today. Dumas has also featured in some films,,,,, and. Several books included illustrations by Dumas,- Marlene Dumas: Myths and Mortals, Venus and Adonis, David Zwirner: 25 Years, Marlene Dumas: Against the Wall, Marlene Dumas: Sweet Nothings, Marlene Dumas: The Image as Burden, Marlene Dumas: Measuring Your Own Grave, Experiments with Truth: Gandhi and Images of Violence. Dumas often uses reference material of polaroid photographs of her friends and lovers, whilst she also references magazines and pornographic material. She also paints portraits of children and erotic scenes to impact the world of contemporary art. She has said that her works are better appreciated as originals since many of her smaller sexual works are very intimate. With many of her paintings she depicts her friends, models, and prominent political figures. Dumas paintings are seen as portraits but they do not represent people but an emotional state that one could be in. Her art focuses on more serious issues and themes such as sexuality and race, guilt and innocence, violence and tenderness. Dumas style is more older Romanticism tradition. She uses loose brushstrokes to add distortion but also great detail to her art. Dumas likes to use a wet-on-wet technique, that combines thin layers of paint with thick ones. Her media of choice is oil on canvas and ink on paper. Her subjects range from new born babies, models, strippers, and many figures from popular culture. The sale of Dumas's Jule-die Vrou, positioned Dumas as one of three living female artists to trade for over $1 million. Dumas taught at the Academie voor Beeldende Vorming in Tilburg, Academie voor Kunst en Industrie in Enschede, Rijksakademie Van Beeldende Kunsten in Amsterdam, and De Ateliers in Amsterdam.
“Smoke” “Adonis” “Venus With Body of Adonis” “Losing ” Sold $1.5 million "The Blindfolded" "Feather Stola" Sold for $307,663 in 2003. "Velvet and Lace," "Ryman's Brides" "Couples" “The Image as Burden” "Young Boys," Sold for $993,600 in 2005. "Black Drawings" "Baby" "Wet Dreams" "The Teacher" Sold $3.34 million in 2005. "Jule-die Vrou" "Evil is Banal"
Awards
Thérèse Van Duyl-Schwartze Prijs, Netherlands, 1989
Sandbergprijs voor beeldende Kunst, Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunst, 1989
2020Marlene Dumas: 25 years of collaboration, Zeno X Gallery, Antwerp 2018Myths and Mortals. David Zwirner Gallery, New York 2014-2015The Image as Burden. Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam. Exhibition was named after her small 1993 painting depicting one figure carrying another. 2008-2009 First American retrospective exhibition. Measuring Your Own Grave. Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Museum of Modern Art in New York, New York; Menil Collection, Houston 2008 First South African exhibition. Intimate Relations, Standard Bank Gallery, Johannesburg 2003 Venice Biennale. 2001Marlene Dumas: One Hundred Models and Endless Rejects, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston 1997 First Asian exhibition Young Boys - Part II, Gallery Koyanagi, Tokyo 1993 First United States museum exhibition Marlene Dumas, Institute of Contemporary Art, Philadelphia 1992 First North American exhibition Insight, Axe-Néo-7, Hull Québec 1979 First Solo exhibition. Marlene Dumas, Galerie Annemarie de Kruyff, Paris
