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CLAY ELLIS
Recently, I have been assembling large scale tent sculptures in a variety of sites: in an industrial building in Brooklyn, New York; on the slopes of Mt. Sainte-Victoire in Provence; on the roof of a former tobacco factory in Marseille, and more. A field study where the constraints of a gallery are replaced by the volume of a suitcase. Although the portability of these tent sculptures was developed as a means of dealing with some of the more practical concerns, there is something very appealing to me in the way that they can be set up, placed, dismantled, reconfigured, and reassembled. While the ease of assembly and the resulting multiple choice of sites pushes the work closer to an installation than I had intended, the transient quality is somehow played down by the image of the tent itself. It may be that a tent, as a simple form of architecture, defines its immediate surroundings as place, even if the tent is non-functional. And in doing so, it allows for variations within the structure without the sculpture’s looking totally different each time it is put up, or being overwhelmed by its setting. I certainly don’t think that this perception is limited to the image of the tent, but for the moment that image is providing me with a means of exploring new areas.
3 July 2003
Born 1955 in Medicine Hat, Alberta. Lives and works in Edmonton, Alberta, with extended traveling and sculpture-making sessions in the U.S., Great Britain, France, Spain, Asia and Africa. Worked under Luke O. Lindoe at Plainsman Clays, Ltd., Medicine Hat, Alberta. Attended Banff School of Fine Arts and Medicine Hat College. 1983-1994 taught at the University of Alberta.
SELECTED SOLO EXHIBITIONS:
2002 Gallery One, Toronto
Harcourt House, Edmonton, Alberta
2001 Vanderleelie Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta
1994 Black & Greenberg Gallery, New York
1993 The Edmonton Art Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta
1991 Kathleen Laverty Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta
1984 Martin Gerard Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta
1983 The Edmonton Art Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS:
2003 Technicolour: Chris Cran, Geoffrey Hunter, Angela Leach, Chris Rodgers, Arlene Stamp, and Clay Ellis, Ecmonton Art Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta
2002 Five Degrees, 25th Anniversary Exhibition, Art Gallery of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta Selections from the Canada Council Art Bank, Museum of Civilization, Ottawa, Ontario
2000 Materialism: Jonathan Forrest, Terry O’Flanagan, and Clay Ellis, Art Placement Gallery, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan and Canadian tour
1997 Peter Hide and Clay Ellis, Museum of Art, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
1996 The Berman Collection at the Johnson Atelier, Hamilton, New Jersey
1995 Grounds for Sculpture, Hamilton, New Jersey Triangle France, Hôtel du Départment, Marseille, France
1994 Obscure Object (2 person exhibition), Littlejohn/Sternau Gallery, New York On Site, Phillip and Muriel Berman Museum, Ursinus College, Collegeville, Pennsylvania Lead and Follow: The Continuity of Abstraction/The Robert Loder Collection, Bede Gallery, Jarrow, Northumberland and Atlantis Gallery, London
1993 City of Poughkeepsie Sculpture Park, Poughkeepsie, New York
1990 Sculpture by Invitation, Edmonton Art Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta (also 1989, 88, 87, 86)
1987 Collaboration in Clay, Alberta College of Art, Calgary, Alberta
1986 Hardingham Sculpture Workshop, Sainsbury Centre, Norwich, England
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS:
Alberta Art Foundation Alberta House, New York
Phillip and Muriel Berman Museum, Ursinus College, Collegeville, Pennsylvania
Canada Council Art Bank
City of Medicine Hat, Alberta City of Red Deer, Alberta
Edmonton Art Gallery, Edmonton, Alberta
Lehigh Valley Hospital Collection, Allentown, Pennsylvania
The Robert Loder Collection
Mendel Art Gallery, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
Museum of Contemporary Art, Barcelona, Spain
National Gallery of Botswana
Sant Pere de Villamajor, Spain
University of Lethbridge, Lethbridge, Alberta
Westburne Collection, Montréal, Québec
PUBLIC COMMISSIONS:
City of Vancouver, B.C., 2002
WORKSHOPS AND SYMPOSIA:
1980 Red Deer Sculpture Symposium Emma Lake Artists Workshop, Emma Lake, Saskatchewan
1981 Emma Lake Artists Workshop, Emma Lake, Saskatchewan
1982 Triangle Artists' Workshop, Pine Plains, New York
1985 Director: Medicine Hat Sculpture Symposium, Medicine Hat, Alberta
1986 Hardingham Invitational Sculpture Workshop, Norwich, England Collaboration in Clay Workshop, Edmonton, Alberta
1987 Art Triangle Barcelona, (invitational workshop), Barcelona, Spain
1988 Sant Pere Workshop, Sant Pere de Villamajor, Spain
1989 Sant Pere Workshop, Sant Pere de Villamajor, Spain
1990 Triangle Artists' Workshop, Pine Plains, New York
1991 Workshop Leader: Thapong International Artists Workshop, Gaborone, Botswana
1992 Mashomack Workshop, Pine Plains, New York
1993 Allentown Sculpture Workshop, Allentown, New York
1995 Triangle France, Marseille, France (President and Participant)
2000 Emma Lake Invitational Artists Workshop, Emma Lake, Saskatchewan
2002 Invited Artist: Triangle Artists’ Workshop, Brooklyn, New York
2003 Guest Artist: Emma Lake Artists Workshop, Emma Lake, Saskatchewan
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY:
Karen Wilkin, "Reformalism: Clay Ellis’s Recent Sculpture," Border Crossings, Spring 2002.
Karen Wilkin, "An Inadvertent Vanguard," The Hudson Review, Spring 2002.
Sky Glabush, "A Review of 'Materialism'", New West, July 2000
Karen Wilkin, "At the Galleries," Partisan Review, Spring 1995
Jeanne C. Wilkinson, (review) The New York Review of Art, January-February 1995
Robert Taplin, "Clay Ellis at Black & Greenberg," Art in America, April 1995
George Melrod, "Reviews - New York," Sculpture Magazine, March 1995
Mary Shaffer, "Maquette," Sculpture Magazine, February 1994
Pauline Pinard Bogaert, "Ursinus Sculpture Show," Philadelphia Inquirer, June 26, 1994
Pherlayn Dove, "The Transformation of Discarded Ruins," Philadelphia Inquirer, June 13, 1994
Lelde Muehlenbachs, "The Place of Sculpture," Border Crossings, June 1993
Esperanza Rabal, "Art Triangle Barcelona," La Vanguardia, (Barcelona) July 2, 1987
Susa Dasca, "Art Triangle Barcelona," Diari 16, (Madrid) May 20, 1987
Anna Guasch, "Art Triangle Barcelona," Diari de Barcelons, (Barcelona) May 31, 1987
Terry Fenton and Russell Bingham, "Sculpture City," Update, (Edmonton) September 1985
Tom Phillips, "Albertans," Alberta Report, February 25, 1985
Russell Bingham, "Clay Ellis: New Sculptures," Update, (Edmonton) January 1983
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