Introducing Andrew Sullivan

If you have been following us on Instagram or Facebook you may have already seen glimpses of Andrew Sullivan’s spectacular dinosaur paintings, which we are now producing as giclee prints. If you are an enthusiast of contemporary painting, one of them should look especially familiar because it was the winner of the Sulman prize for genre painting in 2014: T-rex (tyrant lizard king) is a hard painting to forget. The Sir John Sulman Prize is one of Australia’s most prestigious awards, and is shown at the AGNSW alongside the Wynne and Archibald prizes

Andrew’s T-rex is funny and maudlin; terrifying with it’s mighty array of teeth, but also jewel-like in its luscious, richly detailed and coloured surface. I can’t help but pity this monstrous fictional T-rex, who’s severed head lies surrounded by the litter of an artist’s studio, it’s mouth propped open with an ordinary chunk of wood and its teeth threatening a butterfly that has chanced to fly between them.

This work is one of a series Andrew is still painting, which features ancient or extinct species depicted as if by some Victorian naturalist who has collected fresh specimens in the field. They look like scientific studies or museum displays. These are funny, joyous and beautiful paintings, filled with complex allegories about science, the role of art and wonder, the passage of time and the leaps of imagination that underlie our familiar scientific truths.

Andrew has a long and impressive CV  including many solo-shows at Australian Galleries, Flinders Street Gallery and others. Personally I think the work speaks for itself. We already have eighteen prints from his witty Mimes of the King’s Court series, and we are excited to say that in less than a week we should have four new and very spectacular prints, including the T-rex, Raptor and a Coelacanth.