A layered grid of intersecting lengths of bent aluminum is painted in an eye-popping primary yellow by Shayne Dark. The artist dances with form and light in this sculpture, with cast shadows creating a non-material extension of the work.
Poised between abstraction and representation, Dark's artworks are often coated in saturated pigments. His networks of steel or wood branches or steel stones, indoor and outdoor iterations, are a contemplative intersection of the industrial and the organic. In 2016, Dark exhibited at the Brooklyn Sculpture Center, where he was artist in residence. The same year, he was given a solo exhibition at the Albright Knox, NY. Dark has received six Ontario Arts Council grants and a Pollock-Krasner Foundation grant. His work may be found in numerous private, corporate and public collections including Queen’s University, the Canadian Embassy in Prague, the City of Ottawa, the Federal Communications Commission, New York.
Since he began his artistic career in the mid 1980’s, Dark has participated in exhibitions throughout Ontario and Quebec, and in the United States, notably at the Albright-Knox Gallery in Buffalo, New York and the Canadian Embassy in Washington, DC. He has also exhibited in Spain and Greece. He has won numerous grants and awards, and has completed a number of major public commissions. A documentary on Dark’s life and work, entitled “Artist in the Round: Shayne Dark”, premiered on the Discovery Channel HD Theatre on April 25, 2004 across the United States.