DAN GUNN

Growing up in the Midwest, Dan Gunn often found the region reflecting upon its past in everyday objects, familiar but often defunct things shaped by place, labor, and memory. In his work, he explores how these representations of regional identity become both a psychological foundation and a mythological mirror. Gunn’s objects reflect the complex ways myth, memory, and longing shape how we understand the past, and how it continues to echo in the present. In this new series of works, Gunn engages the layered meanings of “interior,” the Midwestern heartland, the nation’s collective psyche, and the decorative domestic space. He intertwines these registers into an exploration of identity, memory, and cultural inheritance.

Gunn’s intricately carved wooden “tapestries” are enigmatic compositions that invite viewers to look beyond the surface. His work stages a tension between image and structure, using carved and sewn plywood to mimic the appearance of drapery while asserting its rigid, constructed form. Many works incorporate objects drawn from the Index of American Design. Established during the Great Depression, this federal initiative aimed to document and preserve a distinctly American visual heritage in order to construct a “usable past.” The original watercolors depicting folk and decorative arts from the colonial period through 1900 serve as both source material and conceptual framework for the artist, translating archival imagery into constructed surfaces that emphasize both the persistence and instability of American identities.

DAN GUNN received an MFA in Painting from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Recent solo exhibitions include KMAC Contemporary Art Museum (Louisville, KY), Monique Meloche Gallery (Chicago, IL), The University Club of Chicago (Chicago, IL), and Good Weather Gallery (North Little Rock, AR).

Gunn has participated in group exhibitions at Aldrich Contemporary Art Museum (Ridgefield, CT), Contemporary Arts Center (Cincinnati, OH), Kemper Museum of Contemporary Art (Kansas City, MO), Elmhurst Art Museum (Elmhurst, IL), the University of Missouri–Kansas City (Kansas City, MO), Elephant Gallery (Nashville, TN), University of Toledo (Toledo, OH), Western Exhibitions (Chicago, IL), Marine Contemporary (Santa Monica, CA), Art Los Angeles Contemporary (Los Angeles, CA), Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago (MCA) (Chicago, IL), Hyde Park Art Center (Chicago, IL), Lloyd Dobler Gallery (Chicago, IL), Loyola University Museum of Art (Chicago, IL), and the Lubeznik Center for the Arts (Michigan City, IN).He has been awarded residencies at the Wassaic Project (2021), University of Arkansas (2019), Anderson Ranch Arts Center (2018), Vermont Studio Center (2015), and Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture (2012).

Gunn’s work has been reviewed in Frieze, Art in America, Artforum, Two Coats of Paint, Newcity Magazine, Artslant, New American Paintings, Observer, Space On Space, TimeOut Chicago, and the Chicago Tribune.

His work is held in the collections of the Mayo Clinic (Minneapolis, MN), KMAC Contemporary (Louisville, KY), TD Bank (New York, NY), DePaul University School of Music (Chicago, IL), Fidelity Investments (Chicago, IL), Joyce Foundation (Chicago, IL), and the Marciano Art Foundation (Los Angeles, CA), among others. 

Image Credits: KMAC Contemporary Art Museum and Diane Deaton Street.