Rory Dean: If I Can Just Survive One More Night On Pervert's Row.

Comrade Rory Dean has a new show coming up. "If I Can Just Survive One More Night On Pervert's Row" will be opening in Vancouver at the east Hastings' gallery TOPDOWN BOTTOMUP on May 25. If you're around, be sure to check it out.

 I wrote a little blurb for it.

On The Recent Work of Rory Dean

“At present, there is no means of making something pass as ugly or repulsive.
Even shit is pretty.”
- Michel Leiris

Rory Dean can be rather unpredictable. As soon as I think I know what he's doing he starts doing things that knock the crap out of me. That could be because there's something essentially irrational about his work. Not that it's inconsistent: there's a great deal of continuity between one distinct set of works and another. The unpredictability comes from what he suddenly decides to attack and how. His work isn't critical - it's adversarial, often taking some concrete aspect of the art world as its object of spite and scorn. This attack isn't always direct and it tends to involve a shift in style. While his earlier paintings took a swipe at the obsession with crass textures and colour that have been selling so well lately, his recent works push along to some of the other trends currently underway.

Pop Up Shows this May: Satok & Dean

There are two pop-up shows opening this month that I would like to encourage anyone and everyone to check out if they happen to have the opportunity, although they have nothing in common.


In Toronto, Lauren Satok's "All The Places We Have Been" will be running from May 12-14 at the Baitshop Gallery located at 358 Dufferin St, Unit 117, which can be entered through the Milky Way. I met with her last month to see some of the pieces and wrote a brief essay to be displayed at the show which also promises hard booze, some kind of country-punk music, video projections and improvised storytelling.


For those in Montreal, Mr. Rory Dean has a solo show at Ctrllab baring the eloquent title, "Fuck It, Fuck Art & Fuck You" running from May 18-21. It seems to be a rather new road for Dean this time out, but hopefully it will get some love since they do still have some genuine appreciation for aggressive painting in Quebec. Here's an interview I did with him a few months ago.

And I promise to update this site more often, but being basically homeless for awhile made it hard.

An Interview With Rory Dean.

When I was recently in Montreal, I managed to meet up with Mr. Rory Dean. He used to play basketball and drink beer with my little brother, the world's most infamous bagpipe player. That's not why I met up with him though. No one is that sentimental. Actually, it's because I've seen his work around and find it curious. Although it shares certain traits with some of the trends to be found in his generation of Canadian painters, it lacks the sentimentality that seems to afflict so many. That doesn't mean that his work isn't personal, it just doesn't stop there. It has other things to do.