Lucy Dodd

 

Lucy Dodd (*1981) has created a painterly universe that can be understood as a radical reinterpretation of lyrical abstraction and action painting. Her works—biomorphic topographies of random and intentional marks—resemble painted evocations of cosmological and spiritual landscapes. They are characterized by an emphatically process-oriented approach to painting and the use of unusual color pigments, which often derive from nature and Dodd’s personal environment. Exhibitions by the artist, who lives in Woodstock, New York, often incorporate elements of ritual and theater.

 

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For Dodd, the material in her paintings is of vital importance. Fermented walnut shells produce an entire range of brown tones; extracts from the fruit of yew trees bring shades of pink to the canvases. Green is created from pigments that the artist extracts from nettles and the leaves of other plants. Traces of black lichens can be found in her paintings. She uses mate tea extracts, kombucha, dog urine and sumac pigments, paints with minerals such as hematite or with soil samples she collects in various places around the world. She rubs the materials in powder form onto large-format canvases on her studio floor, sprays and smears them as liquid paint or places them on the canvas in their natural state until specific color reactions ensue.

Dodd’s works convey a profound freedom, confidently balancing painterly control and the relinquishing of that control. Circular contours left by kombucha cultures merge with arborescent color structures created in the chemical interplay of certain coloring agents with the canvas. These elements are embedded in moving, organic whirls of color attained through the application, smudging, subtraction and re-addition of pigment extracts. The result are biomorphic color fantasies and atmospheric compositions made of mineral patterns, spots, smears and traces recalling fossils, corals, sky constellations or rock formations. Dodd’s works advance the pictorial repertoire of abstraction in unexpected ways. Possessed of an ethereal, fearless beauty, they are the product of an aesthetic vision that expands the legacy of high modernism to include archaic and cultic aspects.

Dodd’s exhibitions also usually include sculptural objects such as self-made armchairs and other seating. These elements play a key role in the performative dimension of the artist’s practice. Viewers are often encouraged to sit down on furniture she has designed and consume beverages she has prepared, the ingredients of which are sometimes also found in her paintings. Many of her works emit an intense smell. Her exhibitions are multisensory and often include music, and their potency is heightened by theatrical-performative interventions that go far beyond the traditional bounds of painting. Dodd explores the exhibition space as a ritualized place where her works not only take on the status of totemistic objects, they also assume a role as protagonists in a quasi-cultic drama. They are objects that address both the idea of abstraction as a spiritual language and that of the painterly as personal, symbolic theater—objects that emanate a new belief in the transformative power of painting.

 

Works
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart, 2021

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart
Black walnut, SCOBY, lapis, cochineal, black lichen, tulip petal extract, Foss leaf extract, onion skin, malachite, vivianite, azurite and acrylic on canvas
241.9 × 457.8 cm
95 1/4 × 180 1/4 inches

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Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
This Is My Wish, 2021

Lucy Dodd
This Is My Wish
SCOBY, cochineal and pigment on canvas
57.2 × 106.7 cm
22 1/2 × 42 inches

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Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
Knocking Down the Narcissism, 2021

Lucy Dodd
Knocking Down the Narcissism
Squid ink, SCOBY and cochineal on canvas
56.5 × 71.1 cm
22 1/4 × 28 inches

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Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
Holy Basil(ica), 2019

Lucy Dodd
Holy Basil(ica), 2019
Holy Basil, yew berry, squid ink, hematite, avocado, black lichen, spirulina, cinnabar, malachite, green tea, black tea, tulip, epidote, green quartz, walnut, and acrylic on canvas; pigmented cotton on seven chair frames
459.7 × 640.1 × 472.4 cm
181 × 252 × 186 inches

Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
Holy Basil(ica), 2019

Lucy Dodd
Holy Basil(ica), 2019
Holy Basil, yew berry, squid ink, hematite, avocado, black lichen, spirulina, cinnabar, malachite, green tea, black tea, tulip, epidote, green quartz, walnut, and acrylic on canvas; pigmented cotton on seven chair frames
459.7 × 640.1 × 472.4 cm
181 × 252 × 186 inches

Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
Miss Mars, 2018

Lucy Dodd
Miss Mars, 2018
Squid ink, hematite, onion skins, liquid smoke, avocado, SCOBY, Kremer’s English Red, iron oxide, dragon's blood, cochineal, azurite, cinnabar, phosphorescents, and acrylic on canvas
309.9 × 462.3 cm
122 × 182 inches

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Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
The Son, 2018

Lucy Dodd
The Son, 2018
Onion skins, urine, pyramid yellow and cadmium on canvas
330.2 × 330.2 cm
130 × 130 inches

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Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
Flight of the Windhorse, 2018

Lucy Dodd
Flight of the Windhorse, 2018
Wild walnut, squid ink, black lichen, SCOBY, dry pigments, and acrylic on canvas
Clockwise from left:
105.4 × 115.6 × 55.9 × 76.8 cm
Clockwise from left:
41 1/2 × 45 1/2 × 22 × 30 1/4 inches

Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
Dragon Tales, 2018

Lucy Dodd
Dragon Tales, 2018
Wild walnut, cochineal, dye on cotton rope and wrought iron frame
approx. 228.6 × 76.2 × 101.6 cm
approx. 90 × 30 × 40 inches

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Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
Butterfly, 2017

Lucy Dodd
Butterfly, 2017
Tetley’s, wild walnut, fermented amaranth leaves, squid ink, Foss leaf extract, Rio Tinto water, snow and ash, hematite, spirulina, Guernica earth, sumac, yerba mate, green tea, pomegranate, black lichen, cochineal, chai, tigers eye, Polar Seltzer, annato, SCOBY, and pigment on canvas
365.8 × 365.8 cm
144 × 144 inches

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Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd
The Peaks of Mount Pubis, 2017

Lucy Dodd
The Peaks of Mount Pubis, 2017
Cochineal, charcoal, hematite and pigment on canvas
152.4 × 152.4 cm
60 × 60 inches
154 × 154 cm (framed)
60 5/8 × 60 5/8 inches (framed)

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Details
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart
Black walnut, SCOBY, lapis, cochineal, black lichen, tulip petal extract, Foss leaf extract, onion skin, malachite, vivianite, azurite and acrylic on canvas
241.9 × 457.8 cm
95 1/4 × 180 1/4 inches

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart (detail)

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart (detail)

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart (detail)

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart (detail)

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart (detail)

Lucy Dodd
Birth of a Living Heart, 2021
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
This Is My Wish
SCOBY, cochineal and pigment on canvas
57.2 × 106.7 cm
22 1/2 × 42 inches

Lucy Dodd
This Is My Wish, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
This Is My Wish

Lucy Dodd
This Is My Wish, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
This Is My Wish (detail)

Lucy Dodd
This Is My Wish, 2021
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Knocking Down the Narcissism
Squid ink, SCOBY and cochineal on canvas
56.5 × 71.1 cm
22 1/4 × 28 inches

Lucy Dodd
Knocking Down the Narcissism, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Knocking Down the Narcissism

Lucy Dodd
Knocking Down the Narcissism, 2021
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Knocking Down the Narcissism

Lucy Dodd
Knocking Down the Narcissism, 2021
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Holy Basil(ica), 2019
Holy Basil, yew berry, squid ink, hematite, avocado, black lichen, spirulina, cinnabar, malachite, green tea, black tea, tulip, epidote, green quartz, walnut, and acrylic on canvas; pigmented cotton on seven chair frames
459.7 × 640.1 × 472.4 cm
181 × 252 × 186 inches

Lucy Dodd
Holy Basil(ica), 2019
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Holy Basil(ica), 2019
Holy Basil, yew berry, squid ink, hematite, avocado, black lichen, spirulina, cinnabar, malachite, green tea, black tea, tulip, epidote, green quartz, walnut, and acrylic on canvas; pigmented cotton on seven chair frames
459.7 × 640.1 × 472.4 cm
181 × 252 × 186 inches

Lucy Dodd
Holy Basil(ica), 2019
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Miss Mars, 2018
Squid ink, hematite, onion skins, liquid smoke, avocado, SCOBY, Kremer’s English Red, iron oxide, dragon's blood, cochineal, azurite, cinnabar, phosphorescents, and acrylic on canvas
309.9 × 462.3 cm
122 × 182 inches

Lucy Dodd
Miss Mars, 2018
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Miss Mars, 2018

Lucy Dodd
Miss Mars, 2018
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Miss Mars, 2018 (detail)

Lucy Dodd
Miss Mars, 2018
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
The Son, 2018
Onion skins, urine, pyramid yellow and cadmium on canvas
330.2 × 330.2 cm
130 × 130 inches

Lucy Dodd
The Son, 2018
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
The Son, 2018 (detail)

Lucy Dodd
The Son, 2018
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
The Son, 2018 (detail)

Lucy Dodd
The Son, 2018
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Flight of the Windhorse, 2018
Wild walnut, squid ink, black lichen, SCOBY, dry pigments, and acrylic on canvas
Clockwise from left:
105.4 × 115.6 × 55.9 × 76.8 cm
Clockwise from left:
41 1/2 × 45 1/2 × 22 × 30 1/4 inches

Lucy Dodd
Flight of the Windhorse, 2018
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Dragon Tales, 2018
Wild walnut, cochineal, dye on cotton rope and wrought iron frame
approx. 228.6 × 76.2 × 101.6 cm
approx. 90 × 30 × 40 inches

Lucy Dodd
Dragon Tales, 2018
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Dragon Tales, 2018

Lucy Dodd
Dragon Tales, 2018
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Dragon Tales, 2018

Lucy Dodd
Dragon Tales, 2018
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Butterfly, 2017
Tetley’s, wild walnut, fermented amaranth leaves, squid ink, Foss leaf extract, Rio Tinto water, snow and ash, hematite, spirulina, Guernica earth, sumac, yerba mate, green tea, pomegranate, black lichen, cochineal, chai, tigers eye, Polar Seltzer, annato, SCOBY, and pigment on canvas
365.8 × 365.8 cm
144 × 144 inches

Lucy Dodd
Butterfly, 2017
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Butterfly, 2017 (detail)

Lucy Dodd
Butterfly, 2017
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Butterfly, 2017 (detail)

Lucy Dodd
Butterfly, 2017
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
The Peaks of Mount Pubis, 2017
Cochineal, charcoal, hematite and pigment on canvas
152.4 × 152.4 cm
60 × 60 inches
154 × 154 cm (framed)
60 5/8 × 60 5/8 inches (framed)

Lucy Dodd
The Peaks of Mount Pubis, 2017
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
The Peaks of Mount Pubis, 2017 (detail)

Lucy Dodd
The Peaks of Mount Pubis, 2017
Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
The Peaks of Mount Pubis, 2017 (detail)

Lucy Dodd
The Peaks of Mount Pubis, 2017
Details
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Exhibitions at Sprüth Magers
Lucy Dodd

Mondi Possibili
Henni Alftan, John Baldessari, Cao Fei, Thomas Demand, Thea Djordjadze, Lucy Dodd, Robert Elfgen, Peter Fischli  David Weiss, Sylvie Fleury, Jenny Holzer, Donald Judd, Karen Kilimnik, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, David Ostrowski, Michail Pirgelis, Sterling Ruby, Thomas Scheibitz, Andreas Schulze, Hyun-Sook Song, Robert Therrien, Rosemarie Trockel, Kaari Upson, Andrea Zittel
August 31–September 14, 2023
Seoul

Mondi Possibili highlights the interplay between art and design and explores the many ways in which experimentation with material, technique and scale can reveal the hidden narratives, quiet drama and humor in the everyday items that furnish our lives as well as our imaginations. Connected through a paradigm of the possible, all artworks on show examine familiar objects – citing, celebrating, adapting or appropriating them – offering surprising, playful or unsettling approaches that open up a range of “possible worlds.” This will be the fourth edition of Sprüth Magers’ Mondi Possibili – first titled by Pasquale Leccese – showcasing significant themes in the selected artists’ works as well as the gallery’s longstanding heritage. Its three previous iterations were presented in 1989, 2006 and 2007 in Cologne, where the gallery’s history is firmly rooted, and art and design have intersected for many decades.

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Sprüth Magers x Artadia

A Benefit Exhibition to Support the Next Generation of Artists
Thea Djordjadze, Lucy Dodd, Karen Kilimnik, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, Pamela Rosenkranz, Analia Saban, Rosemarie Trockel
April 4–April 22, 2023
New York

Bringing together a group of outstanding female artists in an innovative and collaborative effort to support the next generation, Sprüth Magers is pleased to announce a benefit exhibition to raise funds for the non-profit organization Artadia. Through grantmaking, community-building and advocacy, Artadia strengthens the invaluable role visual artists play in our society.

The exhibition comprises influential contemporary voices across multiple generations, reflecting both the discourse on art, gender and power that is firmly embedded in Sprüth Magers’ history and its enduring support of pioneering female figures. Featured will be works by artists who are all part of the gallery’s dynamic roster, including Thea Djordjadze, Lucy Dodd, Karen Kilimnik, Barbara Kruger, Louise Lawler, Pamela Rosenkranz, Analia Saban and Rosemarie Trockel. All funds raised will go towards the impactful Artadia Awards program.

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Lucy Dodd
Lucy Dodd

Lucy Dodd
Heart Overture
February 2–March 12, 2022
Los Angeles

Sprüth Magers is thrilled to announce Heart Overture, an exhibition of new paintings by Lucy Dodd, the artist's first presentation at the Los Angeles gallery. This body of work marks a culmination of a seven-year cycle of paintings, as well as announces a new collaborative method of picture-making that has pushed her canvases into new aesthetic territories. Produced with myriad natural materials, Dodd's new paintings teem with life and movement, relaying moments of spontaneous fun, chaotic action and alchemical energy.

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Dreaming Mirrors Dreaming Screens
Theodora Allen, Slater Bradley, Lucy Dodd, Lizzie Fitch / Ryan Trecartin, Andy Hope 1930, Oliver Laric, Pew Die Pie, Jon Rafman, Pamela Rosenkranz, Sara VanDerBeek, Stan VanDerBeek, Lesley Vance, Andro Wekua
curated by Johannes Fricke Waldthausen / GOODROOM
January 29–April 2, 2016
Berlin

Bringing together the practice of thirteen international artists, the exhibition Dreaming Mirrors Dreaming Screens appeals to the intuitive mind and creativity beyond referential thinking. Departing from the artists' production, it navigates through narratives in the realm of surrealist animation, abstraction and subjects of new materialism embracing the logic of the internet.

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Lucy Dodd
Press

Lucy Dodd: Sprüth Magers
Artforum International, article by Sherman Sam, February 2019

The Stars Align for Artist Lucy Dodd
Cultured, online, Kat Herriman, March 2018

Lucy Dodd
Bomb, interview by Rashid Johnson, January 9, 2018

Biography

Lucy Dodd (*1981, New York) lives and works in Kingston, NY. She completed studies at Art Center College of Design, CA (2004), and Bard College, New York (2011). Selected solo shows include Whitney Museum of American Art, New York (2016); Power Station, Dallas (2016); Rubell Family Collection, Miami (2014) and Pro Choice, Vienna (2010). Recent group shows and performances include those at Sprüth Magers, Berlin (2016); Armada, Milan (2015); The Kitchen, New York (2015) with Sergei Tcherepnin; Church of Saint Luke and Saint Matthew, New York (2012).

Education
2004 BFA Art Center College of Design, Pasadena, CA
2011 MFA Bard College, New York
Performances (selected)
2004 Homeopathic Nurse, 40 Deuce, Los Angeles
Raymond Incident, Art Center Graduate Studios, Pasadena, CA
SnowFlake Band with Yutaka Sone, Centre Pompidou, Paris
SnowFlake Band with Yutaka Sone, Bowie Van Vallen, Amsterdam
SnowFlake Band with Yutaka Sone, Bar America, Guadalajara
SnowFlake Band with Yutaka Sone, Pink Pony, New York
SnowFlake Band with Yutaka Sone, Spaceland, Los Angeles
2005 Macrame Cabaret with Jason Rhoades, Mapa Teatro, Bogota
100 Coconuts No Machete, Transcontinental Nomadenoases, Art Basel Miami Beach, Miami
Island Plastic, Placencia
Sheep Fat Dancing, Maxims, Paris
Sheep plug White Ape Installation with Jason Rhoades and Silverbridge Dionysiac, Centre Pompidou, Paris
Indiana O’Keefe, The Palms, Wonder Valley, CA
2006 Cake Ninja, Marvimon, Los Angeles
Chowchilla Pow Wow, and Transcontinental Nomadenoases, MACO, Mexico City
2007 TightLoose, Mandrake, Los Angeles
Pole to Bar and Back Again, Condesa Hotel, MACO, Mexico City
2008 Fire Place Ping Pong, Christine Nichols, Venice
Chocolate Lady, Silver Platter, Los Angeles
Tortoise Shell with Sylvere Lotringer, Tiny Creatures, Los Angeles
BirdaParadise, The Bounty, Los Angeles
Mallet Squash, Kreiiling &, Los Angeles
2009 The Ripples and the Tides, Mildreds Lane, PA
2010 Ron Don Nine And Three Quarters Long, Human Resources, Los Angeles
2011 Fluxus Concert, Performa 11 with Sergei Tcherepnin, New York
2012 Tropical Year Zero, Church of Saint Luke and Saint Matthew, New York
2015 Maize Mantis, with Sergei Tcherepnin, The Kitchen, New York
Public Collections
Aïshti Foundation, Beirut
Rubell Museum, Miami
Rachofsky Collection, The Warehouse, Dallas, TX
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York
Sammlung Goetz, Munich
UBS Art Collection, Zurich
Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York