Denyse tomasos biography of michael w

Visit readfoyer. Denyse Thomasos. Metropolis , Acrylic, charcoal, porous-point marker on canvas, unframed: x Art Gallery of Ontario. Born in Trinidad and raised in Toronto, artist Denyse Thomasos left an indelible mark on contemporary painting. When most painters of her generation were forsaking abstract language, she embraced it.

Through pattern, scale and repetition, she conveys the vastness of events — such as the Transatlantic slave trade — without exploiting the images of those who were most affected. As one of the finest painters to emerge in the s, Thomasos had a singular style that employed abstraction as a means to explore contemporary issues of race, the architecture of confinement and our multivalent relationships to space and place and the environment.

Spanning four decades of artmaking, the retrospective features more than 70 paintings and works on paper from several series — including Excavations , Dwellings and Dismantle — alongside archival photographs, sketches, interviews and documentary footage of Thomasos at work. This exhibition highlights not only numerous AGO acquisitions, but research gleaned from an academic symposium organized by the AGO in that helped reignite interest in her work and propel her to the Whitney Biennial.

Denyse thomasos prints

Arc , Acrylic on canvas, overall: Purchase, with funds from the Women's Art Initiative, When Thomasos died tragically in , she was at the height of her career, with major museum shows, a full professorship, New York and Toronto gallery representation, and many prestigious awards and residencies. We look forward to celebrating and furthering her legacy.

The exhibition opens with a large-scale photograph of the artist at work.