Sean Scully at Abu Dhabi Art, 2011

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Kerlin Gallery has announced a solo exhibition by Sean Scully at Abu Dhabi Art, 2011. 

Sean Scully is widely regarded as one of the most important abstract painters of his generation.  The development of Scully’s signature style of abstraction, ‘horizontal and verical stripes’ can be traced back to his first visit to Morocco in 1969 and the impact and importance of this visit is documented in the monograph Sean Scully, by Maurice Poirier, Hudson Hills Press, New York, 1990 and in the 1992 BBC documentary ‘Artist’s Journey: Sean Scully on Henri Matisse’.

Since then Scully has revisited North Africa many times and  evidence of the direct and fundamental infuence that Arab and Islamic culture has had on Scully’s painting practice can also be found in the  title of such paintings  as Morocco, 1969, Araby, 1981, Fes 1981, Mata-Mata, 1991, Taza, 1992 and Tetuan, 1991-3. The most recent of these is the majestic  double triptych Tin Mal, 2010 that will be premiered at Abu Dhabi Art 2011 

Tin Mal           


‘Tin Mal (2010) is the second triptych I have painted as a series of major works, dedicated to important spiritual sites. The first was Iona (2004-6), which is now in the Philadelphia Museum. This will be a continuing project.

‘Tin Mal is a very important site on the Atlas Mountains in Morocco. I visited the village twice in 1996 when I stayed in the mountains. I took many photographs of the mosque, which was under restoration, and so open to the public. The site, the mosque and the village, plus its location had a significant effect on me. I wanted to remember it with a major rhythmical work. Which is also accompanied by a triptych of pastels, Tin Mal (2011), which remind me of the dry sand surfaces of the architecture, and it’s silence.’

Sean Scully
 24 December 2010

Scully’s major solo exhibitions, include, most notably the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, D.C.; the Phillips Collection, Washington, D.C.; the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth; Whitechapel Art Gallery, London; MACRO, Rome; Galerie nationale de Jeu de Paume, Paris; and Fundació Joan Miró, Barcelona, among many others.

His paintings, works on paper, and photography can be found in more than 80 public collections worldwide, including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, New York; the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; the Irish Museum of Modern Art, Dublin; the Tate, London; Lenbachhaus, Munich; IVAM, Valencià; and the National Gallery of Australia, Canberra. The Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth has a permanent installation of paintings by Scully and in 2006 the Hugh Lane Gallery in Dublin opened a dedicated room of the artist’s works.

Sean Scully’s  upcoming solo exhibitions in 2012-13 include amongst others, Kunstmuseum Bern, the Benaki Museum of Art, Athens, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Alhambra, Granada, Museu Picasso, Barcelona  and the Pinacoteca, Sao Paulo.

This exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated publication.